Cristen Rodgers's Blog, page 5

Broken Petals

When a flower loses a petal, it continues to bloom. It doesn’t close in upon itself in fear of losing another. And it doesn’t reach out to take one from its neighbor.

When a tree is bent by the wind, it digs down even deeper. A tree continues to grow, and through that struggle it becomes stronger. It doesn’t try to pull the rest of the forest down with it.

When a tomato falls from the vine, it lets go of its form and welcomes the next chapter. And in return it is born again as something new. It doesn’t exhaust itself trying to get reattached.

Life will bring pain and loss and sometimes doubt. But when it does, I too will continue to bloom.

I won’t pass that pain on like a baton to the next person. I’ll accept it, and learn from it, and transform myself, and the pain, into something beautiful and new.

©️ Cristen Writes

I wonder

I wonder if he knows how often his name still crosses my lips, or how everyone I’ve loved remembers his name and envies whatever magic he must possess. Whatever magic makes the simple memory of him revive something deeper than even the most experienced of divers can’t seem to find.

I wonder if he realizes the mark he left or the power of that love, so deep and so unique that even I dare not dabble in it for long.

I wonder if he knows the meaning that every memory holds, or the way that they merge with memories deeper still, as if viewing the shore from under water – each layer unique and yet also blended in this intangible kaleidoscope of color and form too beautiful for a human throat to define.

I wonder if he knows its timelessness. I wonder if he knows that the ocean has no beginning or end, and that the sun and moon never really sleep. They turn and they roll and change, but they never really go away. Not really. I wonder if he knows.

©️ Cristen Writes

A Pretty Story

This isn’t a pretty story, even if all you see are the fragrant blooms in the revealed chapter.

What you don’t see, what happens in the quiet when not another soul is around, is bitter and painful.

You don’t see the blood dripping from my hands as I dig against gravel and aged earth to uncover what’s still fertile beneath. You aren’t there when the thorns tear into flesh and the rocks bruise my dirty knees while I toil away, rinsed only occasionally by tears and sweat.

You don’t know how many times I fall and force myself to get back up again; or how some days can feel like a storm at sea, constantly pushing and pulling while I learn second by second how to breathe water and speak with the wind if only to stay alive.

No, what you see are the bright green sprouts that forced their way through that madness. You smell the fragrance of roses and you think, what a lovely story.

But it’s not a pretty story. It’s a real story. Just like yours, just like all of ours. It’s beautiful and terrible and loving and terrifying. It’s a story of hope and resilience, but before that must always be some sort of defeat and yearning.

If you find this pretty, then it is only because it’s real.

©️ Cristen Writes

Hold the Line

Hold the line.

When the world feels like a sea of quicksand, grabbing at your ankles and trying to pull you down. Be still and wait. Wait for the hope that’s already rising inside.

Hold the line.

When it seems like everyone is giving in and giving up. Remember the truth, that even these mountains can move.

Hold the line.

When it looks like everywhere there’s division, derision, and heartless decisions. Open your heart, be patient and feel the connection running through it all. Even now, even in this.

Hold the line.

Hold the line.

Hold the line.

For every fall there’s a rise.

For every wound there’s a salve.

For every end, a beginning.

For every division, a coming together.

For every fear, an everlasting love.

Hold the line.

Hold the line.

Hold the line.

©️ Cristen Writes

Over and Over Again

So many times over the years I was caught in wonder. I watched in amazement, as I witnessed the simple magic that some people seemed to carry without effort or even awareness.

For years, I progressed through various stages of emotional response – first jealousy and fear, then admiration, yearning, seeking.

These people inspired me. At every phase and stage, whether by pushing me or pulling me, I couldn’t help but be moved by the knowledge that this type of person even existed.

That type of person.

The kind of person who somehow finds the silver lining even in the midst of a hurricane.

The kind of person who seems unbothered by the shadows in others, even when cast their way.

The kind of person who walked, and talked, and spoke with a lightness. As if the world could not force its gravity upon them.

And so I set out on my own journey, not because of them, but perhaps in part thanks to them. For showing me that there ‘must be’ a way.

Years have passed since the last time I looked to another person’s journey to find my own way, but now looking back I imagine that if I’d asked them back then, ‘how do you do it’, I think I might know what they’d say.

I think they’d say over and over and over again.

It takes being courageous enough to look. Looking in the mirror. At the past, at the roots, and cycles, and trends. Looking at relationships, your fears and dreams. Looking at the beauty and the darkness within and around. Looking at your enemies and your friends.

Looking even when you thought you saw it all. Looking even when you’d rather not. Looking when it hurts. And looking when the beauty of it almost shines too bright.

It takes looking. Over and over and over again.

I think they’d say it takes forgiving. Forgiving yourself. For all of the shadows only you can see. For the things that were hidden, silenced, feared, or blamed. And forgiving others for all of the ways that their shadows come out, and are amplified, for all of the same.

It takes forgiving each time your mind goes autopilot. Forgiving every time someone lashes out because they’re trying to hide. Forgiving every time you fall. And every time you maybe take a little too long to rise.

It takes forgiving. Over and over and over again.

It takes letting go. And opening up. It takes humility and a certain kind of death. It takes burning to ash and rising again. It takes making time to reflect, to meditate, to observe, to pray.

Over and over and over again.

Maybe some people are born that way. Gentle and kind and giving. Maybe some people are planted like little seeds in such rich soil that they grow into that lightness with ease.

Maybe.

But when I imagine what that kind of person would say if they were asked how they do it? I imagine they’d say it’s by practicing the simplest things. Like tiny little steps that eventually grow longer.

Over and over and over again.

©️Cristen Writes

Release

I forgive you for all of the pain you caused. And I forgive me for holding on to it for so long. You do not owe me anything and I no longer bind you to me in wounded frustration, fear, anger, or loss. I no longer bind myself by reliving those years in different faces, or places, or things. You did the best you could, I see that now, though I won’t deny that your best caused so much pain. I release you from the unfair expectation to understand, to admit, to change, to heal. That direction was never mine to give in the first place. I release me from the template you handed me, as I set out to forge my own. No longer must we be pulled by invisible threads – of regret or suffering, denial, fear, anger, or loss. Let us both be free of any stubbornly held attachments to the past, because the wound may have been there but the medicine lives here. I forgive you for all that was wrong and I release you from the need to make it right. That responsibility is my own. Go in peace and know that you are loved, and I am too, in all that we were so many years ago, all that we are, and in all that we have yet to become.

©️ Cristen Writes

Too Little

There are so many people stepping up and saying “you are not too much”. And it’s such a blessing to live in this time of widespread authentic blooming.

But there hasn’t been much talk about being “too little”.

Too quiet.

Too still.

Too simple.

Too boring.

Too few definable goals.

Too few material things.

Too few observable activities.

For years I suffered under the weight of thinking that there was something wrong with me.

Because I didn’t “take up enough space”.

Because I didn’t “make myself heard”.

Because I didn’t “own the room”.

I thought I was anxious when really I was overwhelmed.

I doubted my soul’s call to step away from the constant stimulation because I’d been taught to believe I was wrong in not wanting it.

Confusion turned to anxiety. Anxiety turned to frustration.

And now all these years later, I have to reverse the clock and undo the very anxiety that developed from believing it was the cause.

Believing it was fear created the fear.

All because I thought I was too little.

And I know I am not alone. Many of us have been called too little in some way.

Called too little, but not actually little at all.

What we really are is too deep for people who only doggy paddle. Too much sun for those accustomed to flourescents. Too sensitive to need all the frills.

Too full of energy to need so much external replenishment.

Too alive to feel the constant need to prove it.

The truth is that they see us doing nothing. Saying nothing. Going nowhere. They see nothing.

But what we see is everything.

We feel heartbeats in the earth beneath our feet. We hear the deep timbre of wise old voices from the trees, and sprightly giggles from little blooming vines.

We feel all of the things that people aren’t saying.

We sense all of the feelings beneath the single one being expressed.

And when we speak, we’re saying far more than mere words can handle.

A single word. Or sway of our hips. A single gesture or look. It contains and conveys worlds of information.

But not everyone will be capable of seeing the many colors expressed in one. Not everyone can hear the entire song contained in a single note.

We too are full of activity. Doing nothing yet being everything. Dancing while sitting still. Speaking with words that only hearts and trees can hear. Listening to the messages written in their eyes or the shape of the light filtering through their leaves.

They may see nothing. And in a way they’re right. Which is what we know but can’t say, because in that nothing we find everything.

So no, you are not too little.

You’re not too quiet.

Or too still.

And you certainly aren’t too boring.

You’re not too anything when you’re being and loving your true self.

©️ 2024 Cristen Writes

Heart

Have you ever had so many things change at once that, in a single reflection, you realize you have no idea how you got here? And you’re not even sure yet where here is. You’re just sure that’s it’s not somewhere you’ve been before. The only thing that’s familiar is the sound of your own heart. And that’s the only thing you can really work to protect because all else feels undefined, perhaps as it always was yet not so obviously. And so you protect it. Not by covering it, or closing it, or cutting it off. You protect it by keeping it warm, tending to that fire day and night. Because that is what it all comes down to. How big is your heart. And the answer to that question might just be what gives meaning to everything that’s happened, and gives shape to everything to come.

©️ Cristen Writes

Little Things

I love the little things. Like natural light trickling through open blinds, or the way the painted sky calls me away, at least for a moment, nearly every morning and night. Books half read laying face down, waiting expectantly to be picked back up and adored again from the same page. I love getting lost in the delicate beauty of flowers or communing with wise old trees. I like lingering. In the forest. At the gardens. By the sea. Under the moon. Little things. Like the feeling of a forehead kiss from the wind, or the smell of sea salt in the air beckoning you to play. The sound of crickets at sunset and song birds bringing in the morning, like little audible blooms. Little things. Like forgetting the time. Or losing the path. Or remembering to breathe. The truth is, I just don’t do well when surrounded by the big and bright and loud, because I find so much more joy, such immensity, in all these countless little things.

©️ Cristen Writes

Love Letter

I think that for my entire life I have been looking for you, though I didn’t know it until now. I sought you out in the faces of co-workers and the arms of lovers. I denied you in the empty words of strangers who saw ‘too little’ and the distant looks of friends who saw in me way ‘too much’. I looked for you in endless pursuits and goals and dramas and schemes, all crafted to look like something I thought you should be. I scorned you when your truth tore all of those something’s down, and yet through it all I was seeking you. To know you. To become one with you and love you for all that you are. And now that we are here, I know that you were there through it all. Never again will I look anywhere but here, in this union that was somehow brought about by so many side roads and dusty trails. My entire life I have looked for you, and now that I have found you, you are the quiet of my heart, you are these words I write, you are the yearning to set these words down and gaze at the stars, because here is where we are, one breath, one moment, one eternal love.

©️ Cristen Writes