Broken (in the best possible way)

by Jenny Lawson

And if one day I look at you and don’t remember who you are or how much you mean to me, know that your importance is still as real then as it is now. Know that you are locked away someplace safe. Know that the me who loved you is still sitting on that beach, forever feeling the sunlight. And know that I’m okay with not having that memory right now, because the me that holds it tight is keeping it safe and uncorrupted and glorious. And she loves you. And I do too.

So currently I’m eating meat, greens, and my feelings.

Sometimes I become paralyzed. Out of fear mostly. Fear of doing the wrong thing. Fear of making the wrong choices. Fear of confrontation. Fear of not being kind or right or helpful.

It’s the whole world. It’s every terrible thing that happens in the universe that I feel like I need to speak out about but then don’t because fear stops me. Then I fear that inaction. I fear that my silence is equal to agreement with terrible things. I fear when I do speak out that I’ve done so inelegantly, or wrongly, or that I’ve made things worse. That it’s not my place to speak or that it’s not my place to be silent. I read and read and read and know every detail of the terrible thing, waiting to find that one detail that will make me know for certain what to say or how to act. But it never comes. And that makes sense, because if simple words fixed terrible things, then terrible things would not exist.