Triumph and Heartbreak

One thing that I have gotten from the dating sites is that every once in a while, one of the men will break out of the cookie cutter profile message and put something interesting…or funny.  I think lately I have been browsing the sites as much looking for different perspectives than an actual date.   Anyway, the other day I saw this quote which I am going to borrow because it got me thinking.

Life is a balance between triumph & heartbreak. These are the things that make  life worth living.
If your afraid of either, wouldn’t be much of a life at all, would it?

At first I was a little puzzled as to why someone would say that heartbreak makes life worth living…but  then I realized that its probably risking heartache that makes life worth living.

There was a period of time in my life when I went through a mild case of post partum depression.  We had just moved to Muskogee from Kingfisher which was a difficult move for me even though I knew it was the right choice at the time. We had lived in Kingfisher where my mom and dad lived for a couple of years and my mom and I had formed an even closer bond than we had before because I was a mom.  So instead of mother/daughter relationship, we related even deeper as one mom to another.  My mom was devastated that we were moving because she had seen her grandsons daily since they were born.  The guilt from that was overwhelming at times.

Then to top that off, Mike’s new job involved him traveling, often for weeks at a time.  I had gone from my parent’s home into marriage soon after high school  and from that failed marriage into another marriage pretty quickly.  I had never been alone before.  So to be alone with 2 young kids was a bit overwhelming.   I didn’t have any friends in Muskogee and though my husband’s family was in Muskogee I didn’t really have a strong bond with them yet, simply because we had only visited and never really spent a lot of time with them.

The isolation, the fear, the anxiety manifested itself in an extreme over protectiveness of my boys.  I was so afraid of something happening to them that I was unable to relax and enjoy them.  I also lived in constant anxiety that something would happen to Mike while he was traveling.  I worried constantly about my parent’s health.  I was afraid at night of being alone.  I was one stressed out mess.  My counselor started working with me to help me to realize that there are simply some things that no matter how much you worry about them you really can’t control. 

He said that loving someone is a huge risk.  Because you don’t know if you might lose them.  He said, if you had the choice of loving someone knowing that you only had a limited time with them, or knowing you had a limited time with someone choosing not to love them because of the hurt up ahead when you lost them, what would you do?  At the time I believe I answered the latter because the thought of the heartache way overshadowed the potential joy.  Gradually, I worked through that and began to let go and relax.  I remember saying to him that I could only risk so much and so I was only going to fully give my all to a handful of people. That would cut down on the risk of loss. 

When I think back on that time in my life I realize that there were a lot of friendships and relationships that I closed myself off to because I didn’t want to risk the loss.  It seems really foreign to me that I ever felt that way because I have evolved into a person that will risk my heart every time, knowing full well it can be broken; because love is worth the risk.

Every person that I have in my life is a triumph over the fear of being rejected.  And even those who have rejected me have left me stronger in my resolve to give it my all.  Because even though it hurts to lose love, to be loved is the best feeling in the world.  It’s worth the risk.

And its not just love that is worth the risk.  The first time I stepped onto a stage to perform my comedy I was taking a huge risk. What if no one thought I was funny?  What if no one laughed?  What if I got booed off the stage?  I pushed through the fear, took the risk and my life has not been the same. Because in that one simple triumph over self doubt, over fear, I discovered a talent that I had not ever used and to use it was exhilarating. I discovered a passion for making people laugh.  Had I been too afraid to even try, I would never have known the joy of discovering something I am passionate about.

Now, not all my ventures have ended in triumph.  And along the way I have had my heartbroken too many times to count.  Some would say I am too tender hearted for my own good.  I disagree.  I think my tender heart is what allows me to feel so deeply and to love so wholeheartedly.   And if I get hurt along the way then that’s part of the journey.  The alternative is to never fully let myself feel the good because I don’t want to fully let myself feel the bad if it turns out that way.  I don’t want to live my life halfway.   Living life to the fullest is worth the risk.