My friend, when you are finished falling, after you hit rock bottom and watch yourself come apart into a million pieces, no one is staying to help you collect yourself, no one is sticking around to pick through your pieces to decide which parts of you are worth keeping. That’s for you to decide.

So stay down for as long as you need to. This is the most important part. Take your time. Pay attention. You already broke. So the easy part is over. Go slow…. I know, you thought the breaking was the most painful chapter. It wasn’t.

Turn the page. The next part is much longer. It’s the healing. The rise. The comeback. It’s the birth of the new you.

And it’s not easy. But you are strong and brave and worth it.

You’ll have to leave a lot of yourself behind, you’ll have to let go of all the parts of you that you’ve outgrown.

We’re not making ourselves small anymore. We’re not bending to fit where we don’t belong anymore. Do you hear me? We’re going all in. Count your wounds, every scar ripped open, every drop of blood you bled like a promise, every tear you cried like a bet in the name of crossing your whole heart, your whole soul, was all for this moment.

Right here. Right now.

You had to hurt like that to get here to this version of you who knows exactly who you are, who you are not, who you will never be again.

Drop the apologies. We’re not sorry anymore for who we are, we’re not sorry for what we had to do to get here, and we’re not sorry for the time it took to learn our worth.

Step out of the box of all you were supposed to be, according to everyone who wasn’t you, and walk into the you, who’s comfortable in your own skin.

It’s time. You earned it.  We no longer wear the expectations of anyone else and we no longer let anyone else decide what we’re worth.

Because we know now.  We finally know.

And now it’s time to celebrate it.

Get up, my friend. It does not hurt anymore.

Now go show YOU what you’re made of.

 

Written By: Stephanie Bennett-Henry