Forgive Yourself For Building Walls Around Your Heart
You put them there to help you keep going.
There’s a wall around your heart.
It’s tall, and secure, and sturdy, and thick. This wall is stone and brick, and materials that are supposed to be impenetrable.
These materials are not supposed to crumble, and they’re not supposed to let anything get in, either.
Each brick, and each stone, and each piece is from a battle that you have fought — times where you were disappointed, let down and betrayed. Each part of the wall is a tiny sliver of your broken heart — taken from the ashes of despair to protect you from hurting again.
You built the wall to dull the pain.
You built the wall to make your days and nights more bearable.
You built the wall to heal faster and survive the wounds that your heart has faced.
At first, it served you well. It helped you move onward. It was your lifeline — your method of survival.
Now, you’re ready to knock the walls down. Now you’re prepared to let people inside again. Now you want to try loving again, and trusting again, and allowing yourself to lean on another human again. But you built that wall to be tall, and secure, and sturdy, and thick. You made it out of materials that were supposed to be impenetrable. You designed it not to let anything in or crumble.
And so it’s hard to knock it down.
The wall has been your armor — and when you’re used to having a shield, it’s hard to stand there naked with vulnerability.
It can be frustrating having this wall stand between you and your next steps.
It can be easy to beat yourself up for building the wall, too. It can be easy to trick yourself into thinking that the wall should stay there, that walls are supposed to be there, that there’s too much danger in letting them crumble and breaking them down.
But that’s a lie.
And please don’t believe that lie.
Please forgive yourself for the walls that you’ve built around your heart.
Please remember that you put them there to help you keep going. You weren’t trying to hide, or disappear, hurt anyone.
Those walls aren’t there because you don’t deserve love — they’re there because you needed to carry your heart a little more gently through this life.
You built the walls so you could rebuild the broken pieces of your shattered heart. And it’s ok; it’s ok.
You put them up, and you’re the one who gets to take them down, too.
You get to let love in, at your speed, and at your pace, too.
Previously published on Thought Catalog, here.
