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    • “Fall harder. Rise up better.”

      Posted at 2:54 am by Dani, on November 5, 2013
      Image courtesy of designbolts.com

      Image courtesy of designbolts.com

      My husband and I recently moved.

      We left the Lake (where we’d been showered with peace, perfect sunsets, and night skies so bejeweled I swore I could reach up and pluck the stars from the velvet welkin) and returned…

      to. the. suburbs.

      I was much more accepting of the move than my more-often-than-not better half.  In my head and heart, it was a need more than a want (a necessary evil, if I’m being soul-scrapingly honest).

      Sure, we’d had great experiences there, but then it was inhabited by people without character…

      without heart.

      And I feared that their toxicity had somehow crept into the nooks of our home and seeped into its structure, just lying in wait to emotionally slime us, to beat us down and to challenge our gratefulness and belief in blessings.

      Another thing left behind (other than my father and his fiancee, who certainly trump sunsets and stars) was our church.  While we weren’t nearly as involved as we’d have liked, we felt supported, loved and safely held in the arms of the congregation, especially by our Pastor, Bob.

      With the hope of finding another congregation to call home, we began our Church Hop yesterday.  We attended service at an old church with a new name.  The people were different.  The music was different.  The feeling was different.

      Nearly everything was different.

      My husband leaned over less than halfway through and whispered, “Do you like it?”

      I stared straight ahead and shook my head…

      No.

      No, I didn’t

      Shortly after, the lights were dimmed and a video was played.

      It was about dreams.  How we live for them.  Then abandon them (before they can abandon us, perhaps).

      And a string of words appeared on the screen…just before the tears appeared in my eyes:

       

      Fall harder.  Rise up better.

       

      I don’t know about you, but I have always been terrified of failure…

      Failure as a wife, daughter, sister and friend.  Failure as a writer.  Failure as a want-to-be mother.  Failure as a student of books and, more importantly, life.  Failure as me (insignificant and yet very significant (to a select few) me).

      FEAR is a powerful word; it is also a powerful emotion.  Powerful enough to emotionally and physically immobilize us (if allowed).

      Truth be told, I’ve made countless decisions out of fear.  The fear of falling hard and rising…

      Poorly.

      Broken.

      Damaged.

       

      No.  More.

       

      The time is now for living and loving hard.  Falling harder.  And rising up better.

      For not allowing fear to numb us, but to stimulate us.

      For not allowing failure to define us, but to refine us.

      For not allowing rising up to frighten us, but to empower us.

       

      We still may get emotionally slimed (odds are good we will).

      But I’ll be ready.

      And will rise up better.

       

      My hope is this:

      that you will too.

      Posted in Failure | 17 Comments | Tagged brokenness, church, dreams, failure, fall, fear, get up, mistakes, moving, necessary evil, new start
    • Words break hearts

      Posted at 8:32 pm by Dani, on October 23, 2013
      Image courtesy of quotesvalley.com

      Image courtesy of quotesvalley.com

      I remember the first time I uttered those words…

      We were playing Red Rover (you remember how it goes:  “Red rover, red rover, send [insert name] over)”.

      One the of the boys from the other team broke through my linked hands with the girl next to me, then took away the best boy from our team.

      During his mad dash through our clenched hands, one of my fingers was hurt.  I almost started to cry.  He called me a baby and mimicked my squeeze-back-the-tears face to which I replied:

      “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.”

      He stuck out his tongue at me.

      And the game continued.

      Recently, I’ve thought about those fateful words.

      Recently, I’ve come to the following conclusion:

      They are a

      horrible,

       horrible

      lie.

      I have been called many things: most were untrue, some were dead on, but all were hurtful…maybe more so than the sticks and stones, which leave marks that, over time, fade and, more than often, disappear.  Words, however; especially the toxic, cruel, and emotionally disfiguring variety; seep beyond the flesh to the heart and soul of us and reside there, if allowed, for a lifetime.

      Some things said to or about me in anger or disdain I’ve forgotten to remember or simply let go of.  But there are a select few which play over and over again on my heart recorder and, after all this time, still have the power to wound.

      To cause doubt.

      And

      To cause shame.

      With the now international attention given to bullying, I’ve questioned my thoughts as both a victim and as a perpetrator.

      I don’t remember ever intentionally being cruel or singling out any specific person, but memories of our own ugliness tend to be less searing than the ugliness of others, so I suppose I did and have.

      I may just have been oblivious, but bullying back then seemed to be on another, much lesser, level.

      Victims didn’t take their own lives

      And

      they didn’t take the lives of others.

      I do remember a girl being taunted by a group of boys on Senior Sleepover Night in the parking lot of our high school.  She had been outspoken and brave condemning underage drinking when most our age just succumbed to it.  Her car was mobbed that night.  It was doused with beer, pelted with cans and then urinated on.

      She must have been traumatized.

      They must have been given a slap on the wrists (if memory serves me right, they didn’t walk in graduation).

      No lives lost.

      No lives ruined.

      I don’t remember suicide attempts or threats.  I don’t remember fourteen-year-olds being charged with aggravated stalking.  I don’t remember eight-year-olds hanging themselves from trees.  I don’t remember twelve-year-olds jumping off silos.  I don’t remember ever hearing the word bullycide.  And I certainly don’t remember being afraid to go to school.

      Probably because I wasn’t.

      I had that luxury.

      The luxury of going to school to learn.

      The luxury of not worrying that I wouldn’t make it home because I disagreed with someone, looked at them the wrong way or, Heaven forbid, won the attention of a boy to whom someone else had laid claim.

      A luxury that kids today don’t have.

      Over dinner last night, my husband voiced his concerns about having a child in today’s world.  How he’d feel selfish bringing a little one into such a mess of violence and injustice just for the sake of having someone call him Daddy.

      I disagreed.

      We’re broken.

      Surely.

      We all are.

      We’re broken people raising other people that, in their own ways, will be broken too.

      But, isn’t that the beauty of things?

       That we’re broken and through each new day, each new experience and our interaction with others we can learn, grow and attain the tools necessary to do better and thus be better?

      I don’t believe that most people are horrible, vicious, heartless sub-humans.

      I can’t allow myself to believe that.

      If I did…

      what’s the point of living such a life?

      If there is no good?

      If I don’t believe that people are better than the circumstances in which they’re born or which they simply or not so simply create?

      I don’t pretend to know much about much, but I’d like to think that I know people.

      That, more often than not, I see things, at the heart level, that others miss.

      So p.l.e.a.s.e.

      let’s be more vigilant with the thoughts that are planted in the soil of our minds and hearts.

      It is from there that the words come.

      And it is precisely there that the heartbreak stays.

      Posted in Bullying | 33 Comments | Tagged "Sticks and Stones", abuse, brokenness, bullycide, bullying, fear, power of words, violence, youth
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      © Dani De Luca and bloomingspiders, 2013-2021. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to bloomingspiders, with appropriate and specific direction to the original content. Photographs are the property of bloomingspiders, unless otherwise noted.

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