Quote: What do you do with all the old hurts and memories? How do you deal with that? Is it just a matter of time?
Julie, I categorize them similar to what ancient mapmakers did on maps - "There be dragons here."
I try not to pick at them. Kinda like scabs.
I still have bruised areas that hurt more than they should when they accidentally get poked. I have to fight to not mourn what could have been. It doesn't help that my personality has always had a streak of melancholia. If I read old journals, or just let my thoughts dwell on the past, I'm afraid that the dragons do arise.
I assume that time will mend much of it.
Someone had mentioned that suffering makes us stronger.
I think there is much truth in that. In the same way that broken bones, when mended, can actually become stronger.
But that broken area will be lumpy for many years - somewhat disfigured, visible if examined with an X-ray. It may develop arthritis, it may give us shooting pains on occasion, and there will be a sensitivity toward overly protecting it.
I don't see how you can come through extremely difficult situations without getting a bit twisted, in the following sense. Trees can be espaliered, trained through pressure and binding to grow a certain way. The pressure and binding can later be removed and the tree can be freed to grow differently, *but* the earlier espaliering will always be a part of that tree's past, its foundation, its visable form.
So, no great advice, just an acknowledgement that we are all plodding along similar paths. And perhaps there is some cold comfort in knowing that billions of feet have trod the same paths, it's just a part of the human condition.
