"I began to feel that love only existed in my imagination. I’d tried to find it in those that I felt close to by changing and adapting who I was, to be accepted and respected for who I was not. I didn’t know then what I know now, to be accepted and respected my self-worth needed to be inspected and mostly spent in introspection. It took me a long time to figure out that love begins within, if there is no love within we become empty vessels on a path to self destruction.

I know all about hurt and pain, I know what it feels like to crawl fighting, kicking and biting into a black hole, alone and afraid. Scared that I’d completely lost it, scared of the thoughts whirling round in my head, scared that my life was over but not realising my life was just beginning. During the times I entered a black hole and they’ve been a few, I emerged stronger more determined than ever, determined to pursue that ‘feeling’. I learnt in the black hole to be in control of the direction of my life required a period of absolute isolation. In isolation I experienced a contentment and happiness that I didn’t think was possible. In fact the opposite was true, in isolation I began to love myself and found out who I was and discovered my purpose",

I didn’t know then what felt like failure was in fact a shift in behaviour, I could never go back to how it was, not after this. I thought differently, spoke differently, everything about me was different. Don’t ask me what it was, I just felt different. It was a metamorphosis free from self-doubt and judgement, accusations and criticisms and ultimately acceptance of who I AM. But I was scared, I didn’t want to feel this way, I wanted to go back to normal, to do the things I used to do, smoke, drink, have a good time, I didn’t recognise the new me. I didn’t know what to do with the new me, so I consciously stepped back into my old lifestyle, not wanting to accept that I’d changed."

'The stone the builder rejected' by J J Law is available on Amazon in both paperback and Kindle Unlimited.

NEXT TIME:
I will offer a self-evaluation on how I came to write about my life story, renewed virtues and the healing that I discovered is yet to be achieved. So stay tuned to a journey experience shared to help, recognise and reconcile the pieces of us that was broken and abandoned, but not forgotten. Peace.