What Does it Mean to be Broken?

There are times when I put in my headphones and I don’t play any music. I want to listen but I don’t want the world to know I’m listening. Sometimes the teacher will yell at me for having headphones in while they’re teaching, as if I wasn’t listening. I don’t tell them that I was because that’s exactly what I want them to think. And sometimes at the end of class there will be people talking and I like to observe the way they talk and the way they interact with one another. How they organize themselves into small groups. The cross country and track kids always associate, the band kids, the basics, the cheerleaders. Not to be rude by “eavesdropping” or anything. I just find it interesting. Other times, I do play music. I blast it so loud so that I don’t have to hear anything. I walk through the hallways with Natalie Merchant “My Skin” plastering the inside of my skull and somehow it makes me feel better. It seems like a movie and I’m only just watching from somebody else’s eyes. In those moments, I never really feel like myself. Sometimes when I play music, I’m not the only one listening. I’ll be in a friend’s car (since I don’t drive myself yet) and we’ll turn on the infamous 96.5 and start jamming out to the tunes. Gabrielle’s adorkable whips and nae naes never get old. At these moments, where it seems like the world could stop any second and I wouldn’t care, where it seems like everything is going in slow motion and I don’t exactly want anything to change, in those moments where I don’t feel so broken by the ups and downs of life. The moments where I wouldn’t change a thing about who I was, and where I wouldn’t question my place in the world. Those moments that give life a small bit of meaning and make it feel so worthwhile. What does it mean to be broken? It means to be stronger. It means to have courage. It means that despite the things that life has thrown at you, the parents that never cared, the constant labeling, as if everybody already has you figured out, the names that you pretend never bothered you but every once in a while they’ll find their way under your skin. To be broken means that you know how to open your heart. You know how to look past the names, the rumors, the lies, and know that there’s more to a person than what lies on the surface. It means that you aren’t afraid to be yourself, no matter who tells you that you’re not good enough. Because to be broken doesn’t mean to be insecure and sad, it means to know who you are and to accept your insecurities and know that they aren’t your biggest setback, they’re your greatest strength. To be broken means to mend. It means to get better. Every day. To take everything for not only what it is but for what it could be. To open your heart to all the people and places and things that come your way. To love and be loved.