The only way through is down

“How did you keep from breaking?”

There was a tension in my chest. ...my question was not about her, I knew that; it was about my own stuckness.

“I broke,” she said. “That is how I kept from breaking.”

“I succumbed,” she said. “I stopped denying the wounds and felt them, felt their width and breadth. Pain can be clarifying. If you are able to feel it...the pain itself will tell you what to do.”

I looked out of the window, feeling disappointed and empty. This was not the answer I had come for. I wanted something else, some other formula or techniqu