broken pieces make sharp tools

Sometimes things break.

Glasses. Plates. Windows. Skin. Levies. Relationships. Spirits.

Sometimes we can patch them up. With superglue. Duct tape. Band-aids. Apologies. Bending. Molding. Adapting. Changing.

Sometimes not.

Usually that line between when one should keep mending things, or take the broken pieces and start anew, is fuzzy and grey.

A crack in a foundation: is it merely a sign of a little wear and tear? Or a fissure that will widen over time - a signal you should put a halt to all construction?

How do you know the point between the 'before,' when you can still walk away with most of the pieces still intact, as opposed to the ''after'', when you have broken it so many times, tried to bend and mold and patch it over and over because you can't bear to let it go, that the original is in such tiny or altered fragments that it is unrecognizable, its potential for future use diminished?

We never really know where that line is unless we wait to cross it. Unless we wait until the levee breaks. Or until the building crumbles to the ground because it was built upon a shaky foundation.

No one wants to wave the white flag without a good fight. But no one wants to step over that line to the point of total destruction. As with most things in life, finding that line is a balancing act coupled with a little bit of rolling the dice. I try to live by the principle that tenacity is a virtue. Yet mixed with an overabundance of pride and stubbornness, it can quickly turn toxic.

No, we never really know.

I think we all perpetually have things in our life that are cracking, breaking, crumbling. Such is life. Nothing is permanent. And that arbitrary line of ''before'' and ''after,'' that point when we're willing to accept the pieces as broken and make a change... well, that point differs for all of us.

But once we are able to see it clearly and are courageous enough to be honest with ourselves and move forward with the broken pieces, there is an up side.

Broken pieces aren't all bad. They can be sharp and powerful tools if we use them in the right way. Michelangelo didn't carve the David with a dull chisel. They can be tools for positive change, tools for meaningful growth, giving us an edge we don't normally have when we are in a place of comfort and complacency.

I meet a lot of people on ''the road'' (my current address) who are carrying around really big, chunky broken pieces of their lives. Many people would describe them as broken. Directionless.

I shared a 2 hour bus journey with a 35-year old journalist the other day. She was in the 50th week of her year-long trip around the world. She impressed me massively with her stories of the remote and unexpected places she has dared to go and the things she has experienced by getting off the well-beaten tourist trail. I expect to see a book out of this woman in a few years.

She said to me, ''I was in a rut with my job as a reporter and wasn't sure how to get out of it. I knew I could make small changes, but they would be band-aids, not getting to the root of the issue. I took this trip because I knew that the only way I was going to know the right next step for me was to really shake things up until it fell out."

I hear you, reporter woman, I really hear you.

She commented that maybe that qualified her as ''directionless,'' but nonetheless, it was the right thing for her.

I shared with her my theory on the topic.

Directionless is characterised as wandering aimlessly, looking for something outside yourself. I know what it looks like. I have seen that in many people I've met ''on the road.'' I am pretty sure I've also been that at some moments in my life. I reassured her that neither one of us fit in that category.

It's a very different thing to accept and admit that your fire has burned out and something has to change. Instead of just sitting on those sharp broken pieces and complaining about the pain, or trying to convince yourself they don't exist, you've picked them up and used them to help you cut through the weeds and carve out a new path. You've stepped away and started doing all the things that you know will re-ignite your fire and you're willing to be open to the possibilities of where that may take you without closing your mind to a rigid set of expectations for the sake of having the security of a well-defined plan.

You're in the uncomfortable place. That's okay. It's one of only three options: 1) uncomfortable place, 2) waiting place, or 3) acceptance place, and to be honest, the only places I like to hover are number 1 and number 3. Dr. Suess couldn't have put it better when he warned of the perils of the waiting place in one of my all-time favorite books, Oh the Places You'll Go:

''...a most useless place. The Waiting Place…for people just waiting.
Waiting for a train to go or a bus to come, or a plane to go or the mail to
come, or the rain to go or the phone to ring, or the snow to snow or waiting
around for a Yes or No or waiting for their hair to grow. Everyone is just
waiting.

Waiting for the fish to bite or waiting for wind to fly a kite or waiting
around for Friday night or waiting, perhaps, for their Uncle Jake or a pot to
boil, or a Better Break or a string of pearls, or a pair of pants or a wig with
curls, or Another Chance. Everyone is just waiting.

No! That’s not for you!''