A Practice For The Broken Hearted

This practice is for the broken-hearted. There are many reasons a heart may be broken - maybe something that happened or is happening to you. Maybe for someone else. Maybe the world. And all of it, maybe for all of it. Whatever you bring here, there is room for it.

You will need a few pieces of paper and some writing utensils that are colorful - markers, pens, crayons.

Seated, close your eyes for just a moment and feel yourself grounded in your chair. Feel your feet planted firmly. Breathe in and out, following the natural rhythm of your breath.

When you are ready, open your eyes, place your hands over your heart. One on top of another. Gaze softly in front of you and see your heart before you. Imagine it. Acknowledge, just for a moment, that your heart is keeping you alive - right now. Gazing softly at whatever image comes to you when you imagine your heart, say thank you.

Choose a color of pen that will represent the feeling you have inside of you right now. Choose a color that represents the feeling of brokenness you carry.

Draw your heart.

Add color to represent that which is inside your brokenness. You may have one color, representing a broken relationship. You may have many colors, representing the broken promises you made or made to you. You may choose a color to represent the one for whom you pray. However you see it, draw it. Patterns. Lines.

Hands over your heart, gaze at your image. Breathe in the feeling you’ve had as you’ve drawn your heart. As you breathe out, imagine light going out through your breath and imagine that this light carries your feelings through your heart and out to the world.

Let the world hold your brokenness.

Now, writing over your drawing (or around it so you can read it), write a prayer of gratitude to the world for holding your broken heart. Thank the trees for rooting themselves enough to hold your brokenness in their branches. Thank your best friend for listening and carrying your brokenness along with you. Thank the clouds for receiving your brokenness with the moisture they inherit and thank them for the rain that falls to cover your brokenness with the promise of growth. Thank God for creating the world that can hold all brokenness and still create new life.

Whomever you want to thank, write a prayer of gratitude for them.

(If you have no one to thank, I will loan you my gratitude for the lemon tree in my backyard that takes my brokenness and ripens grace-lemons so that I can make healing-hope-lemonade.).

Put your hands over your heart and let your heart know that you would like to read it a prayer of gratitude. Trust that this prayer will nudge something inside of your heart that will, in the end, take some of the brokenness away.

Hands over your heart, read your prayer out loud.

One more time, breathe in and breathe out.

You may have to do this exercise over and over again. Broken hearts need tending. If you cannot imagine yourself doing this now because of pain or separation or fear, ask someone to do it for you. They can draw their heart, hold their heart in their hands, write their prayer of gratitude and you can know that our connection is so deep - like those roots - that any shift of energy, no matter whose breath it is - shifts your energy too.

May it be so.