Boxers and Broken Hearts

A professional boxer is popularly considered to have hands that are deadly weapons. Saying "I have a broken heart" is akin to climbing into the ring with one, being pummeled to a pulp, and then saying "I have an owie." Heartbreak is not an instantaneous event that leaves a few pieces that can be swept up and put back together with a bit of crazy glue. Anyone who's experienced heartbreak knows that it feels like your heart is being torn apart, ripped asunder, or any other appropriately violent expression of pain. In any event, 'broken' doesn't begin to cover it.

Trying to hold yourself together while your heart is ripping apart is a lengthy torture of the worst kind. Not something that can be endured silently. Once it's all over and you're left with a damaged, wounded heart, how do you heal it?

Some of us try to shield it by keeping it away from love. I suppose that's some sort of survival. Seen any zombie movies lately? There's no pain, no sadness; but no happiness either. It reminds me of the afternoon daquiri teas I witnessed as a child, where all the ladies were chasing their Valiums down with daiquiris or mint juleps. I can tell you they felt no pain - or anything else for that matter. That's not the way to heal your heart.

Another reaction is to push the pain off on others. Hurting someone else doesn't take the pain away - and doesn't hurt the person who broke your heart in the first place. So again I ask, how do you heal your heart?

Contrarily, love is the only cure for a wounded heart. You have to dare to love again for your heart to be whole. Are you brave enough? I dare you...