Whenever I feel that my contributions and efforts fall short, I remember that if I don’t like something I’ve done or made at any given moment, I can try again. Above all else, I remember that I don’t have to do it alone. I can ask for help. I can be inspired by other people. I can have someone accompany me, plain and simple.
I’ve been blessed to love and be loved by mentors, matriarchs, aunts and mothers – both by blood and by adoption. They have taught me a good many things. One of the harder lessons has been that although rejection can be awful, it is in those moments of rejection that we must love ourselves the most.
When life gets tough, or I meet people who don’t know how to appreciate or value me as a person, I remake my heart. Not to fit what others want, but for my own growth. Together, we can tread our way out of the drowning of rejection to a place where, with new hearts, we love ourselves again as children of God. Everything we do can remake the world into a place that reflects our transformed hearts.
This message is excerpted from “Wonky hearts” by Kristina Diaz in the January/February 2023 Gather magazine.
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