Pain to Perseverance

How true is that? "Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls, the most massive characters are seared with scars"?  Pain leads to perseverance I have learned. Nothing in life creates more strength than getting back up again after being defeated.  Our body shouts, "DON'T GET UP!!! YOU CAN'T!! YOU DON'T HAVE ENOUGH STRENGTH! IT'S JUST GOING TO HAPPEN AGAIN!!"  yet our hearts whisper......"You can do this, don't give up..I know it's hard. I want to give up too.....but we can't, we have to TRY."

Time after time again, I recall hearing those shouts inside me, wanting to break me down, make me submit to their power and many times I did; until one day the whisper, however small that it truly was within me, was so gentle that it created the strength within me to persevere.  The pain within me couldn't be deafened by drugs, alcohol, lust or love, time consuming activities, adrenaline junkies, or adventure seeking smoothies; the pain rose within me again, time after time, like the sun that rises relentlessly.  Damaged emotions, scarred perceptions, false views of the world, all those things were voices within me that drowned out any chance of hope, finding love or faith in purpose for my life until.......

Until one day, deep in the darkness of death; my soul left in the void of nothingness after a car accident, I found my strength in the light. As the darkness began to eat away at any chance of going back to life by haunting me with lies of deceit, unworthiness, and sorrow so severe, a light appeared.  As bright as the sun, as beautiful as the dawn, full of love and peace, it showered me with hope. "Gwen, why did you do this to yourself?  You know you are there for a reason.  Now you have to get through the physical pain in order to get back to where you are supposed to."  

                                  PURPOSE!!!!! PEACE!!!!!! ENDLESS LOVE!!!  
                                                PAIN into PERSEVERANCE!!!!

The very Creator of the Universe picked me out of the darkness that day to bring me back into a life of light, love and purpose.  The damaged emotions that drove my heart into another car that night and left my body in pieces along the road, on the verge of life and death, and in the hospital for over month, they left scars all over my body that can be seen to this day.  When you look into my eyes, you see the scar going all the way down my nose from it being completely smashed.  When you go to hold my hand, you see 8 more scars along my arm and hand where they had to drill 8 screws into my bones to piece it back together after being shattered in 14 places.  When you go to jump into the lake with me to enjoy a sunny day, you see the huge scar that splits my stomach in half length-wise from the top of my chest to under my stomach when they had to salvage what they could of my insides and/or take out due to their extent of damage.  When you listen to my voice through the sweet music it creates to soothe your soul you hear at times a rhaspiness from the voice box being rotated 180 degrees from the whip lash. When we go to run down through the field in the heat of the day, sun in our eyes, my pace sometimes slow and uneven from the bones that chipped off inside my ankle.  

My scars are my war wounds.  They are evidence that even from the depths of the deep where souls RARELY escape, a soul can be brought back to life to live a life free from lies of unworthiness that bind them into a life filled with faith in God, hope for a brighter future, and a love deeper than any darkest emotion.