Crossroads

Trauma always leaves a mark.

We can act unscathed, maintain appearances, deftly manage the expectations others place on us. We can say all the right words and take all the right steps. We can slap some paint on the ugliness, press a band-aid on the bullet hole.

We can fool everyone.

We can. But we shouldn’t.

Because eventually, given enough practice, we get too good at it.

And before long we start fooling someone else…ourselves.

Our existence becomes a false artwork, an illusion, a maze of our own creation, and if we linger long enough, deep enough, we may never find our way back to reality.

We live in a culture that glorifies stoicism. We often get rewarded for being “ok.” People tell us we’re courageous for staring down our tragedy with a straight face.

But we know the truth.

We know paint fades with time, that band-aids don’t fix bullet holes. We know that beneath our courageous facade lies an imperial cowardice seeking to destroy us, a reality neither we nor our loved ones can handle. So we hide. We curl up in a ball and turn off the lights. We cry in private and smile in public.

But we can only hide the truth for so long.

And the truth is this: At the foundation of every grief journey is a trauma, and trauma always leaves a mark.

You see, the crossroads comes for us all. The moment when we must confront our brokenness and stare our pain in the face. When we abandon pretense and get real.

My crossroads (one of many I’ve experienced) came a few weeks ago, and it shook me to my core.

Faced with a barrage of life-altering choices, I realized my grief had paralyzed my ability to make decisions. Though I was once able to make confident decisions without batting an eye, I now deliberate endlessly, consumed by the possible repercussions of every choice. It’s equal parts frustrating, painful, and harmful; it’s utterly debilitating. And I now realize there are two important lessons hidden in my indecision:

First, my present indecisiveness is rooted in fear. I’m mortified of making a mistake. In my post about secondary losses (http://bryanctaylor.com/secondary-losses/) I discussed many of the challenges I’ve faced since losing my wife. Prime among these challenges was the complete collapse of my social structure. In the immediate wake of my loss, I made a series of well-intentioned decisions that resulted in catastrophe. Naturally, because of that trauma, decisions that were once simple are now unnecessarily complex.

Second, and more importantly, decisions are difficult because of a fragmented identity. I spent too long in the maze. And though I eventually climbed out, part of me never found its way back to reality; I lost myself in the illusion of being “ok” and I now exist as a fractured version of my former self.

Maybe you’ve experienced these challenges. Maybe you’re experiencing them now.

The first step is to abandon pretense and walk in the light. As Megan Devine so wisely says, “It’s OK to not be OK.” It’s sometimes hard to believe, but it’s true.

The next step, and the most crucial one, is to never operate in fear. Be real, be honest, be raw. Make a mistake. Then make another one. But no matter what you do, never let fear get in your way. Keep living. No matter what.

Trauma leaves a mark, but it needn’t be a scar. Your tragedy has forever changed you, but it hasn’t made you less-than.

Let those words guide you…

When the crossroads come, choose to keep living.

A fellow journeyer,

Bryan