What I’ve eaten today:
- Sweet Potato Hash with Diced Bacon & Fried Eggs
- A handful of mini chocolate chips
When I was 15, I went on a missions trip to Romania. It is still a very sweet and beautiful (albeit, fading) memory for me. It was there that I started to formulate the image of myself that I projected for many years later. It informed my decisions to become a medical professional. I just desperately wanted to help the orphans…everything else was just fluff and white noise. When I am honest with myself, that is still how I feel. I just desperately want to help the orphans…everything else was just fluff and white noise. An important thing to remember when trying to recreate refashion myself and my dreams moving forward.
=) But back to my trip… Toward the end of this trip, the missionary we had been working closely with spoke to the team telling us what she felt G-d was saying to her about each individual on the team. I remember being slightly jealous when one was told they were a door or a key or some other multi-faceted, interesting item. When it came to be my turn, she says, “Ashley, I just see a big heart.” I can’t remember if she mentioned it being a bleeding one, but I do remember that it was just huge and full. And my heart is both of those things – huge and full. Always pulsing on about one mission or idea or another, never stopping to take a breath. But there are times when I have held this against myself. “After all, how can one be the fighter that one needs to be in the situations I CRAVE if I am this big (bleeding/bloody) heart? You will just get trampled. You will be crushed and then how will you get up again? How will you go on?” I challenge myself. And then I read this comic posted by one of my very favorite people, my Indelible:
And then I remembered, that when describing fighters/boxers they always say of those who refuse to stay down, “That one’s got heart.” Hearts don’t/won’t/can’t stop. They beat involuntarily, and without your permission. They just keep right on being themselves, beating.
And just like that, something that was a handicap becomes a strength.
Are you a big (bleeding/bloody) heart? What is it that keeps you getting back in the ring?
Eating My Way Through It 