Support4Change Blog

January 30, 2008

Categories: Q-and-A Club, Understanding Yourself, Strengthening Friendship and Relationships

By Arlene Harder, MA, MFT

 

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With Valentine’s Day coming up shortly, on some of the blogs between now and then I’d like to focus on love in its various forms. Today I’m bringing you a quotation by C. S. Lewis as the introduction to several Q-and-A Club questions about broken hearts.

“If you want to make sure of keeping your heart intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket of your selfishness. But in that casket – safe, dark, motionless, airless – it will change. It will not be broken – it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The only place outside of heaven where you can be perfectly safe from the dangers of love is Hell.”

Since few of us have gotten through life without ever having our hearts broken, I suggest you look carefully at the following questions to explore whether you have tried to keep your heart intact by shutting it away.

Q-AND-A CLUB QUESTIONS FOR UNDERSTANDING YOURSELF AND FOR STRENGTHENING FRIENDSHIP AND RELATIONSHIPS

Is a broken heart the price one pays for being human?

Have I been able to comfort myself when my heart was broken so that I would not be afraid to open my heart to love again? How did I do that?

What has a broken heart taught me about myself so that I am a better person than I would have been had I not experienced that loss?

What has a broken heart taught me about others?

What do I allow to stand between me and accepting love fully from others? Why?

What part did I play in the circumstances that caused my heart to break the last time it was broken? Why?

If my heart has been broken many times, is there something I have failed to learn from the experience that makes me unnecessarily vulnerable again and again?

If I have carefully wrapped my heart in “hobbies and little luxuries” as a way to avoid entanglements so that it will not be broken, is that security worth the price of the love I might have had instead if I had worked toward a satisfying relationship with someone?

These questions are available for no charge if you want to use them for your blog, newsletter, website, or discussion group, but you must (1) attribute the questions to the Q-and-A Club and me, Arlene Harder, (2) provide a link to Support4Change, and (3) include both the introduction and the questions.

Join the Q-and-A Club Yahoo! Group for questions on other topics and discussion with people who like to stretch their thinking.

NOTE: The broken heart comes from Embroidery and Digital Printing, a company with a wide variety of embroidery styles for any occasion. (No minimums and no setup)