You Are the Child Being Held

The house is moving, and you are the floor that holds it up. You smile at the breakfast table, you answer the questions, you make sure everyone else has what they need.

But inside, the water is rising. You are the anchor who is secretly drowning.

The mask feels heavy this morning, glued to your face by the fear that if you stop performing, everything will fall apart. But the light does not need your performance to see you.

It sees the cracks in the plaster. It sees the trembling hands behind the steady voice.

Jesus walked through crowds where everyone wanted something from him, yet he stopped for the woman who had been bleeding for twelve years. She didn't have a perfect speech.

She didn't have the strength to stand tall. She just reached out from the bottom.

And he felt it. He turned and called her 'Daughter.' He did not ask her to fix herself first.

He did not ask her to stop bleeding before he spoke. He gave her peace while she was still broken.

You do not have to be the strong one for the light to hold you. In fact, the light is closest when the mask slips.

The strength you are faking is not required. The drowning is not a failure.

It is the place where the real reaching begins. You are not the floor.

You are the child being held.