Grace through the Flaws

I am aware that I am deeply flawed. I’m healing, but Trauma has changed me. Years of unrelenting pain shaped my nervous system, my beliefs, my sense of safety in ways I’m still uncovering. Some days—like today—I believe those flaws make me unlovable. I feel pulled from my center, my mind wandering into darker places I usually know how to rise above. Self-criticism creeps in.

My body responds before my mind can catch up. My heart feels erratic. My jaw stays clenched. Old physical trauma resurfaces in quiet but insistent ways. My breath shortens. I try to ground myself, breathing through the waves, letting the energy move without judging it.

I chose gentleness over distraction. Curiosity. I asked myself what this part of me needs. I turned to breathwork and movement, moving my body and sifting through the stuck places. Eventually, I settled into deep meditation.

With my hands over my heart, I focused on that beautiful space..breathing into the tightness, the intensity, the ache. As my heart softened and the energy evened out, everything I judge myself for rose to the surface. Every flaw. Every place shame still lives. And then something shifted. As the shame appeared, my heart expanded—not away from it, but around it.

Unconditional love rose from within me. Love for myself. That love didn’t try to fix or bypass the darkness. It simply met it. Held it. Washed over it with compassion. Grace changed the lens through which I see myself. As that love settled into my chest, I felt something holy in it. A reminder that this love did not originate with me—it was placed there. That even in my brokenness, I am not separate from God’s unconditional love but held inside it. Unconditional love is not something I have to earn through healing or perfection; it is something I am invited to return to, again and again. A sacred home within my own heart, where grace waits patiently for me every time I forget.