Each of us were born with a cage around our heart. It's there to protect us and hold it all together. We never think about the cage and how strong someone should have to be to break through it let alone how strong they'll need to be once they do.
I think most people think about their hearts as something that is just hanging out there, like a branch that birds can land on from time to time. Like a pendant on a necklace. Or perhaps, that's how I have always treated mine. I never thought till recently (and am still trying to teach myself to think) that my heart was something that someone should fight to get to, should fight to have. And not only fight to attain, fight to keep.
Your heart isn't free. We all come with a cage.
There are all sorts of reasons I love my cage. It's been around me a long time. It knows how to defend itself well enough. My cage knows the landscape and how to avoid pot-holes of heartbreak. Having a cage means you have something strong protecting you, that you have something worth breaking through to get to the good stuff.
But I hate my cage too. It hasn't garnered the protection I hoped it would. My heart is apparently stronger than what surrounds it. It goes where it wants when it wants, often times with little regard if it SHOULD be going there. It never adapts to my sneaky tricks of escape. My heart won't let that cage hold me back. Also, I have to walk blindly past the cage of crap that has formed some pretty dense walls around my heart. These issues would be hard to miss for someone trying to break through as well.
That cage, that baggage, those walls, that's some tough stuff. Ex-fiance issues, daddy issues, trust issues, body issues, faith issues. It's no joke. If someone wants to get to the pot of gold, they invariably have to go through some trash to get it.
So as I side-stepped or flat out ignored my cage, I think my heart is very familiar with the low-hanging fruit philosophy; if it is in the right position, it is an optimal target for ownership by someone else. This was not a good philosophy, one I changed over the past few years.
Your heart isn't free and it certainly costs a lot, especially if you try to give it to the wrong person.
But on those rare occasions when you do love the right person and they do break through the cage and earn the right to have a place in your heart, then you know they earned it.
Then comes the hard part for both of you......learning how to let someone else make your heart their home.
