Don’t think of betrayal, rejection, disappointment, or failure as deprivation, rather a nutrient-rich, bitter bite. Trees are pruned in slices, without ruth, to the life-giving quick of a bearing branch. The inward, blue stripes of brokenness–that rite of passage called surrender–produces the most impassioned, sweetest, and lasting fruit.

You will rise again to re-plow, re-seed, and re-water with sorrow and hope mingled. You will rise again to a flourishing inner secret garden, laden with joy and beauty, whose seedbed soil has been enriched with your tender forgiveness and determined faith and watered generously with your tears.
-Bonnie Saul Wilks