Hello and welcome back to practicing human, the podcast where every day we're

getting a little better at life. I'm your host, Cory Muscara. In today's episode

we're going to talk about why breaking down often leads to growth. More to come

on that in a moment. First let's settle in together with the sound of the

bells. So we're going to frame this episode with a poem by Danielle Dobby. She

writes, the breaking leads to opening. The opening allows expansion. The

expansion creates more space. The space invites growth in. So notice if you can

feel that poem and the truth of that. The breaking leads to opening. Let's try

and look at that more closely. So if you maybe are experiencing right right now or

have just known the experience of breaking, breaking down. Just what that is like

when we're brought to our knees. Something in us cracks. The compensation we

do to get throughout the day to hold ourselves together to keep ourselves guarded

and in control. Just shatters and we're just lost. We feel broken. But if we

can allow ourselves to be in that space and really be present for it, not immediately

fight it. And usually if we get to that breaking point, this is inevitable. Something in us

opens. And it comes because we're no longer, we can't control anymore. We can't protect

anymore. All of our usual defense mechanisms or survival mechanisms, they've just,

again, out the door. And so the only thing that's left is an opening. And so that opening

allows expansion. Do you know that feeling? Or are you just something in us softens? Almost

as if we were carrying a hundred pound weight up a mountain and we get to the top and we

just release that weight so much of our trying to control and figure out and being

charged and no, it's just this heavy weight we're constantly carrying around with us. And when

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