The rope was being pulled so tightly that her fibers were starting to break. Each stress of her life and everyone in it pulled on her harder and harder until each string deep inside her weakened and started to tear, one by one. What was once a thick strong rope became frayed, worn and tired. Exhausted. Each piece of her unraveled until only one piece remained trying so hard to hold on, twisting and turning, getting thinner and thinner until at last the she had to let go and stop the pulling. The rope saw herself in the mirror and she cried and she cried.
“I have bent,” said the rope out loud. “I have failed those who love me. I have not stayed strong. I am flimsy and thin and useless.” And she cried some more.
But at that moment, the rope felt a chill in the air and heard a voice speak to her loud and clear. More loudly and more clearly than anything she had ever heard before.
“Rope,” it said. You have not failed. Instead you have now released your tension. You have let go of your rigidity and your stiffness and you have let yourself become soft and pliable. No longer are you fighting all that pulls at you, no longer are you letting yourself be pulled in two different directions. No longer are you taking on everyone else’s stresses and trying to hold on. Instead, you have let go of that you cannot take on, and are now bending. And now that you have learned to bend, you will not break. Now you have room to wrap yourself around those you love, and you have room to breathe.”
And the rope realized the voice was right. A taut rope has no flexibility. A taut rope cannot blow in the breeze. A taut rope cannot wrap around the one she loves and hug them tightly. A taut rope can break. A soft rope will bend.
And from that day forward the thin, soft rope relaxed a little. Moved. Stopped taking on problems she could not fix. Found flexibility, found freedom, found hugs. Let go of things too hard and too painful to hold onto. And when she saw the thick, stiff and frozen ropes out there, she regretted the days she was like them and the time she wasted holding on so tightly to things she could not control. And to things that would not let her bend. And daily she thanked the voice, whomever it was, for teaching her that a taut rope has no joy and a flexible, bendable rope will live happily ever after.
©️Kristy Sands 2022
