A Letter to the Broken Hearted

When was the last time you did a price check?

I mean, when was the last time that you really took into consideration your worth, especially when it comes to the ones you love. What type of value do others place on the love that you freely give? 

Are you someone who stays in a relationship nursing a broken heart because the one you love also shares their love with another? Or are you waiting for the day that they finally realize you’re worth more than a few phone calls or a couple of stolen nights? 

Excuse the rant. I’m just fresh off the heels of discovering my own worth. So many people, especially women are afraid of being single that they end up accepting whatever form of love people are willing to give. The sad part is, some men are aware of this fact and tend to come with the attitude that if you don’t take their love the way they give it then someone else will. These are men who don’t see you’re full worth because the market of love has become saturated with broken-hearted people.

 Here’s how you can tell if you’re broken. 

• Do you always pick the wrong type of man?

• If you didn't support him with your money the way that you do, would he still hang around?

• Are you willing to share him with another? With his wife?

• Do you already know that he isn't fully invested in you, but still wait it out until the day that he is?

• Is the strongest card you have in your relational deck the sex card?

• Do you have the type of ‘arrangement’ that allows you to have casual sex with old boyfriends, husbands, or friends with assumedly no strings attached?

Please don’t lie to yourself. YOU ARE BROKEN.

Take yourself off of the market and give yourself time to become whole again before you end up breaking someone else. Take this time to invest in yourself so that the next time you offer your love you’ll know its full value before you give someone else the option to decide it for you. Until you know that you don’t have to put a price on something that was meant to be free. Until the next time a man or a woman offers their version of a broken love, and then has the audacity to put a hidden clause in the fine print telling you that you can take it or leave it, you are strong enough to say to them, ‘Thank you but no thank you. I require more of an investment. Get back to me when you can make the down payment.’

One of my favorite movies is The Joy Luck Club. In this movie there is a line when a mother asks her daughter who is fighting to hold together a marriage to a man who has declared she was no longer of value to him. “What you worth?” And it wasn’t until she was able to let go that not only did she discover her value but others were able to as well. The hardest part was letting go. Today I am asking you. What are you worth? Think about this before you let someone else make the decision for you. 

-LaToya Knight