I Believe In You

I Believe in You
By Z Zoccolante

It’s Monday night and this blog isn’t written yet for tomorrow. I thought about not writing it, just letting one-week slide. Then I thought about the creation of this blog and how since the first week it went live, a few years ago, I’ve consistently written once a week. It’s something I’m incredibly proud of because I’ve struggled with commitment and healthy consistency.

For years, while I was in my eating disorder, I daily felt like a failure and a disappointment. Those feelings became my normal and took a huge toll on my self-esteem and my relationships.

Then I began my recovery. I’m so incredibly blessed to have had a partner that truly loved me and stuck with me in spite of my failings, who saw the beauty in me even when I couldn’t see it in myself. Even when they didn’t know what to do, or said all the wrong things, they showed up and loved me the best they knew how. And in the end, I recovered because of them, because they showed up and refused to give up on me.

As I reflect back on this past year, it’s been one of tumultuous magnitude. My life has been shaken to the core. I honestly thought that my eating disorder would hands down be the worst thing that happened in my life, and yet I was wrong. I had yet to experience my heart shattering into a billion pieces. I had years where I couldn’t shed a tear, but maybe I’d just stored them all for this one year when my life as I knew it was ripped out from under me.

We all will face these moments, unexpected, unpredictable, where chicken little’s cry will prove the premonition of our lives.

Tonight, I sat at a coffee shop with two of my best friends in the world, clustered together in a human triangle. One of my friends told a story of a stupid argument she’d had with her mother and how her dad got on the phone and said, “Cynthia, you have to stop this. Anything can happen at anytime.” The very next day he had a stroke and shortly after, her father was gone.

Anything can happen at anytime. As those words passed her lips, they triggered something deep in me like a little knife prodding and pressing on a tender vein. For the rest of the conversation, tears slide down my cheeks, from a place inside I couldn’t quite pinpoint. The words ran through my head. In one moment your entire life can be different. In one simple moment, the sky can fall down. In one moment, the sky can implode.

And yet, my friend said, “In this moment right now, everything is perfect.” If we separate the past and the future and just look at this little sliver right now, everything is perfect.

I think we forget that. I know I do. I forget that the past is just a bunch of stories I can run in my head until I might spiral down. I forget that we really don’t know what’s going on in someone else’s head. Sometimes I briefly forget that we all see things through our own lens of pain, sadness, or cloudy vision. Sometimes I forget that maybe the point of this life is to love the people around you fiercely because at the end of this life none of this other shit matters.

The reason I recovered from my eating disorder was because I was loved and someone believed in the good in me, that my light was stronger than the darkness.

And so this will be my gift to friends, to those I love, to strangers I meet. I will believe in you. I will believe in your goodness. I will believe in the beautiful in you. I will believe that you can recover, without expectation or attachment. I will believe that you will do the right thing. I will believe that your heart is healed and whole. I will believe in your health and your joy. I will believe in love.

I believe in you. I will hold the vision of the most graceful, loving parts of you. I will hold the vision of your goodness. I will believe in you.

In this slivered moment, everything, including you, is perfect. You are kind and good, loving and whole. You are free and happy. You are at peace. In this moment, I believe in you and all your beautiful. I believe in you.

With Love,

Z :)