Beautiful Heart..

One day a young man was standing in the middle of the town proclaiming that he had the most beautiful heart in the whole world. A large crowd gathered and they all admired his heart for it was perfect. There was not a mark or a flaw in it. Yes, they all agreed it truly was the most beautiful heart they had ever seen. The young man was very proud and boasted more loudly about his beautiful heart.

"Why your heart is not nearly as beautiful as mine." I said.

The crowd and the young man looked at my heart. It was beating strongly, but full of scars, it had places where pieces had been removed and other pieces put in, but they didn't fit quite right and there were several jagged edges. In fact, in some places there were deep gouges where whole pieces were missing.

The people stared -- how could i say my heart is more beautiful, they thought?

The young man looked at the my heart and saw its state and laughed. "You must be joking," he said. "Compare your heart with mine, mine is perfect and yours is a mess of scars and tears."

"Yes," I replied, "yours is perfect looking but I would never trade my heart with you. You see, every scar represents a person to whom I have given my love,my care,my affection,my friendship - I tear out a piece of my heart and give it to them, and often they give me a piece of their heart which fits into the empty place in my heart, but because the pieces aren't exact, I have some rough edges, which I cherish, because they remind me of the love we shared. Sometimes I have given pieces of my heart away, and the other person hasn't returned a piece of thier heart to me. These are the empty gouges -- giving love is taking a chance.... Although these gouges are painful, they stay open, reminding me of the love I have for these people still, and I hope someday they may return and fill the space I have waiting. "

[ as one gets older and we look back,it is these moments that we remember and cherish the most....the times we have loved and given, does not matter if we have recieved as much in return.....its those moments that have made life worth living]