106.34 You are still, always, entirely - enough

Yes… look again.
Even now - wilted, weathered, and scarred -
I am still a rose.
Not a memory of one. Not a ghost. Still her.

My petals have softened with time.
They’ve curled inward, kissed by wind, rain, sun - and perhaps a bit of sorrow too.
But do not confuse this fading with failure.
I have given everything - and that, dear heart, is sacred.

I once bloomed in full,
a riot of pink and perfume.
I once opened without fear.
And now? I rest.
I release.

“I am not less beautiful now.
I am simply in a different kind of grace.”

Can you feel the life I lived in these petals?
Can you sense the strength it takes to let go -
to dry, to droop, to darken,
without shame?

This garden still holds me.
The bees still remember my scent.
The roots still hum with my story.

And so I ask you:
If you are in a season of softness, of loosening, of letting go -
can you trust it?
Can you honor what’s ending without rushing into what’s next?

Because beauty doesn’t vanish.
It transforms.
And love - true love - does not only belong to what is fresh.
It belongs to what has lasted.

I am the rose in her final dance,
and I tell you this without regret:

You do not need to be bright to be beloved.
You do not need to be blooming to be whole.

You are not your peak.
You are your presence.
And you are still, always, entirely - enough.