HowDoYouBreakAMan?

How do you break a man?

You take away his eyes…
No, that wouldn’t work. Then he would have no choice but to listen. Without the benefit of sight, he would begin to pay attention to each little thing you say. And not only understand more, but he would actually care. He would begin to sense past what seeing alone prevents him from actually “seeing”. A person’s beauty is only skin deep, and with the increased perception he gains from losing that sense of sight, he can begin to dig deeper into the diamond vault that is her inner beauty, A vault that has been kept behind lock and key in the form of pain and tears from past relationships. When you build up the walls around your heart in an attempt to hide inside yourself, he will be the one to feel his way around it, looking for the weakness that will allow him to be close to you. He would become the blind man that found the light in the truth hidden underneath the physical. He will see no evil, and his view of the world would remain untainted.
But he will not break; he will go on…

You take away his ears…
No, that wouldn’t hinder him. Without his hearing, he would be able to see the world in a better light. He would learn to decipher meanings behind actions that would usually be ignored in favour of a nod and a “Uh-huh” just to show that he heard you…but that doesn’t mean he was listening. Then the tenors of his mind begin to attune to the patterns of pitter patters on the rooftops of his soul. The observations he makes will become the basis of the music he hears in the depths of his chest. The sound that his heart makes when she strings together melodies in the form of actions that pluck on his heartstrings like the chords in songs, because words do little to describe affection when words are only movements of lips beyond his understanding. He will be free from the confines of sound and he will understand through his own physical experiences, regardless of what beat the world decides to play on the surface of his eardrums. He will hear no evil, and his own judgment will be the final word.
But he will not break; he will go on…

You take away his strength…
No, that would not stop him. He would just grow stronger in more ways than brute force. Without the facility of strength, he would gain the mental capacity to comprehend more than he ever has. The shackles that bind him would break and he would be able to fly through clouds of wisdom and skies of endless possibility. There is no cage for the human mind, and he would grow to reach unfathomable heights as he accepts his own weakness. Trading one aspect of power for another, he broadens the scope of his strength beyond what he learns and develops it to reach the unthinkable. The heavens become just another level to reach past, when the human body has failed to become an anchor. Instead of using his fists, his tongue becomes sharp as blades, with the skill of Blade hunting vampires. His verbal assault will go far beyond what jabs and hooks are capable of, his intellect acting as the ammunition. And with the increased eloquence he gains, he becomes capable of expressing his feelings to the greatest extent of his ability.
But he will not break; he will go on…

You take away his mind…
No, for he would simply live a life in ignorance. He would be unaware of suffering and the understanding of pain would be unknown to him. This idiocy would be his shelter from all the hurt the world can distribute and he will be invincible. The shell of naivety will be his armor and this crusader would be invulnerable from the evil of society. Nothing but the most basic and simple desires would present themselves to him, and so simple things like love and war would reflect off of the little bubble he resides in and fly off into oblivion. Without the input of others, he will hold on tightly to his own morality, with no second thought about his own mortality…he becomes selfless.
But he will not break; he will go on…

So how do you break a man?

You break his heart.
The heart that allows him the freedom to accept the ideas and impressions that reality has placed so willingly into his mind. The heart that allows him to see and hear what it yearns for most in combination with the irresistible desire to be irresistibly desired. The heart that gives him the strength to place his heart on his sleeve and risk it all on a leap of faith into a jungle composed of cactuses known as “heartbreak”.

You cover the heart behind his eyes in the emulation of an eclipse, desaturating each color into nothingness. Without his sight, he loses track of what he was looking for. Tears flow from behind his eyelids as he loses the treasure he has spent a lifetime in search of.
And you break his heart…

You leave him isolated with nothing but the mirages conjured from the depths of his loneliness for company, and his heart will grow deaf. The slow beating will dawdle to a deafened thud as the repeated whispers of despair in his head torment him. He covers his ears in hopes that it would protect him from his own demons…but it doesn’t.
And you break his heart…

You take away the strength of his heart to beat for “the one”, and he withers away. Without the passion that courses through his veins, his mind becomes numb and paralysis runs its course. He becomes doubtful of his strength to go on and his weakness overcomes him, rendering him a pathetic shadow of himself. A shadow in search of a way out of the abyss he has fallen into on his race to the one he had fallen for.
And you break his heart…

You allow his own thoughts to torture him into submission. With no way to escape, he attempts to hide inside the bubble he had built, thought it only serves to keep him imprisoned in his own misery. In his own mind, his past circles him in shifts of regrets and “should-haves” and “would-haves” and “could-haves”. Memories upon memories begin to stack on top of each other in a macabre image of pain as he relives each moment he despised, as they continually flash through his mind. Without somebody to hold him in an embrace meant to comfort, he remains solitary within a sea of his own tears located inside of himself.
And you break his heart…

You break the heart that keeps him attached to the world. The heart that grounds him in reality. The heart that acts as his tether to the universe. Without it, he becomes a broken vessel incapable of reciprocation. The act of falling in love becomes the accidental injury dealt to his soul. As he himself falls in love, his heart plummets though the air at the same pace he has raced towards her. And when it makes contact with the rejection she issues, it shatters into fragments that are strewn across the landscape of his psyche. Constantly, the throbbing pain in his chest serves as a reminder of her…and he is left broken.

How do you break a man?
You break...his heart.

Based on "How to Break a Man" by Vince Ticsay