Peace and Love… Sucks.

You can tell me when its over, if the high was worth the pain…

Being in love has always been my favorite part of living life. It’s never been something that I have wanted to or let define me, but the time that I have spent happily in love has always shined a little brighter and made every day a little more special. But allowing yourself to fall deeply, madly, wholeheartedly in love with another person comes with its own set of risks, and if you’ve ever suffered a breakup that wasn’t your decision, you know exactly what I’m talking about. If you haven’t, there really aren’t words or phrases to truly convey the intense feelings of soul crushing loss of this person that you trusted your heart, your secrets, your insecurities, your vulnerabilities with. The embarrassment that you let this person in and it was all for nothing. The humiliation of the fact that you had introduced this person to everyone in your life and now everyone knows that it didn’t work out. The realization that all of these plans that you had made for a specific version of the future now no longer exist. The feeling of being haunted by memories spent with this person and the what ifs of what life would be like in this moment if that person hadn’t left your life. All of these things happen when you get your heart broken, and you walk around feeling like time is moving in slow motion and you have an open wound that only you can see and feel.

I have never been the type of person to have a lot of acquaintances or friends, my circle has always been very small. But the people that are in my life, I love intensely, fiercely, and without conditions. I don’t open up to many people, but the ones that I do, I give my whole heart to. The metaphor that makes the most sense to me about this phenomenon is that loving someone is giving them a loaded gun that works only on you, and trusting them not to pull the trigger.

I’ve had the trigger pulled on me twice.

You’d think that having to endure that pain once, much less twice, would be enough to make anyone swear off loving, liking, or letting another person in ever again. But I think, for me, its just taught me the lesson of the consequences of this kind of deep love. That being able to love someone so intensely can also lead to intense pain. That the highest highs can be followed by the lowest of lows. Which makes the ability of being able to open yourself up to being vulnerable with someone new all the more special, because you know exactly what it could cost you, but you do it anyway, because the chance of finding something real is always worth the risk.

My broken experiences with love have not broken the way I feel about it or my outlook towards love. I’ve learned so much about myself and what I want and what is important to me and what I have to offer someone else in a relationship. Going through the pain of losing what I had has only made me feel like I have leveled up and evolved into an even stronger and better version of myself. I’m changed and different than who I was before, but in the best way that makes me so excited about the future. Yes, love can suck sometimes, BUT its also one of the most wonderful things we get to experience as humans.

I have been hurt, but that hurt has had a part of making me into the woman currently writing these words. I’ve never been more unapologetically myself, I love myself more than I ever have before, and I’ve never been more excited about what comes next.

Beginnings always hide themselves in ends.