Sometimes when you learn something, it changes you forever. Life is full of such moments, those specific points in time where you know you can never go back to the way things were…you can never go back to being who you were. It’s a strange feeling, a significant feeling and a little bit of a sad feeling because things won’t ever be the same again. Although some types of change are good change, it still feels a little uncomfortable, unknown terrain, like driving into the sun…you can see a little but mostly not. It’s also a little like losing something, something intangible like when you were a kid and feeling freedom and accomplishment like never before as mom or dad let go of the back of your bike without the training wheels. You were flying like mad, the wind in your face, everything blowing by in a whir without a care at all until something happens unexpectedly and that bump in the road you were on propelled you from your seat of blissful freedom and suddenly gave you a lesson in concrete topography. You get back up and you try again but you may never have that feeling again, that feeling of trust, no fear, pure innocent exhilaration. That is until the first time you touch unconditional love, many, many years later as an adult.
Most of my adult life, romantic relationships were really about ego lessons, power struggles, compromising for control, stealing or preserving energy, suffering and delivering emotional manipulation blindly. That’s just the way things were in my ignorant state. In a way I think that ignorance was bliss for quite a while, never mind the fact that I had to keep starting, stopping, starting over again, stopping and starting over again in an endless heartbreaking cycle. For a while I shut my heart down altogether and pursued only the emotionally unavailable. What was inside of me manifested outside of me and I never understood why. I was a victim of my own mind, my own thoughts but through the years I gained a little wisdom and I learned to change my thoughts, change my heart and change my mind. Somewhere along the way, despite flying high, taking a tumble or two and learning about all sorts of terrain and topography as I was thrown to the ground again and again in my own emotional desperation, I learned something astounding. I learned something new. This one thing I learned changed me forever and I will never, ever be the same. I learned how to love without condition. But I couldn’t hold that because the rest of my thoughts had not made it to the level I somehow found myself. I hadn’t chosen very wisely, what I chose felt safe but the love I felt was real, it was unconditional and it was beautiful.
As I said, I couldn’t hold it and when it reverted to conditional and I saw that the individual I loved did not know about unconditional love, I saw how things would go and it had to end. He pushed the buttons, I did the walking. It was easy, it was mutual and then the emotions set in. Difficult emotions but it wasn’t so bad. I remembered what I had learned. So here I sit in my self-imposed solitary social confinement. I need time to think. I need time to breathe. I need time to heal some more. I need all of my thoughts to catch up to where I now know my heart is capable of going. I’ve now limited myself in a very incredible way, “a quality problem” a good friend of mine would say. I know that I can never go back to the types of relationships I’ve had in the past. I’ve tried dating some and my heart is open but I see so quickly now what spans out before us the instant we meet and one date is usually it. So, I’ve decided to take myself out of the game a bit…contemplate this “quality problem” of mine and decide what it means. It may be a little lonely for a while but thankfully, I’ve got my family, my work, my creative pursuits to keep me busy until I really finish healing, until I can really ascend to that place I almost claimed and then I’ll try again. What I am looking for is not easily found. I can never settle for a warm body and someone to feed my ego. I can never settle again for the mundane drudgery of compromises and reciprocal narcissism and I cannot start again until I find an equal at every level. I no longer feel the need to put a thing (relationship) before a person. I’m not afraid any more of being alone. Loneliness has become my best friend and that doesn’t make me sad not one little bit. It makes me happy because I’ll never again face those lessons I’ve already learned, I’ll never again settle for less than I deserve and I know I will never start something again I know I won’t finish. I am content to be and do and exist in my world moving in time with my own music, my own soul and the inner unconditional love I found. It’s an infinite well I learned and I know one day another soul on this path like me may be walking one night under the stars and maybe we’ll run into each other noticing Venus or Mercury in the distance and we might both realize we both will never be the same ever again.
I guess in a way I’m saying good bye. I’m closing a door that should have been closed a very long time ago and I’m not sure where I’m going or how I’ll get there but love is my truth and the truth shall set me free. Be well on your journey my friends, my thoughts…as always…are with you. Love and light!
Sunday Features - Photography and Poetry 
Joy
Neutral
