Pain, Love, and Lessons

Sometimes pain becomes such a huge part of your life that you always expect it be there, because you can't remember a time it wasn't. But then one day you feel something else, something that feels wrong. Wrong because it's so unfamiliar. And in that moment, you realize your happy.

Love gave me this feeling. One single, beautiful, and gracious person. I had gotten so used to living a life full of pain that I didn't realize I was resisting something so much larger than myself. It took me two years to give it a shot and only three or four months for the flame to die out.We burned so brightly together and I've realized I was wrong to regret that for the past couple months.

Looking back on it now, I am ever so grateful for the time I spent carelessly happy and blissfully free, no matter how short it lasted. Because to me, every moment of pain I had risen from, was worth every second of love and letting someone in all the way. It was so hard to let go of, because it was such a long journey to get to where we had gotten. Letting him in was the hardest thing I had ever done and in the end it taught me that I can't get through life shutting people out. If I want to live happily that is. That love has taught me more than my words can express and more than I can even fathom right now, and that boy was the single best thing to ever happen to me. He walked into my life and changed everything, and that, is only one of the many things I thank God for every night.

I believe he was my soul mate. But before you mistake my intentions, I do not believe a soul mate is necessarily the person you are meant to spend the rest of your life with. In fact, I believe a soul mate is someone who uncovers layers of yourself that you didn't even know you had. Someone who saves you from a great struggle and someone who helps you find who you are supposed to be.

You may think you and your soul mate are meant to be. Hell, I was positive we were and at a time, he was too. Yet, I think we were so meant to be that we weren't. People come into our lives for reasons; whether it's to teach us a lesson or to guide us through the trenches. I believe that he did just that and I believe no matter how messed up everything currently is and how lost I might feel, that I'm still right where I'm supposed to be.

And I have faith that he is too.

Oh how the thunder does roll, Garth

The thunder rolls
And the lightnin' strikes.
Another love grows cold
On a sleepless night,
As the storm blows on
Out of control
Deep in her heart
The thunder rolls.

Do us both a favor and be straightforward dammit.

"I’m not like all the other guys" he says.

"Your cute and I like you" he says.  "Ya ya I’m sure you say that to all the girls huh?" you reply. "No no no it’s just you. I really like you" he says.

Cheesy pickup lines.

Putting on the “nice guy” face. (How don’t I know the signs of that by now? How can I not possibly tell that a guys is just planning to play me when it has happened so many times already?)
Doing and saying all the right things (How the hell did I not see the red flags?)

Ladies, I think by now we all know what I am referring too. Players. They exist and they’re everywhere and they suck. I don’t think boys understand the toll it has on a girl to be played. I don’t think they can see the damage they are doing when they look at you with that glimmer in their eyes. It makes you feel special, it makes you melt and it’s just as knee weakening as their soft seductive voice that knows exactly what to say and when to say it. Before they even go for a kiss they’re already killing you slowly and by the time they are leaning in, it’s then that they’ve got you hooked.

With kisses of poison they inject venom. Venom that’s addicting. It keeps us wanting more and it’s blinding. It’s not until the “deed” is done that we have the clarity to see what has actually just happened. To hear the words, “I don’t actually like you. I thought we were just messin around”. Ha. Messin around. Is that why you were so persistent? It wasn’t that you actually liked me for me? Is it ever going to be that someone likes me just for me and that for once they aren’t going to want just sex from me.

One urge, one goal, one mission. Whatever you call it, it’s all the same and it disgusts me. You give us false hopes and lower our expectations. You cause girls to degrade themselves, lose respect for themselves and grow to believe and accept that all guys are going to treat us this way; which leads us to settle for less than what we deserve. It’s a terrible cycle. I know that there are girls that do it too but not to the extremities that guys do.

Why don’t you put your extremely good acting kills to use and try out for a soap opera? Or even
better. Maybe if you boys decided to use all that time and effort that you do trying to get girls in bed, and put it into finding one nice girl that can be yours, then you can have all the sex you want with that one person. All that time and effort could be put to good use elsewhere as well. Hell, if you’re too much of a douche bag for commitment, at least save the nice girls the hurt and be straightforward about your motives. That way you’d be saving both our time and especially our feelings because we are girls (we’ll deny it) are kinda stupid sometimes. Sometimes we don’t see what things really are (or we refuse to) and we take you assholes and your bullshit at face value.


I am not disposable. So stop treating me and millions of other women like we are and give us some substance; give us validity; and for the love of god, quit making it utterly impossible for us to find some complacency.

Me

A guy asks me out on a date and my immediate thought is, 'Why?'.

'Why would you want to go out on a date with me?'

Then I start listing all the things that I see wrong with me. I start comparing myself to him and other girls. This boy is kind, athletic, funny, interested in the same things as me and super good-looking; he could have any girl he wants and he's asking me on a date?

Yeah, he sure is. And you know what? He won't be the last guy to do so.

I have stunning blue eyes, silky strawberry blonde hair, and a great smile. I also have a great body- I forget to be appreciative of it, no matter how hard I constantly work to keep up with it. I love exercising and being active. I am extremely athletic and competitive. I love sports, but especially football. I love the outdoors and sitting on a still pond casting toward the shore. I am not the typical girl who loves to shop and do my make-up because I think that natural beauty far exceeds all the fake tans, manicures and foundation caked on your face.

Aside from my looks, I have a killer personality. I am funny as all hell; I can make others laugh just as easily as I crack myself up. I am fun and no matter where I am, what situation I am in, or who I'm with; I make a good time happen anytime. I am creative and innovative- able to make something out of nothing. I appreciate all life's little things and I am easily amused. I am spontaneous. I dance when I hear music and I am silly when I feel like being silly. I smile often and I think the world we live in is an amazing place. I am great with children and will one day be an amazing mother, despite the past misfortunes I have experienced. I look at my traumatic past like it's a stepping stone to a great future. I see it optimistically- that my trials and tribulations have made me who I am today. I am strong, resilient, and brave. I have perspective that many don't, and I use it to my advantage to help others. I am grateful and appreciative, never forgetting to count my blessings. I am wise beyond my years and I am the only one of me there is. I may be hard on myself, but it is days like these that I realize I should be proud of myself. I have come so far and still have so far to go, but I have risen from so much darkness and it's imperative that I remember the progress I've made.

It's time I start believing and stop questioning why a man would ask me out on a date.

I am beautiful, I am me, and there is no one else I'd want to be.

Him.

I want so badly to just be free from the thought of him.

He haunts my dreams, my wandering mind, and my every move. Rifling through my purse I find that plan ticket stub that was the end of everything, under my bed lies my suitcase that I refuse to touch because inside I know his t-shirt lies, and hell, I can’t remember the last time I turned on the radio and left it up to fate to see what song would bring me to tears this time.

I go for a run to sweat out the very memory of him and shame on me for putting my iPod on shuffle when “I Want Crazy” stabs like knives into my eardrums.

I scroll through my facebook to pass sleepless time and every other post is either his or one he’s tagged in.

I get sprite to drink in the dining hall and I think of him.

I press my lips to a bottle of bud, a handle of tequila, a shot glass. I think of him. I forget about him for the night but as soon as

I lay in bed there he is next to me.

His arms around me and his steady breath buried into my hair.

"Mine"
"Yours"

On my skin I still feel him.
On my lips I still taste him.
Kissing people who's faces are a blur and I still taste him.

Every image, every emotion, every memory crashes into me all at once.
His touch.
His eyes.
All his “I love you’s”
Him.
Oh him and all these damn lies and I think to myself: 'Was it all just a big lie?"

I can’t escape.

At night I pray for him. I ask God to guide him, show him the way and to lead him to happiness because I know he so desperately seeks it. Needs it.

But then I proceed to ask God to just let me forget him. 

I walk with my head down and watch my feet hit the ground.
Everyday is the same.
I take them one at a time.
Trying my best to find my way
without
him.