So I've been on an unintentional internet diet here. Those internet issues I mentioned a while back? Well it was almost a full month of them. Seeing as I couldn't do my posting at work, I was pretty much without resources to start telling the stories floating around my heart and my head.
As it turns out, though some good things have been happening...it's been a very stressful time. I can't say with 100% sincerity that I'm happy right now. I'm not really. Especially in the past week or two, some things have come up that I have been having trouble with.
I'm fantastic at bottling things up, and I've done nothing but do that for at least two weeks now. Time to break the bottle. I'm fighting it as I'm doing it here...
So I think as much as people have positive mantras or words they live by, they have negative ones too. Things you believe because you feel like you haven't been proven wrong yet, or you think you haven't. And when you're stressed or tired or when you see an old situation crop back up, it's really easy to let that thought consume you. If we could only let the good ones consume us....but it never seems to work that way.
I recently kind of opened myself up to getting hurt almost intentionally. I didn't realize what was about to be said would get to me, because I figured I'd turned my heart off to it by now. Which in itself is something that disturbs me, in hindsight. But on some sort of devil-may-care whim I pretty much threw my arms wide open and said "hit me with it!" thinking I could handle it. And I couldn't.
One of the things I've lived a lot of my life believing is that people always leave. That the only person you or anyone else can count on is you. And I've amassed files upon files of evidence to that point, and when I'm hurting, I tend to sit there and convince myself that that's the only way it can go, despite any evidence to the contrary. And it sucks, and I'm old enough to know that that's what I'm doing and I need to stop, but in the face of a particularly poisonous arrow, there's that old ghost lurking in the shadows again.
It's not what you'd expect to hurt either. Because a part of what I heard I was expecting to hear. It's this...have you ever felt like no matter what you do, you'll always just be that person it's convenient to turn to? Or the one it's convenient to be around? You know, like "always a bridesmaid, never a bride?" Sometimes I feel like it's "Always a lover, never loved." or "Always finding people important, never being important to people." A throwaway. And I was listening to a friend with a broken heart beat up on herself in ways I never want to hear anyone talk about themselves. She was saying never enough, hates this about herself, hates that...can't possibly be enough for someone. And I was overwhelmed with the urge to just shake her silly and go "YOU ARE AMAZING." because she is...but I heard my own voice in it too. And worse, in the state of mind I've been in, I let it marry with the voices telling me there's never anyone to count on. I let it tear me up enough to doubt the arms holding on to me. I let it bubble up and spill over other places...and while that wasn't all bad, because I finally spoke my mind and told someone what *I* need instead of just trying to be there for what everyone else did...I didn't want to spread the bad feelings, and I probably did.
I was thinking about who I've become lately, and I don't like all of it. I think I've put up bigger walls than I ever have before. And I feel like a lot of times I turned off my heart, to the detriment of myself and others. I can't look straight in the eyes of what I want to see most because I'm afraid it'll turn into something else as soon as I see it. And I wasn't always like that.
At the same time, I feel like even though I've grown and become more assertive, and been able to look at people and tell them no, flat out. I can't, or I won't... that I still operate a certain way. And I don't know that I want to operate any differently than I do, even though it contributes to this problem.
Time and time again I get that "Oh you're so naive" look. Or the one that says "we think you're a doormat."
But I'm sick of being apologetic for who I am. I'm a passionate person. I always will be. If I love something, I show it. And that IS NOT WEAKNESS. It's looked at as weak, especially in relationships with people, friends, family and otherwise. It's the only way I know how to be. If you're in that group of people I love with my whole heart, it's always going to be that way. And I can't change that. Sometimes I try. Lately I've been trying, because that hurts a lot sometimes. It hurts to go 30 miles for someone who won't go down the street for you, you know? It hurts to pour out your heart every day for a year and have it not really make any impact on that person (that's the hardest one. it hurts to type it). It hurts to be a close confidante but never really valued as a friend. All these things are true, but I don't want to let it change who I am. I don't want to let this get in the way it has these past weeks.
And I apologize, because this entry is less for anyone else than it is to just purge some of this bile inside of me that I've been carrying around. I don't feel like walking around under a dark cloud is where I want to be. And I don't want to freeze out my heart, so I purge here.
Here's one thing I did want to say. As Hallmark as it sounds...if you read this and you ever felt like this...I guarantee you someone else in your life has too. So...remember someone. Think about the people in your life who have made a difference that you haven't told in a while. Then stop thinking and tell them.
Two things will happen: It will remind you, if you are feeling like me, that you're not unloved and you're not forgotten, and you ARE worth something...it will remind you of the people who cast bright light on all those ghosts in the shadows-who became family, or stood beside you when you needed it the most
And it will make someone feeling that way, or just having a bad day in general...feel like someone out there cares about them.
Let me 'splain. No no, there is too much...let me sum up (and thanks for reading the long version)
Give a little bit
Give a little bit of your love to me
Give a little bit
I'll give a little bit of my love to you
There's so much that we need to share
So send a smile and show you care
I'll give a little bit
I'll give a little bit of my life for you
So give a little bit
Give a little bit of your time to me
See the man with the lonely eyes
Take his hand, you'll be surprised
Give a little bit
Give a little bit of your love to me
I'll give a little bit of my life for you
Nows the time that we need to share
So find yourself, we're on our way back home
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