Conversations with my Universe

“I’d love to see you call your own bluff and blow your own cover. I’m hoping you’ll stop hiding your assets and keeping so many secrets. And I really, really wish you would come out of the closet not just about your unique gender identity, but also about the other idiosyncratic twists and turns that make you who you are. Please stop being afraid of revealing your beauty, Libra—even the work-in-progress aspects of your beauty. It’s time to close the gap between the real you and the images people have of you.”

Who am I?

In trying to heal you, I’m healing myself.

I’m gifted or cursed with the outside appearance of absolute calmness even while the hidden me is raging with emotions. People tell me all the time how serene I look. It use to surprise me because I can feel the emotions swirling inside and assumed it must be obvious on the outside too. But it wasn’t. This is great when I want to hide my true feelings, and it’s horrible when I need to feel protected. Everybody assumes that I’m fine all the time and needs no help.

More and more I’m feeling vulnerable and want comforting hugs to hold me. I use my calm exterior as a shield to protect myself, and it’s now so tough that it’s keeping people out. My friend J. keeps reminding me that it’s through vulnerability that we connect with each other. I believe her, I just don’t know how to show this honestly without seeming desperate. I guess we all feel scared and alone at times; I just need to find a way through this.

I finally understand why I’ve been holding onto you, even when you moved hundreds of miles away. I was trying to save myself by trying to change you. I always felt indignant about the way you so desperately wanted to be loved and your fight with loneliness. I looked down on it. Now, I see that I felt this way because I was trying to change that in myself. I thought that if I could make you see how great your life was I could heal my own life. Your blossoming career, your friends who try to love you and your family – I wanted you to open your eyes and see the wonderful things that were already filling your life, but you seemed to only focus on the lack. I always got angry when I heard you this way, I wanted you to see how blessed you were. So I tried and tried to make you see. Even when you left, I wanted another chance to make you change, and I couldn’t explain the force of that urge to myself until today.

I couldn’t figure out why you were in my thoughts so often. We weren’t that close. It finally opened up to me this morning, and I understood that through you, I was trying to make myself see, to convince myself that my life was already great and to stop dwelling on the lack. Convincing you to stop trying so hard to be liked and stopping you from thinking that you could only be complete with another person at your side was my cry, not your’s. I see that this was not about you at all, it was all about me. The parts of you that I secretly looked down on were the me that I was trying to heal. I don’t want to change you anymore. It evaporated the moment I realized the truth in my crusade. Now, all I want is to say: Thank You.

I understand: it wasn’t who, it was why.

I hit the core and there’s nowhere else to go. There’s only here and right now. I feel like a soft marshmellow that’s too close to the fire.

Thank you for my $10 lesson. Learned. Got it, and will not be doing it again.

J. helped me understand why I try so hard in wanting to be perfect all the time. It’s the idea that I’d be acknowledged, seen, and loved. That I’d be cherished. Peering into my past, I can see myself doing this my whole life. I do it now. Every time I deliver a project early, I hand it over whispering, “See how great I am?” There’s two sharp edges to this sword: it’s a bribe, and it’s a set up so that when the Thank You’s don’t gush in, all is as expected and I get to start over again; reaching, reaching, reaching.

It amazes me that even when it never worked to get the appreciation I craved I kept trying. I never stopped. The acknowlegement I got was never enough and always evaporated too soon. I constantly needed more. The only thing to do now is to find a way to be great simply to be great. To do it for myself, with no strings. I don’t know how to get out of this insane cycle. It’s too painful to stay.

Thank you.

Home I want to go there.