Nobody’s the bad guy, especially when it’s obvious that 1) a person genuinely loves you, and 2) the schemes they execute are to keep you in their life (a well-intentioned fear).

My only retort to #2 is that you have to let go in relationships and allow for things to fall into place. Love is freedom. Relationship is something different. Relationship is a shell, the cocoon of Love. Relationships are intended to protect the shared bond, Love. Sometimes in protecting the bond, we suffocate it by holding too tightly, when the thing we should be holding onto is Hope. If Love has been identified, then it is there. It will always be there. I think the mutual Belief in that is what keeps two people together in the worst of times. The Belief that you, this person I Love, loves me and is not trying to harm me or misunderstand me. There’s simply a disconnect or miscommunication. Both of these have remedies, one of which is to let go of Ego.

I am a grey person; I take into account all of the reasons to judge what is and what isn’t real or necessary. This characteristic makes me a great lover, person, a decent designer, and writer. A lot of people only think in black and white because it’s simpler for them. But it’s not simple from a black and white point of view to understand. And I think it’s important to understand the reasons, the details.

I really did need to move from Dallas to realize this. I needed physical distance and to stop moving (traveling) to see from a different perspective; to survey the land on which I’ve been building.

I needed to see that someone not showing me encouragement or affection did not mean that they did not love me.
I needed to see that someone breaking up with me was not them re-enacting my father leaving me or even that they did not care.
I needed to realize that giving my body freely was not an acceptance of true love or even true affection.
I needed to realize that true love and true affection come from hard work and time.

And now I can love in a healthy way that doesn’t include fear of being forgotten or left behind. And I’m sure I will fear at times but now I know that fears are illusions and the true love I hope to receive and/or keep in my life will be truncated by fear. To Believe in Love, keeps Love between two people alive.

I love so much better now. I realized when Treu and I broke up that the purpose of that relationship was to show me that I could have that kind of relationship where we are one, we are mutual, we are symbiotic. My relationship with Bright showed me that I am a fighter for what I believe in, that I did believe in something even if it wasn’t in my abilities or really even in myself. This whole journey over the past year was for that very reason: to believe in me.

I say and feel “I love you” every day for them, not out of reciprocity, but out of true love and appreciation for them. And because I feel Love, I can’t not express it. Funny that I didn’t know how before but now I can’t stop.

A chapter is ending in my life. I’m feeling ready for the next one.