Goodbye...

My soul is shattered. Our moment was perfection. I didn't ask; I didn't beg; I didn't force you to do anything. You acted on an impulse - a feeling. You made a move of epic proportions. Our souls swirled in a passionate and mesmerizing moment that my mind has squandered on since the moment your lips left mine. Our fate was sealed. A moment - a friendship - a destiny; our lives were speeding into eternity. We were only steps from capturing forever. It was as if the world stopped turning. Our reign of tortuous and heart wrenching flirtation turned into a kiss of insurmountable epicness. Epic passion, epic closeness, epic understanding ensued in an instant. Friends don't kiss like we did; best friends don't kiss like we did; lovers kiss like we did. Don't tell me you don't kiss; don't tell me you didn't feel it; don't tell me it was nothing – I call bullshit. We are perfection and you are scared. You are terrified to move towards forever.

And yet, you allowed our destiny to disintegrate. You found a way to completely destroy me without trying. Only now do I know that your lips on mine, the moment that revolutionized our existences, was simply a goodbye. The kiss that changed our relationship forever was only a moment of closure for you; a moment to end an internal struggle. I don’t blame you – I blame us equally. If only one of us were honest with each other; if only I knew you were saying goodbye – I would have begged you to stay. My soul has expired. There are no words to explain the gravity of the situation. Our ending was accelerated in one swift motion. I had no control, no saving grace, and no chance of surviving. We are anything but existing – our relationship, our friendship, our time, has escaped us. We kissed forever goodbye – You kissed forever goodbye.

But I love you; I've always loved you; I will always love you. You were my best friend. You were my rock. You were my happiness, when I never imagined happiness was possible. You were my saving grace so many times, I cannot even count. You are my forever.  I can't imagine how I will survive without you. But I will continue to breathe. I will continue to hold you dear and I will always remember the feeling you gave me, even when you didn’t know it. I will continue to hope that our paths will cross one day, because it is all I have left. I am completely in love with you and I can only hope that somewhere in your cold and desolate existence, underneath all the lies and hate, you love me too. 

Love "me"

You have to love yourself, before you can love anyone else.

A concept so simple. Love yourself and then love others. But how do we go about loving ourselves without affection? How is it that we can love ourselves without a loving relationship? And if there is a way, what is it?

I guess it works the same way your needs do. If you cannot suffice your own needs and care for yourself, how can you anyone else?

But the truth of the matter is, we avoid ourselves inside and out. We avoid mirrors, pictures (unless you are narcissistic), self conversation, talking about ourselves, our needs. Everything we do, will never be good enough by our own standards. We will never amount to anything in our own eyes. We continue to be our own biggest critic. We will never be comfortable and safe in our own skin.

STOP!

We are gorgeous. We are smart. We are funny and bright. We have great ideas, we have a great personality, and people love being with us. We are beautiful just the way God made us.

See, our attitude keeps us down. We allow ourselves to get down because we listen to the critic inside.

So stop listening. Argue with it. Tell it to eff off. Tell the inner critic that we love ourselves. Upset the critic so that it listens for a change.

I'm realizing that once that voice shuts up, my brain has a few minutes to love myself. And everyday, I intend to grant my brain a few minutes more to love me.

So I challenge you. Shut the critic up, and love yourself for a few minutes each day.

Because ultimately, until we love ourselves, we can never love anyone else and chances are, the majority of people we know, will not be able to love us.