Not quite there yet. But trying.

I have always been obsessed with the concept of love and how it brings joy to everyone who experiences it—not because of its magic but mostly because of how it practically helps you survive your day-to-day struggles cheerily. I have always believed that love is so powerful that however much you were hurt before, real love can trump this negative feeling. I’ve always shooed away cynical people whenever they question the existence of true love and insist it just wrecks the lives of people. Turns out, my thoughts about true love are so pure, almost to a point of being beguiled by my own musings. Love, in every beginning, should be great, one that uplifts the spirit. It should smell like the aroma of freshly lit candles straight out of the grocery bag. It should feel like a warm shower right before retiring on a chilly night. It should look like stars twinkling in the dark blue sky after a day of heavy downpour. It should sound like soft whispers of cicadas, which will most likely put you to sleep amid the exasperating noise. It should taste like a newly popped bottle of Malbec—crisp and lush. But why does it hurt? If love is such a wonderful thing, why does it always come with pain? People tend to drown themselves in the idea of being in love. There’s nothing wrong about it. But they should be reminded that love is not about nights when you cry yourself to sleep. It’s not about incessant drinking to a point of bleeding your gut. It shouldn’t be about random crazy nights of sitting on pavements wishing you’d see them by their doorstep. It is definitely not about spending $1300 on the most expensive bottle of wine just so you can make yourself feel good. It’s also not about begging for affection and sex just so you can be assured that something’s going on between you. Love and relationships sometimes go hand in hand. We all want that love to flourish into something transcendental. We all want to be in a relationship that’s real and truly deserving of our time and effort. All of these, we express in a seemingly haphazard and hasty manner. But what’s more agonizing is how we end up seeing ourselves in compromising situations. We compromise our beliefs. We compromise our standards. More so, we compromise our self-worth. We swing from tree to tree just to make an innocuous connection work. We climb mountains only to find out no one is there to face us. Everything becomes a vicious cycle. Suddenly, the magical feeling is fading. Until one day, you realize that what you thought was cunning is slowly transforming into a black hole that sucks all your energy from within. And yet, you continue to cling onto that one possibility. You still hope that if you just give it your all, something good might happen, borne out of a fairytale mindset likely coupled with unimaginable pain. You just want to be free from this senseless captivity. But you also fear that liberty is not the answer. On and off. You make decisions without thinking. But the fear of not being able to love someone as much is just creeping in. You are afraid to lose that special someone who isn’t even sure of things. You are afraid. And you realize.. That’s all it is. You will always be scared. You will always be scared of things that are uncertain. You will always be afraid of something you don’t deserve. The craziest part of being in love is realizing that after going through all this grueling pain, you still end up thanking God for all the wonderful moments you have shared with that one person. You still silently wish that sooner or later, your stars will align. You secretly hope and pray that one day, the person who gave you immense suffering will be the same person who you’d celebrate your triumphs with. You intimately imagine how beautiful a life both of you can have together. All these wishful thoughts, wet pillows, and soft wails. What a way to end each and every day. I guess, that’s the beauty of love after all—learning to embrace the pain of letting go while continuing to live in a world of fantasy and make-believe. Excruciatingly beautiful. I do not despise myself for having these celestial ideas of how true love should be characterized. Perhaps, what I believed in still stands. Only that, I am yet to meet that one person who will be a testament to how all these otherworldly concepts can be attributed to love.

[Cover photo by https://unsplash.com/@larm]

[Originally posted on Facebook]