The Worst Part about Love

I have always been a people person. I like friends. I like family. I can think of no better way to spend my life than investing in the people around me.

I love people.

I love the opportunity to experience new things. Laugh together. Cry together. Support one another. Cheer on one another. People. Love. Relationships. I love it all.

However, it is all fun and games until someone gets hurt.

And people get hurt A LOT.

Have you ever been hurt by someone? (Insert sarcasm.) Of course, YOU HAVE! From the time we were young, we were getting hurt by people. Friends, family, peers on the playground, there are an endless amount of opportunities to get hurt in this life.

We all have people in our life that have disappointed us. Not just the acquaintance we work with, but people close to us. Times when we found out something hurtful a friend said about us or when we needed support but failed to receive it.

I have some of the most amazing friends and family a girl could ask for, but that doesn’t mean my relationships come with no cost. There are so many opportunities for misunderstandings.

I believe this is something that should be talked about more. Don’t get me wrong, I am not cynical, but I do consider myself very practical.

Sometimes misunderstandings happen that seem completely innocent and then there are times when the pain seems deliberate. These experiences make us second guess having people in our life at all.

This is when the rubber meets the road and love can seem like one horrible idea.

We have done ourselves a disservice because we don’t have a good understanding of what love is or the power that it beholds. Somewhere along the way, we have told ourselves that if we love big, then we will be loved big.

Truth is, if we Love big, we will Hurt big.

So many of us expect our love to be returned to us at the measure it is given. Love is not given to the measure it is received. Love is given to the measure of capacity.

I can love big, but not because I have people in my life who don’t make mistakes, but because I have worked for years on growing my capacity to love.

Love isn’t about receiving what you give.

Love is about giving all that you have.

Love is about stretching you to become a beautiful person, no matter if someone else chooses to do the same.

The Truth about Unconditional Love

Growing up, I heard the term “unconditional love” a lot. Honestly, I had the mindset unconditional love was everywhere. I thought every friend and family member I had would love me, value me, and honor me without condition.

Of course, it didn’t take me long to learn the harsh reality that unconditional love wasn’t as common as I thought. In reality, there are a whole lot of conditions to the relationships we live, some spoken and some unspoken.

For years of my life, I tried really hard to “prove” my worthiness to my friends and family. I did this by trying to be the “perfect” daughter, sister, friend, and wife. Of course, I was nowhere near perfect and this left me exhausted.

I was constantly afraid I wasn’t going to measure up and in the end, they would figure out I wasn’t worthy of their love.

In my early twenties, I became a bit obsessed with trying to be “perfect”, had a minor life breakdown, and demanded I find a new way for myself to live.

I will never forget, standing in front of my bed, crying to my husband that I was exhausted, broken, and completely discouraged. I felt like I was failing at being who everyone wanted me to be.

I felt like a failure… and I was.

I was a failure at reading everyone’s mind. I was a failure at being perfect. I was a failure at being sure no one would ever reject me.

You see, I was extremely afraid my friends and family expected me to be perfect and I knew the truth.

I wasn’t.

I was so afraid once everyone figured it out they would leave me.

And I was afraid to be alone.

This breakdown led me to one of the best journeys of my life. I decided to stop trying to be perfect. I chose to stop trying to be what I thought everyone wanted me to be. I decided to stop trying to control everyone else and their choice to love me or not to.

I looked at my life and realized there were a few people I really did think loved me unconditionally. I chose to talk to them about what I was going through.

I had conversations with them and explained how much I had been afraid of failing them. I talked to them and owned it. This wasn’t their problem to fix. It was mine. I didn’t tell them so they could treat me with care. I told them so they could encourage me to find healing.

And they did.

Year by year, I learned I did have people in my life who loved me unconditionally.

I learned not everyone, but some people are willing to look at the worst parts of me and say,

“That’s ok, I love you”.

I learned it was ok to be the failure that I was.

I became obsessed with getting real with my crap. I didn’t tell everyone everything, but I made sure to at least tell someone everything.

I started feeling free for the very first time in my life.

No secrets.

Nothing left to be afraid of.

I began to understand not everyone in my life is even called to love me unconditionally and I don’t even need that anymore.

I have learned I have been given unconditional love from a few so I can now give unconditional love to many.

And maybe in the end, that’s what it has always been about.

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