#carlad

In my short time of being alive, I’ve realized 2 very important things about myself. 1. I have an abundance of love to give. 2. I seek out the wrong kind of love for myself. Let me explain. When it comes to my group of friends, I’ve always been the one unlucky with love. I’ve dated the most number of guys, had the most drama and also NEVER not been in a relationship. (That’s going down a whole different path of a blog post which I’ll get to one day. Hopefully) But yes. I was the girl who “changed boyfriends like I changed underwear”. I’ve dated guys for superficial reasons when I was in high school (“ooooh he’s cute and mysterious and has tattoos!!”) I’ve dated guys I’ve met in clubs in college (“wow he’s standing at the bar looking at me, it MUST be a connection we share and oooooooh look he has a sexy accent”) and then I’ve dated guys whom I’ve worked with and eventually they choose their work over me (surprise, surprise). But the point is, I’ve always looked for love in the wrong place. Don’t get me wrong. I’m fully aware of where this lack of judgement comes from; losing my dad when I was 6. Having never grown up with a father or even a male figure in my life, I’ve pretty much spent my entire existence just “guessing” how a man should treat me based on the films I’ve watched or stories I’ve heard. I strongly believed in the idea of “true love” and finding your soulmate at first sight. I believed in running away together and starting a life outside of your secular world. I believed in not needing any money or assets to live a happy life with your partner. But the older I get and after more failed relationships than not, I’ve started to realize my expectation of love is pretty unrealistic. So here are a few things I’ve learnt from my many failed rodeos which I hope will help prevent you from making the same mistakes. 1. Love yourself. Yes, in a relationship you have to love your partner. But never, NEVER, love them at the expense of yourself. Know your limits and boundaries. Know that if a line has been crossed you need to address it. Don’t keep quiet about things because over time, these little things will grow into big things. I found this our after I ended up at the hospital after a particularly large fight with an ex. 2. Stop looking for love. Love is all around. But sometimes when we are so obsessed with finding it we completely overlook it. Stop. Breath. Relax. Take time for yourself. Do things YOU love to do. Treat yourself on dates, movies, shopping. Instead of looking for someone to show you love, why not show yourself some love so you KNOW how it feels. So you have a benchmark when this lucky fella comes into your life and you can tell him confidently “yes, please take me to the movies cause I looooove chickflicks” The right man is going to see your self worth and want to make you happy because he feels you deserve to be happy. And he’ll want to be the only man to share that happiness with you (no matter how lame chick flicks might seem to him) 3. Love isn’t absolute. As your relationship grows, so will your love. It may start out as a crush and slowly develop into a deep passionate love. And then over the course of your relationship, filled with new events and decisions on both your parts, your love has to adapt. Your love has to be molded to withstand circumstances. Your love needs to evolve because the both of you evolve. No 2 people go into a relationship and stay exactly the same all throughout. Change is inevitable. And if you don’t have a love that can keep up with the changes, it will fall apart. 4. Learn to accept love. I’ve grown up in a full female household and therefore it was always hard for me to release control to my partner. Whether it was small things like choosing where to have dinner, to bigger things like allowing someone to take care of me and drive me around. I found it really difficult because I thought it meant I was weak and NEEDED someone. The idea that I “needed” someone in my life was so foreign and made me really uncomfortable. Because what if that person wasn’t around anymore? How would I be able to carry on without them? But truth be told, it feels absolutely incredible to have someone take care of you. To love you whole heartedly. To want to do things to make you happy not for any other motive but your happiness. Not because he’s trying to get into your good graces or even your pants. But because he sees your weaknesses, he sees your flaws, but he also sees your heart under all of the walls you’ve built from having shitty relationships. He sees your insecurities and sees your true self. And he wants to love you in spite of everything. And it’s not even a begrudging kind of love. It’s a full, whole hearted, “we don’t know what’s going to happen but let’s jump” kind of love. It’s a pure, raw, animalistic kind of love that involves no bullshit. That’s the kind of love that terrifies me and I’ve tried many times to push it away, but that’s also the kind of love that’s real and that’s what I need. 5. Love is love no matter what. When you have felt the full magnitude of what love can be, you know it will exist even if your relationship doesn’t. Love has taught me that many times, the greatest lesson is to know when to let go. Because love has never once been a tying factor. I love many people (it’s an actors occupational hazard) but it doesn’t mean I need to be WITH them. Love transcends any and all boundaries. Love is supposed to make you put the other person before yourself without even thinking about it. Love is meant to liberate you. And sometimes that liberation means you not being in the picture and you have to learn to accept that.

I’ve always wanted to be an entertainer. There’s no point in my life where I look back that I ever wanted to be anything different. As a child I would constantly put up shows in our backyard for my family and neighbors. I’d set up chairs for then, prepare my stage and even made sure my cassette was in the player and ready for my 1 man performance. I loved being the showman. I loved telling stories. I loved seeing the reaction on people’s faces as for that brief moment while they were watching me, they trusted me to transport them to a fictitious world. I felt there was so much power in being able to give your audience the gift of YOU. As I grew up, I never lost that love. I never lost that dream of wanting to do something I LOVED for a living. I couldn’t bare the thought of having to hate a job on a daily basis. I can only imagine how extremely tiring that would be (for many people I personally know in that situation). I knew that I didn’t lead an extravagant life and that I never wanted to be an entertainer for the fame or flashiness of it. I simply just loved to perform. Everything that came subsequently from me performing was merely icing on the cake. I was the girl in primary school who had huge dreams of making it in the entertainment industry. I was the one who studied during the school term and worked every single school holiday on various tv and film productions. I would work on weekends and film till midnight just to wake up a few hours later to lead the school in morning assembly (yes, I was the Assistant Head Prefect) And here I am, at 27 years old, with so much love in my heart for a job that I wake up and get to do every single day. Over the years I have learnt to respect my art so much because when you take away the fanciness of my chosen career, there’s A LOT of discipline that’s needed. I look up to people who have been doing it their whole lives and it makes me so excited to know that that’s something I can TOTALLY do. It’s not impossible to love your job. You just need to fight for it. And never, ever stop dreaming. Because dreams are what drives our hearts. Our souls. Xoxo Carla D