#fallingoutoflive

Falling in love has always been portrayed as something mystical and beautiful—a spark that may or may not truly exist. I adore falling in love, yet I despise how much it hurts. They say love comes easily when it is true, but for me, it never has. No matter how breathtaking the view is while you fall, love turns bleak and painful when you realize you will eventually crash—alone.

I have fallen so deeply, embraced by a boy’s arms only in my mind. For three years, I chased him through endless fields of tulips—his favorite. I ran through those meadows beneath a golden sun, his smile lingering in the sky. I danced in the rain, frolicked with butterflies, convinced he would come. But eventually, I saw the truth: I was alone in the meadow, alone with the tulips and the butterflies. He never loved me. I had built a world of solitude, mistaking it for something shared.

Love, when real, is not a prison of waiting and longing. It is not the quiet insanity of weaving lies so tightly that you remain trapped in them for years. I love falling in love, but the bliss has never lasted more than a fleeting moment. Falling out of love, however—that has brought me satisfaction, even pleasure.

For so long, I looked at him and saw someone beautiful, someone I longed to love, someone forever out of reach. But I grew weary. The meadow, once boundless, withered. The tulips bowed and died, the butterflies fled into the dimming sky, the sun sank below the horizon without the warmth I had once mistaken for his touch. I lay there as my love faded, as my obsession fell away. It was sad, it was dim, it was empty. Yet my shoulders, once burdened by longing, felt lighter.

Like a caged bird, I had sung of love and freedom, believing myself unbound until I saw the bars that confined me. I sang, hoping to be set free—only to realize I could never leave until I accepted that I might never stop loving. Only then did I let go. He became a part of me, but I could set him free. And in doing so, I set myself free.