#howdoyouknow

He’s kind and funny. Sometimes he’s a little weird, but aren’t we all? He may not have the looks or the education, but he works hard, or is trying to. Something just isn’t there. I can’t explain it. The initial high, the wanting to text him every day all day, just went away after three days. Does that mean there is something wrong with me? Something about who I am that’s getting in the way of me and my love story? Or is it fate telling me that he is not the one and to move on. How do I move on? He continues to text no matter how reserved I am, no matter how short my texts may be responding to his lengthy ones. How do I tell a seemingly nice person that I am not interested anymore- I do not want them anymore? Because it’s the truth. I do not want him anymore. This essay will be filled with many question marks because my life is just that, one big question mark. I’ve never felt secure in one place, besides the arms of my family. Of course I know their love and adoration, I know their heart. However, once it comes to me and the outside world, I’m lost. I’m lost and I feel as though I may never be found. This sounds as though I am an angsty teenager, with my dark hair covering my eyes, my dark eyeshadow and black nail polish. I wallow in my self-despair and dream of days where I don’t have to feel this way anymore or think about these things. But haven’t I moved passed those days? Move passed the angst and found the light? There is no light sometimes. Sometimes all there is is heartache and confusion. Anxiety gets the better of us and we sit there day dreaming of good days where we never felt this way, we dream of a world where everything is right and easy. But nothing is right and easy. Nothing can just come to you. Everything must be worked for, everything must have a price. Even the love of someone has a price. Should it be this way? Should it be this hard? Do I stay with him and give it a chance because I’m not sure what I want? Because all of my friends tell me I don’t give guys a chance? Say I give him a chance and realize later on I was right, my gut was right. What then? I tell the man that fell in love with me that I never loved him. That I knew from the very beginning our train was destined to fall off a cliff. To die. How do you tell someone you don’t want to hurt that the one thing that is hurting you is being with them. I don’t want you anymore. I never knew that feeling. I always questioned how someone could be with someone that they liked and wanted to see all of the time and then all of a sudden tell them “I don’t want you anymore”. But now I know. Are we, the dumpers, in the wrong? Possibly. But how are you in the wrong when you’re telling the truth? Should I lie for the rest of my life to keep someone from feeling pain or rejection? No. That would mean I live my life to appease another person, but shouldn’t I live my life to appease myself? This all doesn’t make sense. Nothing makes sense. You live to find someone to share this life with and to share the happy and sad times with. But how do you know? How do you know that one person is actually the one you want to spend all of these times with? 

Those reading this may have realized by now that I don’t even know myself, how would I know love? I don’t. I don’t know love besides the love of my family. I know rejection, I know heartache, I know loneliness. I’ve always said that once I found “the one” I would know. I’m told to enjoy being single and to use this time to understand myself. I thought I did understand myself. I thought I knew what I wanted. Maybe I don’t. Maybe I’ve spent these past years wasting time and not truly using it to understand who I am and what I want. I’ve wasted time that I could’ve used learning. I want to give up. Not all of the time, but most days, I want to just kick up my heels and call it a life. But no, not yet. I can’t lose myself to this life yet. I want to explore, I want to grow, I want to live a life I’ve never thought I could have. I use the excuse of how I was raised as reasons why I am the way, but is that really a good excuse? In my opinion no. But how do I break through this barrier? I want to jump out of my skin and run into a new one. I want to break the hold that’s held onto my life and just get away. Would I be happier away from here? Away from my family? I don’t know. I know I would miss them with every beat of my heart, but missing them doesn’t mean moving away is a bad idea. I can miss someone and still be apart from them. I can miss someone and still leave them to do what is best for me. 

So, as I write this, I took the chance. I told him it’s not meant to be. I told him we weren’t right, in my opinion, in my gut. We weren’t for each other. The man I so wanted to see every day, I so wanted to text and not be ignored by, has been ignored by me. And I feel fine. Does that make me a sociopath? Me justifying that he doesn’t want to be my friend, only my lover, as a bad thing and that he is the one that is making the mistakes and that he is the one that ruined this friendship that could have one day turned into a relationship. I don’t know if it does or not. I sit here, hoping it doesn’t, hoping I’m right in the fact that he wasn’t for me, that the guy that I met on a dating app that wanted to jump into a relationship wasn’t for me. I was on it too, but I so clearly knew that this will not work. This will not be because I am not his and he is not mine. I could see it, but he couldn’t. I had other men on my mind when I might have only been on his. But was I? A man who lives thousands of miles away, only wanting to be with me? A girl he’s known less than two weeks. Could that even be? My faith in love is low, to trust someone you’ve only known for a few weeks that he could be faithful, that online dates is enough, that a good morning text is enough. It’s not enough for me. I’m facing my reality. I’m facing what I think I need for myself and I stood up today. I didn’t ignore him, I didn’t “ghost” him. I stood my ground and told him what I needed. I needed a friend. Someone who would be there and understand my grief and then would one day I would see as something more. But of course, how do you ask that of someone? Is there actually someone who can see me and say to themselves, “I would wait for her”? I want someone to want to wait for me. To think I’m worthy of waiting for. To have that though, I must think I’m worth waiting for. Do I? Am I worth the love I feel like I deserve, that I want? I don’t know. I think everyone deserves the love that they want and that they feel like they deserve. No one should ever have to sacrifice to appease others. Sacrifice for the ones you love, not the ones that hurt you.