I Still Believe In Beauty After Experiencing So Much Pain

It’s not easy for me to trust someone after being betrayed before. It’s not easy for me to believe someone is going to stay after being abandoned before. It’s not easy for me to love after being heartbroken before.

Despite all of the hardships I have suffered through, I am not going to allow the pain of my past to negatively impact my future. I am not going to let fear overshadow my desire to enter a loving, committed relationship. I am not going to hover inside of my comfort zone when I am unhappy and isolated there.

I am going to take a risk by letting myself love again, because staying at home and stewing in my loneliness is a different kind of risk. One that I am unwilling to take.

It has been hard for me to let my guard down when there is a piece of my mind warning me that I am better off alone, but I cannot live my life expecting to get hurt. I cannot let my skepticism overrule my faith that I will someday find my soulmate.

I still believe people are capable of keeping their promises even though I have seen them broken a million times. I still believe people are capable of good things even though I have witnessed so many bad things in the past.

History does not have to repeat itself. Falling in love is not necessarily going to lead to heartbreak. There is always a chance it will lead toward my final happily ever after. I cannot give up hope of finding my person. I won’t let myself become cold and bitter because my love story has taken longer to unfold than I would have liked.

I am going to keep searching for someone who understands me. I am going to keep opening my heart up to others. I am going to keep putting myself out there even on the days when it feels pointless to try.

I am not naturally trusting. My first instinct is to look for lies hidden in stories, to keep my eyes open for red flags and warning signs. When I enter a relationship, it’s not easy for me to take the other person’s words at face value. I am choosing to trust the other person. I am making a daily decision to think positive even though it’s so much easier to let negativity prevail.

I don’t want to be the kind of person who focuses on the worst in others, who never gives anyone a chance, who assumes the world is a horrible place filled with heartless souls. I want to be the kind of person who sees the beauty in others, who takes a chance on love, who refuses to let the past interfere with the future.

I have been hurt before but that doesn’t mean I’m going to get hurt again. I have to keep telling myself that.

Maybe You Feel So Lonely Because You Can’t Let Yourself Be Vulnerable

For the longest time, I never talked about my insecurities, issues, failures, mistakes, and any troubles that I had been going through because I always wanted to be perceived in a certain way. It was difficult for me to tell anyone when I messed up. It was not easy to admit I had insecurities. It was very hard for me to share my fears with someone or talk about my traumas or phobias. I didn’t want people to get the wrong impression of me. I didn’t want anyone to know my weaknesses and use them against me someday. All this ended up making me show some layers of myself and keep the other ones hidden. I didn’t open up with someone else about what was occupying my mind the most because I wanted to appear tough and as if I had it all together. I kept being this way for a really long time, which made me feel incredibly lonely because I was going through everything on my own.

I didn’t speak to anyone about my anxiety or depression or any tremendous fear I had about something. I didn’t share with anyone how bad I had been doing lately. I didn’t open up to anyone at all till I met people along the way who were not afraid to be vulnerable with me. Those people so bravely shared with me their struggles and their deepest low points. They trusted me enough to engage me in their struggles and healing journeys. They weren’t afraid to show me all their insecurities and tell me all about the things they did and were ashamed of. They weren’t actually scared to show me this part of themselves — this weak, ugly, unfiltered, and raw side of them. And I couldn’t help but feel the beauty of this.

It’s such a beautiful thing when the person in front of you is not afraid to be vulnerable when they are with you, because they make you feel like it’s okay to be vulnerable too. It’s okay to mess up and say that I messed up. It’s okay to say that I have insecurities and that I don’t know how to deal with them. It’s okay to say to others that you’ve been through so many things that messed you up to the extent that you just can’t get back to what used to be your usual self. It’s okay to say that you’re emotionally tired and drained. Seeing how others were unashamedly vulnerable with me helped me let my guard down and finally be able to be vulnerable in front of someone else. And for the very first time in so long, I felt somewhat free. I felt like all these things I held deep within me were finally out there, and I was engaging someone else in helping me with them.

When I started sharing all the things I was so cautious about sharing, I found so many people out there like me. I found others who were going through the same things, and I felt like I became less and less lonely every single time I talked to one of them. We shared each other’s experiences and we learned from one another. We understood things about ourselves, and we acquired wisdom and knowledge about dealing with what we’re going through just by sharing with one another. Opening up to others has healed my constant feeling of loneliness because I realized that I wasn’t the only one going through what I was going through, but others were dealing with the same exact things.

I used to perceive vulnerability as something that would make me look weak, but it’s actually the essence of bravery and strength. It’s this beautiful state of honesty and rawness that lets you communicate intimately with the person in front of you like never before. It’s actually the cure that nobody told us about.