“but was the love worth it?”

it’s a rare and beautiful thing to live in the light of love knowing that heartbreak and pain are almost guaranteed and still choosing love anyways. the fullness of love is not only its sweet fruit but the dead branches in winter and the changing leaves in autumn and the new sprouts in spring and the eventual death of the tree and rot of its center as it returns to the busom of its mother the earth.

i’ve made my life’s purpose to be an investigator of the fullness of it all—a student of life itself—and it’s inevitably led me to being a student of love as well. here are some things i’ve learned as their student:

• the love is always coming—always on its way from you or to you.
• the love is always where it needs to be, when it needs to be. love is never late—it’s always right on time.
• there is no lack of love but that which we create ourselves. love has never been and will never be scarce.
• to love is to not only risk pain but to almost guarantee it. this world is incredibly fallible. so are the beings who reside on it.
• the pain is not a deterrent to those who seek the fullness of love; rather it’s one of love’s many benefits. pain, like joy, is our teacher, friend, and translator between our hearts, minds, and bodies.
• the love is always worth it.

So many times in my life i have receded into myself, convinced that higher walls or better standards or better people would somehow save me from the pain of betrayal, disappointment, and heartbreak. Each time I learned that the emptiness of trying to be an island was much more painful to me than the fullness of my hurt.

I don’t always remember these lessons ofcourse.
i don’t always remember that the love is worth it.

and sometimes i’m even the arbiter of other peoples pain, the cause of the hurt myself. I am a fallible creature, just like everyone else.

and yet everytime i find myself deciding that the love was worth it, and it’s worth risking it all again and again.

and so i find myself sitting here, writing this, because the pain of rejection or humiliation from being so open and vulnerable with my heart is so real i can feel it, like the energy in the air before a thunderstorm. but also—the love is always worth it. and i find myself drawn to others, made for loving even those who can’t or won’t accept my love and all that comes with it. I find myself reaching out when others are pulling away. I find myself always wanting to stand in the light of love, most especially in the darkness.
if you can’t make the love yourself, borrowed or store bought is fine. Just stand in the love, and see how it fills you up and transforms you, and transforms your whole world into something beautiful.

i find myself more and more willing as i age to trust that i’m strong enough to handle the consequences of loving others. and of the nature of my love being misunderstood. love scares a great many people. just say i love you a little too early into any friendship or relationship and watch them shake in their boots about it.