People Who Stay
Do they actually?
Why do we need to belong so much? Why is being seen that important? What is it that our souls have been longing for over centuries? Why is there something called the other half? Are we innately forced to feel whole through someone else’s presence?
If that’s the case, it’s safe to say we are screwed.
From years of dating experience, I, for one, can say there’s no such thing as learning from experience in dating. I never learnt because I never wanted to. We never do. All the fairytales and love stories we were told growing up cloud the lesson. I know this sounds cliché, but I think the rule about being better at teaching something you can’t master yourself applies to love too.
For centuries, love songs have been written, movies about soulmates made, books published. And why? Why are we so good at explaining something that, when it comes to actually demonstrating it, we constantly fail?
It’s because, as humans, we rarely know how to love deeply. As much as I believe in both nature and nurture, when it comes to love, nature becomes the underdog. We were designed to seek connection. That’s an essential part of being human. We were created with an urge for belonging. And yet I can’t seem to figure out what went wrong that caused people to shut their hearts to real connection, to genuineness, to honesty.
Showing love is the strongest act a person can demonstrate. Yet in today’s world, it’s seen as weakness.
Recently, I’ve been reading a book on Stoic philosophy. People once spent centuries trying to define what virtue is. Let me declare it: in the 21st century, there is no such thing as virtue. Only selfishness. That’s not the world we want, but it’s the one people built to protect themselves.
The modern world has become too hard to survive in by simply opening your heart to everyone, with a clear set of intentions, and acting the way you want to be treated. On the contrary, it’s the opposite. The unspoken rules of dating now require you to treat others in the exact opposite way of how you want to be treated.
How heartbreaking.
I used to refuse to believe that. But then life happened, and I was forced to. Only an inch of a centimetre is left before I close my heart to love entirely.
Which brings me to the most devastating point of all:
Was I not supposed to open it in the first place?
