Falling

There’s a version of me that would tell you never to fall in like, love, or anything in between with anyone ever. That version of me would tell you that falling of every kind means eventually you hit the ground, you get hurt, and you do everything in your power to never fall again. So, yeah, I guess you could call me a romantic.

Quite a few years ago now, I got my heart broken…Well, maybe just broke my own heart but, semantics aside, I was destroyed. I threw all of my confidence in the arms of someone who didn’t even realize what they were holding or that I had given them anything at all, a tale as old as time. In a dark car, in the parking lot of an iHop (a comical anecdote now that used to feel like the pathetic cherry on top) I told my friend next to me, “If I could give all of my feelings away, I would, in an instant.” Every bit of me then was willing to numb myself, to dump the core of my humanity in a box on the curb in order to send away the sadness and shame I felt for taking the risk that is feeling. I worship daily at the altar of vulnerability, but that doesn’t mean I don’t question it frequently. So, I burrowed into my bed and into a mental fog that allowed me to lose myself for fear anyone would see me hurt or even just feeling. I remember saying to my friend, “This is going to change me for a long time and I really hate that.” I think I hate more how right I was.

When I dug myself back out, turned on my brights to try and fight through the fog, I hit the pedal hard, motivated only by my want not to be a burden. I produced my best smile, fighting through how heavy my face felt under my swollen, cried-out eyes in order to give people the peace of thinking I was ok. I covered my desk in post-its notes scribbled with mantras I wanted to believe and took a lot of deep breaths. I focused on work and friends and filled my days to the brim so there wasn’t even a chance to hear my inner monologue. I would end the days so exhausted just from existing that I had no choice to do anything but sleep. To be clear, for my own pride and sanity, it wasn’t that I missed this person. In fact, the more I got to know them, the more I realized we were everything other than made for each other, that what happened was a true blessing from the universe. (Let it be known that I would never bury myself like that for a MAN. Puh-LEASE.) I was so ashamed that I let how I wanted someone else to see me dictate the way I saw myself, how I let this be the person I took pride in when that person wasn’t even me. Instead of being inspired to fight for myself, I took the easy way out and convinced myself that it would yield some sort of healing by refusing to explain what I felt and pushing through everyone to get out and over it. However, what I thought was moving forward was actually avoidance. What felt like reemergence was just digging myself into another pit.

I would get into my car to do my usual detox drive, hoping that my pain would surf away on the wind and that the sun through my windshield would make me feel like I was glowing on the inside. I would plug my phone into the aux cord and for the first 3 minutes feel like this could actually work. Yet, what goes up must come down and no matter how much I ignored the extra weight I was dragging around, it always seemed to pull me back down to the ground in record time. Next thing I knew, the shuffle gods would be obvious about betting against me, the song seeping through my speakers would be one that used to give me butterflies or the familiar smell of the end of Summer would hit me with a wave of deja vu and everything would come spiraling down. It never ceases to amaze me how simple moments can be our joy one day and our enemy the next. Stumbling through the biggest cavern in the journey back from heartbreak, I cursed everything about me: my lack of career, my living situation, my emotional baggage, my taste in music, my useless obsession with drawing the perfect eyeliner wing, my failed friendships, my relationships with my loved ones, the size of my clothes, my hair, my voice, my sensitivity, my sense of humor, every imperfect moment I could remember, my constant need to be heard and reassured, my contradicting inability to ask for what I need, the never ending cycle I was once again caught in of letting anyone and everyone but me dictate who I was. I had spent weeks, months even holding together my outer shell, but now I felt it cracking from the burning rage I was on the inside. I clung to my ever fleeing independence with ferocity, arms tired from the constant fight with my inner want to just be taken care of sometimes. I couldn’t believe the absolute mush I had melted into, admitting I wasn’t the usual image of a strong, courageous fighter who could do it all quietly, by herself. In the small moments where I did let someone else know how I was doing, I felt silly and naive and embarrassing, especially when it went wrong. I felt like a fool. People would tell meit was ok to cry and be sad, but I didn't want to cry or be sad, I just wanted it to be over. In the very last of these drivers-seat therapy sessions (at least in this phase of my life), overwhelmed by the feeling of all of my imperfections and fears pushing their way out of my brain, I slowly pulled over and sobbed to the quiet miles of gravel and cornfields and open sky, finally resigning myself to the realization that maybe feeling everything was the only thing I had left to give.

Now, I wish I could tell you that I learned the big lesson that day, that I went home and suddenly was the most self-confident, bad ass bitch on the planet, that I feel out loud for all to see with no fear now and forever. Unfortunately, it’s not really that simple, but what is? I relaxed back into the seat of my car that day and, with only the sun as my witness, immediately took an important and necessary deep breath, feeling like a weight was lifted off of my chest. (Like only the best cry fests can do.) I drove back home and promised to try making some scary choices…in a good way! Feeling is risky as hell, rejection and judgment run rampant like they own the place. However, for the first time in life, I learned what worthy risk was through practice, I let myself feel that. I realized that imperfection and confusion and awkwardness were unifying more than they were debilitating, that maybe my friends advice about crying and letting myself was getting over things, even if it wasn't cute. (I doubt anyone reading this has seen me cry but let me put the emphasis on NOT cute.) I trusted the statement that none of us are perfect, that all of us have our faults and that they don’t make us unworthy of good things, as long as we own them and apologize when we need to. Just like we need our strengths, we need our weaknesses too. I embraced the good and bad that came from feeling, not as someone who I thought people would like, but as the person whose feelings had given me the best friends and memories, the ones that had taught me the relief of clarity. Heartbreak was never going to be fun or easy, no matter if someone else rejected me or if I rejected myself, but growing from it was worth the risk. I’m still trying to remember this when the arches of my feet rest on the cliff’s edge of feeling out loud. It’s hard to hear the voices (internal and external) that tell me that it’s worth a shot because hurt is visceral and the lottery of chance isn’t easy. Yet, the easy way has never been the right way, I’ve never learned or found joy from the easy way. Staying here on the edge isn’t as safe as I can convince myself it is when life is quiet. So, no matter if you’re falling into the unknown of confrontation or love or choice or any other form of disruption, I hope you can steady yourself knowing hurt is temporary and learning is brave. Sometimes, you just have to fall.

Remind me of this the next time I say, “feelings are dumb.” I really don’t mean it.

-Mary