Everything Love Shouldn't Ever Have Been.

Somewhere along the line in our lives we were taught that love is everything it isn’t.

Everything it shouldn’t be. Everything it should never have been.

We were taught that love should mean breaking yourself to build others. Hurting yourself to heal others. Abandoning yourself to find others. Sacrificing to serve others. Codependence instead of independence.

We were taught such a toxic way to perceive, to define everything that love should be. Everything that love should look like. Everything that love should feel like.

Somewhere along the line instead of learning the definition of what love should be, we were told of what love would demand from us instead of what love should give us.

We were taught to make excuses for people because “nobody is perfect” for things that are truly inexcuseable but are told should be excused.

Somewhere we were taught to fill the cups of people who don’t fill ours.

We were taught to value the wrong things in people, to be blind to red flags if things felt "right" or if other people thought they were a "good person" rather than if they actually were in the ways that make someone truly a good person.

We confuse chemistry with compatibility. We care about competition over clarity. We care about proving righteousness more than validating feelings. We care about ego over compromise.

We were taught to care about the wrong things in people and then wonder why things don't work out.

Somewhere along the line we were taught that love should complete us instead of compliment us.

Somewhere someone taught us that we needed someone else to be whole then all we ever needed to learn was to be whole ourselves.

Somewhere we were taught that it is normal to nourish others even if it means neglecting ourselves in the process. That it is normal to give to others who only take from you, who only drain you.

Somewhere along the line we learned how to get addicted to the toxic highs and lows, the cycles, and the abusive ways that we only learn in adulthood of the ways that people can truly be cruel to those they claim to love. Because somewhere along the way we never learned how to walk away, how to let go....how to say no.

Somewhere along the line society taught us through our pasts, through our parents, through the media, and through our peers the things that would normalize patterns, pathways, and mentalities that would cause us much trauma before it transforms us.

Somewhere we learned how to be manipulated by others into accepting less than we deserved because we never truly learned our own worthy because our standards and expectations were never clearly, finitely defined.

Our boundaries were never built. Our self worthy was never established. Our self respect was never developed.

Somewhere we learned the backwards way of thinking that we are only worthy of being loved if we bring value to someone often forgetting to check if that person actually brings value to us.

We learned be blind to seeing who someone truly is and perceiving them as the person that we want them to be, who they wanted us to believe they were.

Somewhere we to learned to look past someone’s lack of value justifying it as it is our responsibility to help fix and heal them because we have done the work ourselves when it isn’t our job to. When in reality they have to do the inner work themselves and it’ll only hurt us by choosing broken people who refuse to pick up their own pieces.

Somewhere we never learned how to communicate properly because to so many good communication means quantity not quality.

It being direct without being mindful, without being kind. It means communicating when it is easy and when it is hard. It means choosing to do the right thing even when it is uncomfortable. It means respecting others enough to not runaway, to not shut down, and to not lash out when emotions get heightened. It means communicating through conflict.

Somewhere we learned the toxic habit of either running at the first sign of someone being “too different” without taking time to explore or clarify or staying far too long because we “love them” even if they aren’t good or right for us.

Somewhere we learned the false idea that we could change people, that we could make them different, that maybe this time it wouldn’t be the same and then are confused when our hearts get broken by choosing broken people.

Somewhere we were taught to give to those who don’t give to us because “that is what love does.”

Somewhere we were taught to think that we have to just be okay, that we have to be strong for others and have to hold it together for others when that should have never been our burden to bear. We have learned to believe that we have to keep it together as if we aren’t allowed to ever not be perfect or be human or mess up.

We weren't ever taught that you can still love someone while also acknowledging that someone isn’t good for you. That you can choose to love yourself more, you can choose to love them from afar.

Somewhere we were taught to justify behaviors in others that aren’t okay and aren’t love just because we “love them.”

We were taught that love should be unconditional without also being taught that disrespect shouldn't be.

Somewhere we thought that loving someone more would make them love us more. When in reality, how is someone supposed to ever truly known how to love someone else if they clearly don’t love themselves.

How is someone going to be able to begin to see you if they won’t see themselves. How authentically can they connect with you if they refuse to connect internally with themselves.

We learned the toxic habit of thinking that if we avoid something that it'll go away or it will protect us. We learned to allow our coping habits to prevent us from growing, from healing, and from addressing the things that we need to address.

Somewhere we were taught to be in a “fight or flight mode.” We were taught to either care too much or not care at all.

Somewhere we learned our triggers and our trauma...somewhere we learned to define things in ways that we didn't deserve but will continue to experience life through until we change the narrative.

Somewhere we were taught to be driven by our own emotions with an underlying level of righteousness. We were taught to interact reactionary rather than responsive.

We were taught to either feel too much or feel too little.

Somewhere we were taught that our state of being, our way of connection, of coping is existing in an extreme instead of finding a peaceful balance in the middle ground. Of not choosing any side of an extreme but existing by rather trying to understand each side for what they have to show us, to teach us.

We were taught to try to prove rather than try to listen.

Somewhere we were taught to seek validation from others when that only leads to our own inner destruction and unhealthy relationships, when the only validation we ever truly need is the kind we find within ourselves. Somewhere we were taught that people pleasing is the only way to “earn” love.

Somewhere we were taught to put others happiness ahead of our own which always will lead us farther away from ourselves.

Somewhere along the line we learned that our value and worth is determined by whether we are in a relationship or not which makes us often stay in things far longer than we should just for the fear of being alone, of being perceived as if something is wrong with us.

Somewhere society told us we should feel shame if we are single when that is indeed the most important time in your life to find yourself, to learn yourself, and to grow yourself.

Somewhere we learned the wrongful thinking of prioritizing others ahead of ourselves, at the cost of ourselves.

Somewhere we learned that the very things that "should" coexist, the things that will make something healthy are the very things that "can and do" exist but we will only attract when we take the time to heal the ways that we choose to connect with others and the things that we seek in others.

There are people that won’t make you feel like you have to subtract to add value. There are people who won't ask you to give without giving back. There are people who won't need you to try to heal or fix them. There are people who will bring you just as much value as you bring them.

Those who won’t do the things that your prior definitions of “love” have made you believe.

People who will show you that the things you wanted were never too much to ask for the right person, to a person who has done the work. To a person who truly knows what it means and looks like to love, accept, and support someone else. To someone who has healed their own definition of what love was and what love is, what love should be.

They will show you that two positives that can coexist without needing to sacrifice. They are the ones that will teach you the true meaning of reciprocity without you having to beg, without you having to ask, and without you having to teach.

They will show you that you were always deserving of being held in the way you held others, in the ways you held others but that not everyone is capable of that.

Because somewhere along the line someone told us that "if they wanted to they would" but the truth is that it is more of a question of if someone is capable, if they have the capacity because will is nothing if someone doesn't have the tools or space to provide you what you need.

They will show you what respect looks like, what support feels like, and what safety feels like without draining you in the process. They will show you what communication should be, what building and navigating a healthy dynamic between two different individuals should feel like.

Somewhere we learned to suppress instead of express the things we feel, our wants and needs.

We weren't taught how to process the things we feel but to allow them to inherently manifest within us and through our relationships ultimately hurting others because we are hurting.

We weren't taught that just being who we are is enough, that it is deserving of love without any conditions because of the projections of others we have absorbed throughout our lives.

Somewhere we picked up their mentality that we need to be less of who we are and what we need to make ourselves more palatable to people who don’t even deserve us.

We’ve been told and taught that to be “loved” or to be “worthy” we have to make others feel comfortable even at the cost of our own comfort.

Somewhere we learned to be scared to be vulnerable, to be real, to be raw when those are the very things that allow us to truly connect with others.

Somewhere we learned that we should suppress and hide the things we feel rather than express because we are afraid of being seen as weak.

Somewhere we learned to be afraid of crying when we often need to, we need to release. To give ourselves space to break so we can build again, so we can heal. So we can grow.

Somewhere we forgot that we are allowed to say no, that we are allowed to set boundaries. And that firm boundaries are what create respect. That a place where you aren’t allowed to have your boundaries communicated and respected is a place where you were never free to be the real you.

We learned that we are supposed to say we are okay even when we aren't. To teach people that they can disregard our feelings by never expressing them. To make ourselves small to allow others to feel bigger. To care far too much about losing other people that we sacrifice our sense of self along the way.

Somewhere we have learned the toxic habit of listening to reply rather than listening to understand and that is where humanity has to learn how to connect again from a different place, from a real place not a selfish one.

We have learned to pass judgement instead of passing acceptance and openness. To engage with curiosity and seek to gain clarity.

Somewhere we picked up this mentality that someone needs to be right and someone needs to be wrong. This mentality that translates into the way we interact with others in conflict that divides us, that makes things a competition of someone trying to right rather than trying to understand. This mentality that seeks to prove rather than to respect and understand that two perspectives can coexist.

Somewhere we picked up the false belief that someone’s reaction to our choices is our responsibility when it never was, it never is.

Somewhere along the line we were tricked into believing that we have to make excuses for those we care about when they refuse to accept accountability for their actions that they didn’t consider the repercussions to. That we have to be okay with things we aren't when we don't. There are only excuses if we allow them to be.

Somewhere it was taught us that it’s normal to accommodate others and allow ourselves to be disrespected just to make others feel comfortable instead of respecting ourselves first.

We’ve learned how to exist and how to connect, how to seek connection in such a backwards and fucked up way that it takes people years, decades to rewire. To build their own self respect, self worth, self love, and a healthy idea of what a relationship should look and feel like.

Somewhere along the line we were taught that we didn't matter as much as others, that there was a hierarchy of importance (family), of feelings, and we carry this weight with us until we decide we do actually matter.

That our happiness matters most and that is the only thing that we are in control of. That we do not have to submit, that we don't have to fall in line. That fighting for what we want does matter just as much anyone else's.

Somewhere along the line we were taught that the very things we should look for couldn’t coexist.

That we should lower our self worth and expectations to settle. That we shouldn't put ourselves first when that should have been the first thing we were taught. To not be selfish, to not be self centered but that you should never have to sacrifice who you are or ask for less to make someone else feel loved or love you more.

To respect yourself enough, to know what you deserve that you are willing to walk away when someone asks you for a watered down version of that.

To not settle for less out of fear of not finding more.

Somewhere in our lives, we were inherently taught by the examples we saw and the world that surrounds us that until we learned how to value ourselves we must first suffer in settling for less in others that we never deserved because of being taught a false illusion of what love should truly look like.

Somewhere we were taught so much that we never should have and would have to learn how to unlearn to relearn.

We learned everything backwards in the way we approach relationships with others and it will often take us a lifetime to learn to reverse those ways of being.

To release the things we have absorbed all our life. To learn the lessons we need to learn the hard way to find clarity. To find our worth. To find our value. To find our sense of self respect.

To redefine. To find our way. To find our clarity. To find our line. To evolve all that we've known.

Somewhere along the line, I believe we all will decide to change the narrative in our own time and redefine what love is to us.

To define what love is to us. Hopefully, for the better.