So hope everyone is well and moving into this summer kind of weather! Time keeps marching on and my conundrum of thoughts continue. Probably much to the dismay of others. But I am me. I was talking to a very dear friend and he said I was just too passionate (and he is too) with our thoughts. We have helped each other through some of life’s biggest changes and challenges and we both are wordy and passionate in our feelings for others. He is my dear friend folks, calm down, we are best of friends at this stage in life. He makes me think and I hope I do him and he sees things from the guy point of view and tells me when I need to calm down lol and I do the same for him from a female persepctive. Anyways, back to my thoughts….
I made a statement about the man I dated, that I said things ended for alot of different reasons on my part and alot I will not go into here. But I said he couldn’t love me the way I needed to be loved. Well I was thinking about this and well that sounded rather selfish in a way. We all love differently and sometimes we can only give the love we know. It made me sound like I was a diva and I am far from that. I think I should have said that we both had different ways of giving and receiving love and he missed some of my love languages. Now of course, in my vision I listened to his love needs and who knows he may disagree. But we all have different love needs or emotional needs and it made me sound that I was hard to please. Have you ever thought about things you say or what you are wanting and maybe how someone views that? Or are you like I said what I said and be done with it? I wish I could be in the I said what I said group!
Dating at a mature age is hard. We have jobs and responsibilities, kids, parents, life issues. Then we have the life issues of our past. Someone gets hurt, be it physically, emotionally, financially….that hurt doesn’t go away. Infidelity, death of a partner, different toxic behaviors that people experience, anxiety, depression, fear of commitment, fear of getting hurt, the need for physical intimacy and the lack of emotional connection. Our suitcases are so damn packed that we can’t move that baggage. Then enters the dating scene. So we have all these compartmentalized issues and we get liquid courage or just courage and we jump in and then we can’t work fast enough to find the nearest exit. We keep that baggage wrapped pretty tight in the beginning OR that baggage is weighing us down so much we miss out on some amazing new luggage. You know the kind of luggage that smells so good, smooth operation, a comfy ride, straps that hold those things of concern in place, zippers that glide and no bite, no trouble steering. But we have that old luggage that we are dragging around and it is weighing us down. Our past hurts and past people make new people and new chances too much for some. I will admit,I carry some of my baggage still. How about you? Wanna get real and look and see what you have packed. I will go first, I am open and honest and just real enough to scare some people.
I dated before I was married. Had some wild times. Got married young and had kids. So in my suitcase is a few regrets from my wild times. Right beside it is the shame of a failed marriage and an ex who had an alcohol issue and anger issues. That took up a big part of my baggage until I forgave him for me. I realized he was responsible for his choices and his actions and that I gave him more power by carting around that mess. But it still left me with some trust issues of being safe and still had some of that emotional abuse that the devil likes to kick around in your head. He moved in with a woman rather quickly during our separation and I always wondered about infidelity. So that piece of baggage is tucked in there…the feeling of not being enough to want to fight for or make different choices or just choosing someone else. I truly hold no ill will towards him now,I feel sorry for the woman and kids he he missed out on. Pack in about 13 years single and raising two kids and not dating as you were told no one would ever want you for the baggage of your children. Just so we are clear, they are NOT baggage but my heartbeat and they will never be baggage. So you try to date again and you realize the world of dating isn’t what it once was. Rejected as you are older, you have kids, you are fluffy and a booty…who doesn’t like that? Or I worked or I had kids or I was abnormal for remaining single for all those years OR the best one who was going to get the cookie and not just the crumbs? So that piece of baggage of not being enough or too much…that one got in my suitcase. What are you wearing? Do you like to cuddle? Why can’t we just hook up? Then you date someone you know from years before. You get along great but you let that baggage move in and honestly he does too. You think you know what you want out of a relationship but then realize you are the one that keeps asking for a relationship. You want time, you want moments to make memories and kisses that take your breath away and you want to know you matter. So you are all in your feelings and you are knocking down walls and feeling the love and that old suitcase seems to be in the closet. But that thing has a mind of its own, like the conveyor belt at the airport, it comes back around. You are feeling the seratonin, working in proving you are amazing, wanting that time….not anything but time and moments….and then they feel different. Their hurts of their past come up, their walls don’t come down and they don’t let you in and you are being held at bay by emotional unavailability. You want to run through the tulips, wind in your hair feeling the sunshine, they are keeping you at arm’s length and you are made to feel and told you are needy, seeking attention and only worth 1 out of 7 days to see. Now maybe this is all the love that they have, maybe their luggage is weighing them down, just tell someone. At this point in life we have either needed to throw that old stuff away or find the person that helps you unpack. The one that says I accept you for the dirty laundry and all and want to walk beside you. So when I said he couldn’t love me like I needed that still made me sound needy and diva and well it out the brunt of responsibility on me. So tholis became an unhealthy relationship. If you are carrying everyone’s luggage, carrying the care and concern and hoping if you show them how you love they will mirror what they see. Well that isn’t healthy either. We forgot how to use our words. I worked so hard to please and he worked so hard to keep me at arm’s length we forgot to ask for what we needed and wanted and then work from there. I am alot to love. I obviously have alot of words that flow through my fingers, but I have so much love to give if someone wants to receive it. BUT I want to be loved too. For all my imperfections, I am perfectly made. You are too. So I had an expectation from how relationships are supposed to go, maybe expectations need to be explored and not implied.
What about you? Keeping it all packed up in there from the past and the past is keeping you from your present. Not even your future but your present? We are so good about hanging on to that past that we miss the present. My old baggage tries to creep out. For me it is in the form of anxiety. There must be something wrong with me. I am too wordy, I am enough, I am not enough, I am old, it must be me. So emotional neglect can effect people differently. It either makes you want to carry and be responsible for everything OR you get so removed emotionally that you don’t want someone to be close to you. Yours may be ghosting, pulling away, it may be let’s get the cookie or the eggplant and disappear. You may be so hurt and weighed down you don’t take a chance. When someone has you twisted up where you are the one asking for time and attention, to know you matter and someone makes you feel you are too needy, well might just have to pack a new bag. If someone wants to claim you as their own but doesn’t want anyone to know you are together, only sees you when it works for them, that clicks in anxiety that unfortunately effects someone else you meet. If you can’t write that name on the luggage tag, you may not need that new piece of luggage. Then you start to question your choice in luggage, why do you keep packing up the same scenarios just in different packages? I know I can’t be the only one who does that! Or you decide to tell someone you like them but your anxiety kicks in and you chase them away. Or you feel you aren’t worthy based on what is in your suitcase. All because of the past and that is weighing down your future. I have always been way too honest in this blog to many peoples dismay. I have typed many words and many thoughts, again a downfall I have. Be honest though with yourselves….what have you got in that baggage of yours? What is keeping you from a new journey? Anxiety, fear of rejection (and that one stings like hell) fear of commitment, fear of just being happy, just plain old fear? That suitcase is weighed down from the past and unfulfilled expectations, the hurt others have caused, the unknown. We are going to break our backs carrying this baggage around! Do we think all men are the same and all women are the same as from our past? How many times have men joked women are crazy or psycho or not so many nice words we women have been called because there was a Jealzabel who ruined a man’s outlook? Or how about you women looking at the men like they are a sugar daddy, or a daddy figure, or a man who you accuse if cheating before he can even think a thought, or that we shaved Sampson’s hair and removed his power before he could even just be a man. As many compartments as our baggage has, we then have the compartments for our past and our present. All thrown in that baggage with no rhyme or reason. Just heaped in there, a big old gam of emotions and mess.
So we let that past creep back in. We give that last too much credit. That past can break our future and interrupt our present. Gone are the carefree days of dates and flirting, now it is even more rules, more restrictions and yet more freedom. Everyone says they want someone but the don’t want anyone. They may keep them for awhile while looking for the next best thing (hence the infidelity and cheating, the dating sites while you are dating someone) yet not realizing what they can cultivate the best thing since sliced bread. The pasts loom like a dark cloud that swirls and blusters about. We carry it around. It isn’t easy. The scars run deep from the jagged storms in life. There are bandaids upon bandaids that cover the wounds and we either rip that bandaid off and jump in with eyes and arms wide open or we barely pull the bandaid back and cover up the wound and stay tucked away from hurt. We all have wants and needs. We all have an idea of love. What is yours? If you are married, do you love now like you did when you were first married or have you grown in that love? Do you love someone now like you loved someone else? Does your last keep you from accepting a love you deserve? Our love changes. How we love changes from our early puppy love years, our lustful and youthful love, become roommates love, disconnected love to divorced love and starting all over again in the sea of love. We give and receive love based on our past and present. I love by touch, words if affirmation, flirting, passionate be your biggest cheerleaders love. I will be honest, that has scared the shit out of some men. I remember what you like, find your birthday gift if what you like, flirt my ass off, kiss you until you feel like your head is swimming. Loyal and faithful, no half ass love but all this big booty can give kind of love. I have realized I have apologized my whole life for who I am and how I love. I have apologized as a grown woman for how I look, how I love, what are my deficits and my attributes. I have apologized for my past, apologized for how I feel because I have been told I feel too much. The lost goes on. Part of that baggage thing. How about you? What are you apologizing for? How do you love and how do you want to be loved? And no not just physically…that is a whole other blog entry! How does your heart and mind need to be loved? I can guarantee if your heart and mind are loved, the physical side will follow very quickly.
So when we say someone didn’t love us as we needed, they loved the best they could. Did we ask for the love we needed and be ok to ask? Do we let the rearview mirror be the picture we focus on or do we look forward? Do we carry that beat up old luggage like a badge of honor or do we look about dealing with that baggage and think about how our past is behind us and the here and now is all we can deal with for now? I sure want to do that. I want to grow from the storms and scar from life and find a new story to unfold. How about you? What do you want? Think about it because we learn from the past, or atleast we should. We prepare for the future. But for just a moment in time, what if we lived in today? I know some may tire of all the introspection that runs in my train of thought, well pay your fare and let the train of thought travel far and wide with the sun on her face and music playing. Or you can sulk away and touch that baggage from the past that rips your heart open. Pack your bags, clean and dirty laundry, never forget your past but use it to step up on the next journey!