Often we hold on to people not so much because of who they are, but because of who we are when we are with them;
certain people have a way of bringing out a long forgotten, buried or untapped side of us. The universe makes no mistakes in putting the people on our path that are necessary for our evolution. Some come for a long time and some only come for a short but otherwise meaningful time and either way they are both important. But if we are so attached to only one outcome then we might just miss the lesson altogether, suffer and find that the same lesson reappears ending in heartache once again until we finally learn what it is we are meant to know.
If you are anything like I was then you prefer to learn the hard way. The drawn out, recurring scene with different people type of hard way. I have since learned that resisting the reality of situations that are not serving my highest good is just prolonging the inevitable and keeping me stuck in a place that never feels good and so letting go when the lesson is complete is my new way of doing things, so much more time and heartache is saved this way.
Years ago, in a somewhat whirlwind time in my life, I met someone whom I fell for instantaneously – even if I avoided admitting it for the first couple of hours. I was dangerously drawn to him like a moth to a flame, he was so wild and free, a quality I admired and wanted to embody. But it didn’t feel so dangerous because he seemed to feel the same way, at first.
He brought out my wild, carefree, reckless abandon side. A side that made me feel like a teenager again, a side I liked perhaps because my teenage years were rather rocky and this felt like a do-over. He made me feel loved and wanted and he amplified my unconditional love side as he was wrong for me in almost every way possible yet my heart and my gut said otherwise. For the first time in a really long time I had no reservations, no fears and no doubts, something I had been missing for so long. He broke down walls I spent years building and even decorating and that made me even more vulnerable and simultaneously attracted to him. We talked about a future, we were hardly living in the moment and yet every moment felt like the best moment of my life, at that point.
We didn’t last long at all, weeks really, we crashed and it crushed me for quite some time (an entire year to be exact). I could not for the life of me figure out where I went wrong, how I fell for someone so completely wrong for me, how I was so blind, how he could walk away so easily and why, if he made me feel so alive in every way, did we have to die.
It has taken me years to navigate my way around these questions, not only about that particular event but about choices we make and feelings we feel about certain people in general, a quest I am sure will never quite end as human behaviour in relationships is the most fascinating to follow.
I spent the years following that fall on a long spiritual journey within to walk my way to these answers and truly understand them entirely. I learned what I wanted and no longer wanted. I knew now how I wanted to feel – alive, excited, ready and I learned that even if one flame dies it does not mean that another flame cannot be sparked again. In fact, when someone lights a flame within us that has been out for quite some time, it is nothing if not a reminder that the possibility of igniting that flame again does exist and it can keep being re-lit until someone comes along who is ready and willing to keep feeding it oxygen.
I learned how little I had been valuing myself, how I had reacted in the days and months following the demise of that relationship and how little I had shown myself respect, compassion and forgiveness. I realized what a terrible match we were but that it was so necessary to see where I was under valuing myself, in a big way and who and what really deserved my energy and attention.
I realized that to feel that “aliveness” again I would have to embark on journey’s that fed my soul instead of waiting for someone else to come along and do it for me.
People come along to be mirrors for us, to show us what is possible for ourselves as we see it and admire it in them, attaching to the person them self is rather unhealthy, instead we are better off to see what it is we love & admire in them and start to uncover those qualities in ourselves. In doing so we then become whole and no longer feel the need for a partner, at which time we can be fully open and energetically attractive to the right person for us, whom we can enjoy without expectations.
It is a blessing to meet these people who bring out a side in us we haven’t seen yet or that has been buried inside of us for many years as they come to uncover a layer that we no longer need to keep on. If these people cannot stay in our lives because they are not the best match for us it does not mean they were not necessary. We are best to express our gratitude for the lesson and the expansion and allow them, and us to move forward with this new found layer of us, that is particularly awesome!
Have you held onto someone because of how they made you feel, or act even if they weren’t right for you in so many other ways?
Comment below or send me an email with your own insight: info@janineaf.com ♥
PS. Always remember, you ARE enough.
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