So, you’re on your own again – what now?

You thought you loved someone a couple weeks ago, maybe that love died a couple months ago... but right now, you’re no longer… in love. Maybe you still love that person; maybe it hasn’t quite hit you yet that at some undetermined point on your timeline, you’ll stop loving that person romantically completely. Yet, it’s happened - the relationship is over - there’s nothing left to do.

There’s no more fight, there’s just your thoughts, and well.. you.

I just had a lengthy phone session with a friend about their (very) recent break-up, and whilst talking through potential outcomes - him being somewhat hopeful about the idea that she would figure out that she’d dun f*ked up and come running back - I offered this up to him: 

“you don’t want to have to convince someone to choose you - you don’t want it to feel like every move you make is one step away from them figuring out they don’t want to be with you; that’s not love. It might feel like it in the good bits, but it’s not a relationship that will last”

It was oddly rational, but it felt like a really nice way to sum up some of the things I’d learnt from my multiple failures at finding my 'person' (do~ you ~exist lol? doubting it at this point, lmao). 

I wrote a blog in Jan 2017 titled "Why being single makes me feel so insecure (and why I should probably be single for a while)" that ended with:

[Look, I am a classic maker of grand statements. I can't say what my love life will be in the near future, but I definitely don't think my soulmate will come striding in to commit to me and my big plans any time soon, so maybe this is my chance to work on how I feel about myself. Not myself on a holiday, or myself at a festival. Not how I feel about myself with a hypothetical partner and life.

Myself.

Just me, as I am.

So I can be the one that determines whether I am enough.]

I got into a relationship a year after I wrote that which has only recently just ended for good (oops), so I'm on my own again. The question is - have I figured out if I'm enough? 

I don't know if I can answer that, and as a high-functioning anxious girl with a lot of big (almost unattainable) dreams, I don't know if I ever will.

I am, however, secure in the fact that I don't expect my future 'person' to fix that. I just want them to get it. My anxiety makes 'enough'-ness feel unattainable at the best of times, but that doesn't mean I'm not okay on my own. It just means that I'll struggle with the concept of being enough with or without a partner, and whether or not that struggle ever ends is really only up to me.

And so, what now? 

There's just as much loving, if not more, to be had roaming the world on 'your own', we all just need to find little ways of channelling it. So far, my friends have been my main outlet for affection, and work has been my main outlet for attention. It's not quite the same as a forehead kiss, or a hand squeeze on a rough day, but in some ways it's better.

Rely on yourself. Attempt the recipe. Take up the hobby. Talk to that old friend. Challenge yourself.

You have all the time in the world for romantic love (if you're like me, you've probably already spent a fair chunk of your life in it). 

SO, I say now you should just love yourself for a bit.

Sounds cheesy. It is. Do it anyway.

 ♡