I’ve hurt more women than I can count on my fingers and toes.

I’ve been the cause of tears and heartbreak.

I’m sorry for diving into territory so fragile with nothing more than an axe. My end goal was never to hurt.

There are casualties in this game of love, but I think it’s time to start viewing this war a little differently.

I’m not courageous enough to dive fully into the heart of love—the kind that takes two human beings to create together. But, not without good reason.

I’m deathly afraid I’ll never come back once I dive in. Instead, I stay on the shore and let the waves rush over the tops of my toes. I say I’ll dive in once I’m ready. But truth is, I don’t know when I’ll ever be.

I walk with my heart wide open, but even this is a myth. I guard it. I guard myself from hurt and heartbreak. I fall in love every day, but I never love fully. At least not anymore.

I have in the past, and I’ve lost parts of myself I wish I still had. I’ve lost my path. I’ve lost friends. I’ve lost my fire. I don’t want to lose again.

Love requires trust and faith. Maybe, this is what I’m lacking. Maybe it’s the wholeness I’m lacking. Maybe it’s my own wounded child I’m still attempting to love with.

I run out of love and into art, into work, into alcohol, into sex. I run because I am not ready. I can’t hold all of you.

I don’t know if I’ll ever land on a reason or justification that satisfies. All I can ask for is forgiveness. To see that I’m learning. That I’m stumbling. That my perceived perfection is no more than a mask.

I am damaged, and it’s cool.

And maybe, just maybe, I love the heartbreak and tears too much. I love the lust. The fiery sensuality. The chase. The raw excitement. The love without tangles.

I am not ready to commit. I know this. I want you to know this, too.

We all hurt each other unconsciously, through our lack of mindfulness. No matter how much we meditate, we still act in hurtful and spiteful ways. We are flawed humans.

Some days I can take a breath in between these moments. The moment where I’m mainlining pain directly into your heart. But, some days I can’t. I fail and forget.

For these moments of forgetfulness, just know that what I said was never a lie.

Sometimes, the weight of this love is too much to bear for a coward like me. Yet, through the fog I can say one thing: I am on the path. But who ever said the path was straight and clear?

Everything is a process. Learning to love mindfully is a process, a skill, an art. We must give ourselves permission to fail through this.

We weren’t born knowing how to do this. We’ve mostly been conditioned otherwise. But, by taking the leap into love and falling down again and again we learn what works and what doesn’t.

We can learn to leave open and full hearts in our wake, instead of leaving them shattered and broken. For those who are restless and have a penchant for leaning into the extreme parts of life and love, I ask you this:

If this was your heart, how would you want it to be held? How would you want it to be discarded? How would you want it to be opened?

~

Relephant Read:

I’m Addicted to Breaking my Own Heart.

~

Author: Kevin Wood

Editor: Alli Sarazen

Photo: Martin/Flickr