Dear heartbroken self,

Thank you, baby girl. Thank you for braving this intensity.

You are so strong. You are so much stronger than you know. This is happening to show you just how resilient and courageous you really are.

I’m so sorry you’re having to feel this pain. I know, it makes you want to rip your heart right out of your chest.

Your sweet, innocent, trusting heart that has already suffered so much. But remember that your heart suffers so much because of its strength, not its weakness. There is so much room in that heart of yours. Room enough for great sorrow, room enough for great joy.

Learn to be with the sorrow. Do not focus your energy on blaming another for your sorrow. Do not try to explain it away and do not speed through it. Today’s sorrow is tomorrow’s empathy and gratitude. You cannot truly receive the gift of love without having fully met the pain of loss.

But I know, it is so much pain to feel. So much, in fact, that you will look back on this one day and not be able to conceive of or remember what it’s like to hurt that badly. You will wonder if it was really all that bad. You might even have a strange, masochistic nostalgia for the pain.

And you will smile at yourself then, on the day you realize you can’t remember what it’s like to hurt so badly, and you will think these words to your past self, “You can do this. The pain can’t kill you. It’s opening you. Open to it as best as you can. It’s helping you to become yourself. Keep going. Keep feeling. You’re doing a great job.”

When you think about why he didn’t choose you in the end, and the voice in your head answers that question by calling to mind all the bits about yourself that you don’t fully accept, please do not try to change those things about yourself. Do not blame them for your pain. Remember that they are what makes you, you. Remember that the gift of this all is that you now get to practice loving those aspects of yourself.

And remember that it is not your job to make anyone choose you. Choice happens freely, without coercion. And for every person who doesn’t fully choose you as you are, there are many more who do and will.  

This pain is part of your process, part of your path.

You can’t see it now, but you will pick yourself back up again. So tenderly, so patiently, and so gently. And you will hold yourself. You will hold yourself so lovingly that you won’t want anyone else to hold but yourself. And then, only then, the right person will come to hold you. But you can’t see that now. You can’t know it to be true. Because if you knew it to be true, you wouldn’t hold yourself as tightly. 

You’ve got you. Trust that. 

And you are enough, baby girl. You are so much more than enough. And you are so brave to face this and feel this. You are so brave to be willing to keep your heart open, to try again.

You are brewing the wisdom inside of you right now that is going to serve you and everyone in your life for the rest of your life. You will be okay. You will be more than okay. You will know that all of this happened for the better. You will trust your own heart again.

You will understand why all of this is happening for you. You will not only forgive, but you will be grateful. And you will forgive yourself—for believing in your love so unabashedly and freely, for being imperfect, for hanging on too long to someone who wasn’t choosing you.

You will believe in love again. You will love again. You will be loved again. 

And this time, it will be love rooted in commitment and a shared desire to create a life together. It will be love that makes you feel fully seen, fully accepted, fully understood. It will be a love that will make you understand why all the other loves had to compost and fertilize the soil so that this one could spring up.

But most importantly, you will love and respect yourself more than you ever have. You will feel so proud of yourself for walking unflinchingly through the fire of heartbreak. And the you who emerges on the other sides of the fire will choose herself unconditionally.

She will know herself to be capable of being alone, and therefore, will have a freedom of choice she’s never had before. She will not need to convince anyone to stay with her, to cherish her, to choose her.

Because she will choose herself, every time.

I choose you, heartbroken self, as you are, right now. I choose you in all your grief, all your confusion, all your anger, all your resistance, all your attachments, your fears, and your dangerous hopes.

I choose you, I’m proud of you, I’m excited for you, I love you, I believe in you, and I’m so, so sorry for your loss.

Love,

Future you.

~