Letting Your Heart Heal

“May your heart remain breakable, but never by the same hand twice”

I have been single for over two years. And before you all start planning my pity party, I have to tell you that I couldn’t be happier. After two consecutive serious relationships, both of which were incredibly toxic, I needed to get out on my own, to do what I wanted to do and to live life on my own terms, for the first time since becoming an adult with the autonomy to do so. There comes a point where you get bored of having to consult another person before you make a major life decision, especially when said person continually tries to hold you back. You get sick of not being able to go to a nightclub for a girls night without being question, you get sick of pointless arguments over things that, even with two years worth of reflection, still make no sense to you. I think this is the point you know that you need to be on your own for a little while. That was the plan initially, a little while on my own and then back to the dating scene. But I settled into it, I got so comfortable having the control over my own life that I gave up even trying and yet, I still continue to be happy. I am happy not because I like the life of a reclusive singleton with 100 cats (I am actually getting a cat soon) but because we don’t need romantic love to define our happiness or our worth on this earth. I am and have always been a firm believer that the right person will find you at the right time so you may as well focus on being the best version of yourself while you wait.  

All of this being said, I do have my moments of what I can only define as weakness. These come when watching a cheesy rom-com or getting too invested in the romantic connection between two television characters. It’s that moment where you think: “I guess it would be nice to have someone like that”. So, you grab your phone and upload yourself in what can only be referred to as the darkest part of the internet… Dating apps.

I find myself doing this from time to time and every single time, I regret it almost instantly. Some of the more colourful opening messages have included invitations to orgy’s, a guy asking to see photos of my feet (that one was just ridiculous) and more terrible pick-up lines than you can poke a stick at! Even when things don’t start as dark and disturbing as above, there is almost always a shift. Like a light switch, they turn from nice guy to twisted maniac in an instant.

There are, however, a select few that are sweet, who you might get on ok with and who just might be worth getting out of your pyjamas to meet in person. This is where anxiety comes in to play. Suddenly this isn’t just a robot who is answering your questions, there is a real person on the other side of that phone and you have to meet them?? OOOOOH NO! I can live with the weird openers. They provide decent content for group chats and are always there for a good laugh when you need one. What I struggle to deal with is the prospect of going on a date with a human being that you know almost nothing about. Trying to connect with a person with no shared history, no real understanding of who they are, will never be something that I can get my head around. I don’t understand how that compares to that moment that a friend or someone you know fairly well becomes someone you want to know a lot more in a very different way. That moment can be magical and nerve racking in the most exciting way. Tinder, in a stark contrast, is cold and dissociative. It is calculated and organised, all the things that love is not. For that reason and so many more, it scars the living hell out of me!!

I don’t know if my anxiety about dating in this way is a reflection of the relationships in my past, I don’t know if it is truly because I have become comfortable in the life I am leading or if that is just a lie I tell myself to hide behind how truly terrified I am of giving someone my heart and letting them take down the walls I have built around it. Giving another person the ability to break your heart but trusting them enough not to is one of the hardest things we do as humans but in so many cases it happens in an instant without us even realising. As we get older, we become more aware of it. With each heartbreak it becomes harder to do and we become less reckless with who we give it away to. Some may see this as being cold or bitter toward love, but I see it as smart. In the same way our eyelashes protect our eyes from dust, our experiences protect our heart from breaking again.

So maybe I am comfortable and maybe I’m afraid, but I am OK with both of those things. What I do know, is that when I do give my heart away again, when I decide to trust someone with the most precious thing that I have, it will be for the right reasons, not because I am bored or I want a relationship like a TV couple. I will never again trust someone with my heart for the wrong reasons. I will give my heart away when I am ready, but only on my own terms and only because they have given me nothing but reasons that I should trust them. Love is fragile, it’s beautiful and it is complete and utter chaos and it should be treated with incredible caution. Don’t love because someone has told you to, don’t give your heart away unless you truly believe you are going to be able to keep it in one piece. It’s never quite the same after it’s broken, like a warrior it builds shields to keep in safe in the event that another war will come. I think the aim of true love is letting your heart feel safe enough to tear down the walls that it has built around itself, to remove the armour, and live comfortably at peace, connected in the best possible way to the heart of another.