3 Reasons I refuse to put my guard up!
I recently discontinued a relationship of approximately seven years with a man that had not only been my best friend, but someone I didn't picture my life without. Needless to say, some part of me believed that one day, he would be my happily ever after.
My friend wanted to make sure I was not affected, because she understood the amount of love I held in my heart for this man. She encouraged me to make sure to stay open to love, even though it didn't come from the man I had hoped. I had told her that I was ok, and that because I am indeed a true lover, that I would always remain open to love, regardless. Therefore, after having that conversation with my dear friend, the content for this post was birthed.
To me, loving is too valuable to not take chances. I always give 100% in love, so when I walk away (realize my effort is no longer required), I never leave a situation blaming love. I am able to rationalize what doesn't work, with knowing that it may not have been the right time or was not meant to be.
Because love is so great, I will always believe that love is worth taking a chance on. So here are three reasons why I believe, that while losing love can be hard, I refuse to put my guard up!
REASON ONE: The risk of living without love is too high!
As someone who holds love so dear and deems it necessary to endure the trials of life, living without love, is reason enough for me to never put my guard up.
I understand that this is one of those things, that for most, may be easier said than done. But think about this, what's the point of desiring love, if you're willing to never love at all?
If you put up your guard, you are lowering your chances of ever encountering love. You're basically saying it's ok if I never open my heart up to loving someone. Because if you're not vulnerable, you will never truly love or be loved.
TWO: Fear is far more damaging than loving and learning.
There's only one thing that is just as bad, or maybe worse, than never loving, and that is loving through fear. When you are scared, in love, you are damaging not only yourself, but someone else. And that's just not fair.
Loving itself is not selfish, and if you understand that, you would rather be alone than break someone else's will to love. So it's important to make every effort to not be afraid of something that is not meant to hurt.
In the grand scheme, removing fear from love is really easy. All you have to do is believe that love itself didn't make the choice for you to remain with someone who didn't value you, or love you appropriately. If you're honest with yourself, you made the choice to stay with someone, hoping that one day he or she would be what you needed. That choice is on you, and your lapse in judgment, if and when that choice turns into a bad one.
One thing I like to remember in love though, is that no choice is really a bad choice. If you choose to learn from your mistakes, you will be made a better lover for it.
Therefore, if we hold ourselves accountable for the choices we make in love, instead of blaming love, we would have plenty of people taking chances in love...
THREE: There is no sure way to recognize when to let your guard down.
Many of us believe we have so much control over our emotions, that we will be able to recognize when it's the best time for us to let our guard down.
We play it safe, until something in us (what we may think is intuition) says he or she is ok. But in actuality, the choices we make, in that regard, are not always done in our best interest. I say that because we don't always make the best choices in life, so what we shouldn't think that every choice we make in love will be accurate! However, we tend to rationalize our feelings as logic. But when making choices in love, you need both reason and emotion to make a sound decision.
You all know the phrase, "love is blind", well in many ways this phrase is true. When we are so focused on what we want to see from love, we tend to ignore all the signs that show us, this decision is no good for us. We allow desire and hope to shape our perception of what is really happening. That's how we distort reality in love.
Now that's not to discourage those of you who believe that you certainly are intuitive, and "know" when is the right time, to open yourself up. But this is to encourage you all to be mindful that all things that challenge us are typically good for us. So, challenges in love should be appreciated, but should never be allowed to dictate whether to keep our guard up. So if we shouldn't be dictating when to keep our guard up, we definitely shouldn't be dictating when to let it down.
However, there are certainly those of us who believe that we are capable of recognizing when to let our guards down. But most of us let our guards down when it's too late. So we miss the boat, all because we didn't want to be open. And for that, we compromise "a greater love" or "the greatest love", for a safe love.
Nothing is certain in life and love, if it was, we would be all be all knowing right?
I think sometimes we forget that there are two individuals in relationships with emotions. We so often get so focused on our personal desires and needs, that we don't appreciate the necessity for vulnerability in relationships.
Being vulnerable, in this sense, doesn't necessarily mean crying all day, but it means being open to feel, without remorse. Don't limit your love experiences due to fear or belief that you always make the best choices. Because quite frankly, we don't always make the best choices, and nothing good ever came from being scared. Remember, it is better to love, than never love at all...
