Darling, Please Follow Your Softness

To all the soft souls out there, I see you. I know it hasn’t been easy, because you think so much and feel so much. Your big, big heart always breaks faster than it heals. You think your guard is high but it never seems to be high enough.

You don’t understand why you have to be so complicated, so sensitive, so emotional. You wish you could be simpler, or perhaps exceptional in some obvious, superficial kind of way so people would overlook all the other ways you’re not so easy to love.

It’s rare for you to come anywhere close to love. But you can get attached rather easily, often to those who are not right for you, not ready for you, or not even enough for you. Your racing mind convinces you you’re the problem anyway. And so you suffer while others quickly move past you.

You beat yourself up for taking so long to move on, for trusting the wrong people, for having so much emotional need that it ruins your life. What you don’t realize is that it’s not an ordinary thing to be you. The very thing you believe to be faulty is the powerful gift you’ve got right where you are.

To be you, it takes courage, resilience, and endless strength. To be you, it takes a lot more reflection, understanding, and patience than being most others. So you’ve done really well.

Remember that not everyone thinks and cares as much as you do, not everyone loves as fiercely as you do, not everyone experiences life to the same intensity and meaningfulness as you do, not everyone takes pain as deeply and profoundly as you do, and yet you’re still here, loving, hoping, giving. How do you even do that?

You’re not meant for everyone, and you’re definitely not meant to please everyone. You’re here for all the people who need your softness, all the people who radiate the same kind of compassionate, loving energy you have, all the people who rely on your insight and wisdom to deal with their own mental complexity and all the chaotic emotions they don’t want to feel but have to feel anyway, just like you do. You’re here for the people who see you and your light.

In this materialistic world, it’s not obvious why being you is beautiful and powerful, but you can’t forget that it is.

To all the soft souls out there, it’s time to accept yourself for all the ways you are and you are not, for all your needs, no matter how big or small.

You can build a strong exterior to prevent yourself from getting hurt, but you will keep getting hurt if you don’t accept that you’re a soft, emotional, gentle being, and such a being can’t fit with just anyone. Such a being needs similarly strong, thoughtful, resilient people who have been through enough ups and downs to be able to appreciate your humane depth.

I know it’s disheartening to rarely come anywhere close to love, but connections are supposed to be rare. And for how rare it is, when you find it, it’ll be worth every effort.

Why are you settling? Why are you wasting time asking for love from the people who will never be able to meet your needs even if they want to? What are you shrinking yourself for? Be large. Be larger. Be you. You can never be anyone else as good as being yourself anyway, so stop denying your own gifts and start living authentically now.

Soft soul, I know the world seems to be a cold and lonely place sometimes, and you can feel so lost, but please have hope and faith in yourself, in your magical softness, especially when you’re in the dark. Don’t stop. Keep walking. Being you is always your best bet, and soon enough things will fall into their places when you keep showing up and putting in the work.

The hurt you’re carrying with you now might be overwhelming and devastating, but in times as you look back, you will understand why it has to happen. You will realize you’re exactly where you’re meant to be. You experience exactly what you’re meant to experience so you can tend to all your rough edges and grow into the person you’ve always envisioned yourself to be.

Don’t be scared. Stay strong.

Listen carefully to your wounds, all the open ones—they’re guiding you. Follow your softness—it will lead you to the right places and people, I promise.