Coming Home To Myself Didn’t Mean Immediately Coming Home To You

I only met you after I met myself. I only saw you after spending time walking down a corridor of mirrors, forcing myself to see this vessel in every light and from every angle. I had to face myself before I could stand before you and I had to do it without the incentive that I would meet you if I met myself. I walked a long journey, cut my feet on the shards of the past, swam through the tears I cried over people who never truly knew me. I stood face to face with people who I had overlooked, had caused them pain while consumed by only one thought: survival.

The truth is that time and time again, the words echoed inside my head: “You’ll find true love when you learn to love yourself.” But that isn’t true. Your soulmate, your life partner, this person that the universe draws you to, will not come into your life if the only reason you are trying to love who you are at the very core of your being is so that you can be loved by someone else. And it’s the reason that so many try to love themselves, but it’s not true love. It’s a facade, a mask, a performance. It’s a means to an end, a short-term goal to reach this long-term goal. But that’s not what self-love should be. It’s not what it is. The long term goal is to fall deeply in love with the light you see in your eyes. To see your bare and vulnerable skin and acknowledge the pain and suffering you have often put yourself through, to benefit people who walked away when the road got slightly rocky. To see your tear streaked cheeks and understand that those who told you that you were not worthy of love were deflecting their own misery onto you. They wanted you to feel small so that you would rely on their love, so that you would never leave them, because they were the ones who were ridden with insecurities.

You are worth so much more than the scars that your body bears. You are worthy of more than all the tears that have escaped from your eyes. You are so much more than the false love you tried to convince yourself was true. You want true love? It’s right within you.

You don’t need another person to love you and romance you when the person you have put through hell, the person who has suffered through the worst of storms and self-destruction, walks alongside you every single day. Do you think that just because you cannot abandon yourself that it doesn’t mean anything that your vessel has not given out on you? Your body carries your heart and soul through the tragedies and trauma you have endured. You have never been alone because you had you. To be alone means to have emptiness in your life consuming you. But your vessel is not empty. Your life is not empty.

Love and romance, it will come. But don’t think of it. The universe has always had a way of uniting those who are meant to be together. Did you think it was a coincidence or game of chance that you ended up in your vessel? No. You were made for each other.

My love? He found me. He found me after I found myself. He walked into the home that I had started to build for myself. He came home and started building with me. We are still laying bricks and putting fresh coats of paint every single day. But I laid the foundations, I did the groundwork. He joined me much later on.