life: acoustic & amplified

I could have…

I have spent most of my adult life in bad relationships, and when I say bad, I mean it in the worst sense of that word. I’m not blaming anyone else. I ‘needed’ and chose those relationships to learn what I have learned about myself, I needed them to shine the spotlight on my dark places and I needed them to show me the differences between what love is and is not, and for my own personal healing, which has allowed me to leave harmful relationships and still fight through to stay open to love.
I believe in love! I want love! I want a life partner! I want tenderness! We are here to love.
I am a girl who loves deeply, loves passionately and has the ability to see potential in others, and have fallen in love with potential a few times.
All human relationships are tricky and there is always this balance of good and bad. The passion and the ugly underbelly of when passion twists and becomes something else, can easily happen.
I’m not calling myself an expert, I try not to judge, but to understand myself through what I have chosen. I have never allowed myself to be a victim. I make choices. I have free will. I am responsible for my own actions. I do not condone the bad actions of others, but I have to take responsibility for only mine.
Here are a few of my own:
I lived in a verbally, mentally and sexually abusive marriage for 12 years; I accepted a marriage proposal in which I was asked to be a consolation prize; I stayed way longer than I should have with a man with a drug addiction who stole all my money (I convinced myself I could help him-ha); I chose to stay for two years with a man who refused to even allow me to sit beside him on the sofa without his permission. I dated a man who was willing to commit what he believed was ‘sin’ with me and then say terrible words of condemnation and judgement of that sin afterward. Then choose to put us both back in that same situation again.
There were many good things about all these relationships as well. Things that made me want to stay, want to see them get better. That’s why it’s tricky. How do you give up? That’s not easy for me.
You have to examine what you’ll tolerate. What’s important. You have to be willing to lose things. Sometimes really big things, and without a guarantee of what you will receive in return. It’s a huge gamble to go for what you really want – and be willing to believe that a real equal relationship is possible. Takes a lot of faith and guts.
Yup, I have been in some real doozies. I am so grateful for paying attention and learning a few lessons.
One of the biggest has been the ‘Potential problem’ 😃 Every person I have ever loved, including myself, has vast amounts of untapped potential. I am hopeful that I have learned the lessons of entering into an intimate relationship with someone who has firmly chosen to leave that landscape under ice their whole life.
Just the other day a wonderful man said to me…’I could have…’ but guess what? He didn’t. I see that. It’s ok. He’s free to make choices. I am just so grateful I have learned and don’t allow myself to give him credit for what he could have done, but left undone.
There are so many things I could do, but what remains is what I do. It is what it is. Always.
I can love someone deeply, but that doesn’t mean I give up what I have learned. That would just be stupid of me.
Through all my adventures and lessons in this complex and wonderful thing we have simply named LOVE, my greatest blessing in taking responsibility for myself has been learning to love myself. I feel so fortunate to have found myself lovely, lovable and totally beloved and to know for sure, you can find that true for yourself – IF you choose to!!
I would love to find a life partner, someone to share myself and the rest of the journey with, but I am ok if that doesn’t happen. I would rather walk alone than be in an unequal relationship. I pray for the ability to keep that always in my vision!
I am so grateful for the words of Anne LaMott, ‘Grace meets us right where we are, but never leaves us there.’ and I have found EVERY little thing is grace, if we allow it.
ACL 1/9/15