Lately I’ve been reading blogs, lots of them—from people I know personally and complete strangers. I’ve been so enveloped in my mind lately, to the point that I feel borderline crazy, but it’s nothing to worry about; sometimes my brain goes on overdrive, which then trickles down to my heart and I end up in a panic.

Xanex? Preferrable, but not necessary. Sleep? Almost always successful as a remedy. An honest conversation, perhaps? The best cure for insanity.

For the last 9 months or so, my life has been so surreal, in the best way possible. Specific people can come in and out of your life and at the time it may seem insignificant, but later you realize that it’s those little moments in time that define who you are and who you become. This is something I’ve known from experience and common sense, but last night it really hit me when I was on the phone with one of my best friends. I read this person’s blog (literally 10 years worth of blogging) and I was so amazed by the details of this person’s mind and life and feelings that I never knew about. It made me realize so much. Nobody is alone. The way you feel, somebody out there also feels, or has at least felt before. Nothing is new anymore.

People grow and evolve. It’s inevitable. But beyond that, you have more control than you think over who you become in time. Your entire life is your choice. God has ultimate control over fate and future, but day by day, He gives us the free will to make decisions that impact and change our lives.

After reading these blogs, I went back and looked at some of my old blogs. I found one of my favorite pieces from almost 3 years ago.

I know we’re not perfect.

I arrived with nothing more than a bouquet of withered emotions; soon resuscitated by the sound of your voice in my ear. I’ve never had it in me to believe someone that way, and you knew that. I warned you about my fears of this ending with fractured hearts as parting gifts, but still, you assured me it was safe to put all my dreams in a cardboard box marked ‘fragile’ and hand them over to you. I loved you every way I knew how, but those flowers still withered.

“I’m convinced this is too good to be true,” I said to him softly, with decomposing vocal cords. As sweet as it sounded, coming off my lips, it’s not what either of us needed.

He had full moon eyes that I remember misplacing my nightmares and dreams inside. I never figured out exactly what colors they were composed of, but I almost felt like they changed depending on his mood. I dreamed that the first time I asked him to interpret their composition, he told me the tone suggested he was growing ill. They always appeared different to me. He probably thought I was insane.

“She’s suffering from a case of momentary confusion and a malnourished heart; vomiting up short-term certainties. I’ve seen those days my love. We’re a pair of angels who didn’t land quite right. Still, we vowed to end the world together and start our own journey; we underestimated the influence of habitual thoughts.”

I imagined you saying that to me; but I knew the day would never come.

We wandered through a collage of memories and tombstones that night on his bedroom floor; swallowed by pale moons and serenaded by the grasshoppers in the trees. To this day I imagine what it might look like in my head, “They’re not grasshoppers, they’re locusts,” I’d tell him. He wouldn’t want to tell me locusts were grasshoppers. He was the technical one to begin with and my satisfied smile was all the reason he needed to be wrong. He thought I was cute.

This is where I confessed my sins and allowed him to watch me die.

He prayed I’d stop relying on the synthetic life support that’s become essential to exist and accept his outstretched hands for everything they were, and everything they would grow to become. He wanted me to believe for a brief moment that even angels with lopsided wings were accepted into heaven.

But we could have been.

Despite the anti-theft device lodged inside your chest, and your tendency to walk away with the less meaningful parts of pillaged relationships, I’m certain one day you’ll beat this.

I found the dream I wanted, and I chased it, only to catch up to circumstance, in its most miserable performance to date. I found another dead rose, in a garden where happiness is only seasonal; so brittle and brilliantly beautiful. Nothing short of being everything that bouquet of happy endings couldn’t, but you can’t accept resuscitation from a pair of charcoal lungs, only smoke signals my love, only smoke signals.

We both need to learn; how not to fly crooked in broad daylight.

I dug his grave up with bare hands, and for what? To bear the nicks and cuts of another failed attempt until I make my way to the next ebony winged angel in need of resuscitation.

I imagine what you’re thinking.

“She came with a disclaimer that I didn’t quite comprehend until now. An elaborate display of stepping stones that didn’t register until we were already drowning. Maybe it’s just the world talking to her, but if this really is the only thing she’ll ever write that matters, then her world is flat tonight, and she’s running towards the edge. Only she’s not taking any chances because she left the scissors lodged inside my fucking throat, and for what? I never told her she deserved to be treated like a princess, I just did it, without questions and without expectations. For the first time in my life everything was natural.”

Someone asked me what my greatest fear was once; I told them there wasn’t much that frightened me. I was probably telling the truth by conventional standards. I’m not afraid to die, most days it’s a lot more frightening to live. I’m not afraid of rejection or having my heart torn out; been there and somehow learned to overcome it in a timely fashion, or at least I convinced myself that I did. Honestly, I don’t know what I’d do if someone truly accepted me for who I am, or if I believed that they did; my array of imperfections and quirks. I either try too hard to impress people or I employ every means at my disposal to come across as insufferable and anti-social. I’m rarely confident in my actions, but for once I was. I don’t claim to be perfect. There’s plenty about myself I’m in the process of fixing, but I’m certain I could have been everything he needed.

Of course, I’m wrong yet again.

He became everything I needed and maybe I shouldn’t have let it come to that. He was my reason for smiles, my reason for random thoughts, he was my reason… the only one I needed. That’s the root of why it was wrong.

Open your fucking eyes; you’re pleading for someone to listen, well I heard the words you never even spoke and I wasn’t afraid to whisper in the dark for you. I’m standing in front of the half way point and I’m okay with that, but where did you go and why? I’m sure you want to ask me the same question. Remember the way I kissed your lips? How it never felt awkward or forced. The type of kisses you see on movie screens; the type of kisses that channel emotions you didn’t know existed.

He is losing himself in another world and everything I have to say becomes meaningless. I’m not sure if the sentence has really been handed down. I’m sure it is, and I guess that’s okay.

I’m not her and you know that. Neither one of us is perfect, we’re not even 100% happy with ourselves; I don’t think that means we can’t be happy with each other though. I don’t believe in perfect relationships, and neither do you. Well, maybe you do, and maybe that’s why it didn’t work.

And I try to be more like you; speak louder and prouder and hide my love, but it just spills out.

I love you, but you know that.

Ouch, right? Yeah, I read this piece often, and the more I do, the more I learn about myself. I’m not in this place anymore—I’m actually in a place that’s quite the opposite and much happier with who I am as a person. I wrote this after a break-up when I thought death was the only cure for my broken heart. I lived in a mindset that strangled me. I lived in a mindset that had no hope. Life goes on. People will hurt you, people will lie, people will cheat, people will use their pride to get ahead, and people will run their big fucking mouths when you thought you could trust them.

But guess what? Life continues, even when you don’t want it to.

Piece of advice that may save you from lots of self-torture and hurt:
Don’t live in the past. Live in the present. Period.