When I left home at 17 years old, I knew I was going to rule my world. Not the whole world, such as it is, but mine. I was going to do that thing, achieve those promotions, and be all that. I’d been taught by the very best, by simply absorbing everything I saw around me growing up. I knew how to teach myself what I needed to know, how to move up the ladder without stepping on anyone. I was excellent at setting and achieving my professional goals, while constantly keeping my eye on the next step needed to progress to the next level.

I was equally dedicated to building my skills, my position, and my wardrobe.

I married at the appropriate time, had a child, and moved on to a bigger company all within a couple of years. Then things got interesting. I was opening stores, and training new management, and had wonderful opportunities to jump forward professionally when the time was right. Unfortunately problems with childcare reared their ugly heads while I was away, and I had to reevaluate immediately.

My baby needed me.

I came back, signed up for part-time college classes in business, and took a job paying $6.25 an hour working in an office so I could be home nights and weekends with my son. No matter how hard it was at times, I didn’t have any regrets. As time went on, he grew into a wonderful young man, and by the time he left home, circumstances had changed again.

For the next three years, I worked three jobs, and left myself no life at all.

If I’d had the energy or wits about me to think properly, I would’ve changed that sooner, but being numb prevented that. Instead, I continued cutting off little important parts of me that kept me alive. How else would I fit into this life I was living now? How else could I continue to do these duties and obligations that were required of me? How else could I function daily without losing my mind with all of those parts of me screaming for attention?

There is no more horrifying sound than the sigh of a soul dying.

I heard it one night, that death wheeze, whispering through the dark as I sought the peace of sleep. It terrified me into letting go, one small thing at a time until I could breathe, into looking around me to see how far I had fallen from my heart, into feeling the kind of desperation that no one should ever feel.

The kind of desperation that knows failure will cause a damage from which you will never fully recover.

My heart had been ground up and plowed under and mixed and scattered with a million things to keep the ground level, the road smooth, the path clear for all. Everything I used to be, or dream of being, was only something to be tilled into fallow ground. My interior landscape had become a wasteland, yearning for even the scent of rain.

Maybe the endless stream of tears on the inside is what watered them enough to cause them to rise, fragile and valiant.

I’m still grateful for that, no matter how difficult or devastating its effects will be on my life going forward. I appear to be calling to me people who feed my heart and soul, those who call the she-wolf out of her den to run, to howl, to gather the things that must be, to do the things that must be done to remain who she is. I choose not to let go of her, the she-wolf.

She is mine. She is me.

It is a terrifying, and beautiful state of being. 

You are welcome to join me.

I have bouncers lined up for my funeral. Two of my very best friends are under strict instructions to ban anyone they hear lamenting my passing with “I wish I would have”s.

Having “almost” died several times in my life, I have a fine appreciation for how fragile life is, how fleeting joy and misery both can be, how important it is to speak the truth instead of the accepted bullshit of day to day living.

There is no day to day, we only have now. 

So it is with those men or women who exclaim with the break up  of their relationships…”If he/she only would have told me…”. That is complete and utter crap.

The truth is, you wouldn’t have done a damn thing different. You would have blown it off, ignored the warnings, disregarded the writing on the wall. You would have assumed it would go away, and that no repercussions would occur from your lack of effort.

Guess what? You’re wrong.

I know this for a fact. I have tested this theory. I have said bluntly, and with no sugar-coating: I am unhappy. What I want from you is a partner, a friend, a companion and a lover. I am willing to be the same to you, if you are willing to give the same 100% that I am willing to give.

Our lives are proof that you put yourself first every time, that what you want for yourself supersedes the needs of us as a unit, that the rest of us are merely supporting characters in the life movie of you.

I find it quite amazing to learn that the others are always astounded when their partners leave. Seriously? You had not even one clue? You are totally side-swiped because your relationship was all you wished for and the other has just left with no warning?

No. I think not.

You chose to ignore, to neglect, to believe that it would be much easier for us to stay and tolerate the status quo than it would be to actually give a shit and invest in your relationship.

So here we are.

This is what goodbye looks like. This is your reward for blowing off the feelings of the person you were so “committed” to. This is what happens when you say “you’re too sensitive”, or “you’re the one with the problem”, or “I’m tired, you’ve got ten minutes to say what’s on your mind”, or “you need to get a life”.

Guess what lover? I’m getting a life. And you’re not in it.

I am so tired of the bullshit of self-deception that most of us perpetuate in our relationships. Negligence isn’t okay. Verbal abuse, lack of intimacy, and complete disregard for your needs or wishes is not fucking okay. Who cares what people think, or what you think you’re supposed to do when your soul is rotting from the inside out?

You are not a dramatic, fucked up little mouse, incapable of choosing your own path. You. Are. Not.

You need to get your ass up, square those lovely shoulders, and step up into the human being you have a right to be, with the life that accompanies said stepping up.

God dammit, live the life you’ve been given.

Aren’t you sick of being told there is something wrong with the way you feel? Or that you’re weak and spineless for being honest about what you need and expect from a relationship? Or that everything is perfectly fine, and you are just fucking neurotic, or crazy, or insignificant?

Fuck that. Fuck them. Long live the Queen.

I beg you…step up and rock your own world. ❤

Welcome to The Masquerade Ball.

This is where you dance when the world in your mind is how you want to live, but you are not yet brave enough to make it real. This is where you circle and smile when you are already alone, but you’re still a couple.

This is the place where you walked in to what you thought was love, discovering too late that you were attending The Masquerade Ball.

Everyone wears costumes to cover up the ragged reality, but nobody wants to be the first to admit that something is terribly wrong at this party. The masks help conceal, as best they can, the Sorrow for the facade, and the Wild that wants freed. There is an aura of despair surrounding all those attending as they smile, and nod and bow to public perception.

As you dance by the others in the graceful manner of the top performer that you are, you see into the eyes of those spinning by in this parody of pleasantness. You see heart-break in one, despair in another, numbness and borderline insanity. Once in awhile you catch a glimpse of someone, and as your eyes meet, you see a wildfire burning and it frightens you.

Oh wait. That was you, spinning past the mirror of regret.

You have learned many painful lessons from this endless dance. You learned the hard way that a relationship is where your actions match your words, and if they do not, then what you have on your hands is a Lie.

Pull the costume around you and slap the mask on, because you can’t ruin the party for everyone just because you’re not having fun, right?

Right?

You dance on as you get pulled close, and then pushed away repeatedly. Your steps match only because you are watching and making it happen. This isn’t really a couple’s dance is it? Don’t they call this a solo?

The music has long since become a monotonous white noise you tolerate as you just try to get by. The band is loaded with friends and family that want you to keep dancing to the tune they’re playing so no unpleasantness disrupts this celebration of life together.

Occasionally you notice a few people at the terrace door leading into the forest beyond. Their masks are off, and they keep watching you as if waiting for something. They stand quietly while their former dance partners match up here and there without missing a step, because hell, this is a Masquerade Ball and it’s all pretense.

The band plays on, and the floor is crowded. The air gets warmer and starts to smother you behind your mask. Your partner stares at you blankly, even when you start dropping pieces of your costume along the way as he spins you around in an attempt to stop you.

First you quit saying what you should, then you quit doing what you’re supposed to and the band just plays louder. You drop what’s expected of you, quit doing the usual, and start to move to a music all your own that starts a chain of events where everyone stumbles as they try to dance on.

Chaos reigns as everyone comes to a stop and stares as you begin a fierce dance that has everyone backing away, fearful of being caught up in your unacceptable behavior. Every time you throw your arms wide and spin with abandon, another piece or two of the costume you came in flies off and skids across the floor.

The crowd gasps when they see who you really are.

You come to a stop suddenly, breathing hard in exhilaration, and the crowd falls silent. No one meets your eyes. You turn to the mirror and meet your own, raise your hands, pull your mask off, and toss it aside.

Then you meet your own eyes in the mirror again…and smile.

First you admit and accept that your hard-ass, quick witted deflections and heart of stone behavior is bullshit. Then you become very afraid and cringe away from the god-awful discomfort of looking inside for the reasons why you live a life of bullshit. Then you ask your heart for the truth, and you have to listen when it says, “This is Bullshit”.

Your heart may lead you into scary and unknown territory, but it will not lie to you.

So you listen, and you ponder, and you write it all out. You build on the truths you hear and you let go of the pretending, piece by ragged piece. You quit saying words you don’t mean, you quit going places because you “should” and doing things that make you suffocate.

Your letting go of the parts and pieces that are not true to your heart will hurt you, and those “close” to you.

They will argue and fight with you over these changes. They will tell you you’re crazy, that you’re going through a phase, a snit, a meltdown. They will try to make you feel weak and feeble of heart and mind. They will ask you what is “wrong” when what is right starts surfacing. They will say you need to “rest” when your heart and soul have been sleeping too long. They will tell you not to be foolish, not to do anything rash.

They will say these things while who you are inside raises its head and howls to run.

You’ll be surprised that no one sees the truth that flickers in your eyes. The truth your lungs are breathing in, and out. The truth your heart pounds with when you recognize it. But the truth falling from your lips is what they can’t take.

Because when you change who you show the world, what you send out into it, you change the world around you.

This scares the shit out of almost everyone, because they are comfortable with their lives when you comply and abide by all their rules for happiness. This is why they fight you, just expect, accept and move forward.

Now comes the hard part…you’re going to love someone.

You will be terrified. You will want to armor up, sharpen your wit, and harden your heart…DON’T.

Whether it be friend, lover or both, if it’s love, you will need courage. Because to love someone you must start knowing who they are, and showing who you are in return. Yes, you will. You will need to tell them how you feel honestly about life and about them. It will hurt sometimes.

You will have to answer questions that are painful to hear, and hurt you to answer. You will have to swallow or share excruciating things and sort through them for the gifts that help you become real. You will have to give them the respect of patience as they open up to you.

The only hearts worth holding are those that they pull out of themselves and set at your feet, still bleeding, trusting you to keep them safe. They deserve the same bravery from you, the same fearful offering for the chance of looking into eyes that love who they see, but it takes time.

You have to let the sun rise, the flower bloom, the wind blow and love grow. The most precious gifts are offered not taken.

But what if it doesn’t come, that offering? What if life tackles us and we fail? What if they have to leave us, what if they die? Well then, there you are in agony because you gave yourself honestly and so did they, and now parts of you will always be tangled together and they are gone. So you reach down and pick up your broken open heart that now holds parts of something genuine, put it back inside you and take it with you until the next time you love someone.

Not only did you give each other a love worth having, you’ve exchanged the knowing of what love really is, what it feels like in all its terrifying glory, and now that you’ve seen it, nothing less is acceptable. You may get to hold each other until your last breath, or for a few years, or days, or only a moment, if that.

But what you hold is not bullshit. It’s the most beautiful thing you’ve ever known.

“I love you” is easy. Loving is hard. Please don’t take the easy road, don’t sleep, don’t hide. When you find them, when you are lucky enough to find them…

Pull your scarred and bleeding heart out and offer it in your shaking hands.

Love them…and let them love you in return.