Love Letter to Yourself

You, Love, deserve the world and more. Every desire. Every heart melting experience. Every passion that lights your soul on fire. Every pleasure that fills your body with ecstasy. Every emotion. Every curiosity.

In this life, you will be pressured to be ashamed of wanting more. Wanting more love. Wanting more life. Wanting more knowledge and wisdom. Wanting more honoring connections. Wanting more powerful ways to use your gifts and strengths. Wanting more pure pleasure and peace and passion. I hope you unapologetically demand nothing but the highest quality respect, values, and behavior in your presence.

There will be many who will tell you you want too much. There will be many who mock you and accuse you of being a fool for your standards. I vow to never belittle your self-respect. I vow to hold your standards with the utmost reverence.

I have watched you experience so much pain and grief. You have been betrayed by those you gave your trust to. You have fallen on your face, sometimes in front of everyone. There have been times you wanted to give up. There have been times you wanted to surrender to life’s weight and just submit to a life of compromise and mediocrity. There have been times playing small and “good enough” sounded like a much better idea than getting back up and fighting for what you truly want.

There are many who will validate your fears and tell you it’s reasonable to compromise and play small. I vow to always believe in you. I vow to whisper words of encouragement in your ear at your most difficult times. I vow to plead with you to get up, even when everyone else thinks you are finished and better off staying down.

I have watched you betray yourself. I have watched you deeply deprive yourself for the sake of someone else. I have watched you give up your peace, hoping to gain just a drop of love from someone. I have watched you put your happiness in someone else’s hands and at someone else’s mercy. I have watched you tolerate your own harm and severe mistreatment, thinking your suffering proved your capacity to love. I have grieved for the pain you have endured and I have gringed at the overwhelming disrespect you have tolerated.

There are many who will tell you you must indeed suffer for love and that if you were truly good enough, you’d earn the love you crave. I vow to remind you love is not earned and you are worthy of it simply because you exist. I commit to remind you of the PRIVILEGE it is to be in your presence. I vow to bring up feelings of anger and rage when someone violates your basic rights and dignity. I vow to scream the truth as loudly as I can to get your attention. I vow to relentlessly tap on your shoulder, telling you true love NEVER requires your self betrayal or toleration of disrespect.

I commit to earn your trust. I commit to choose you over all of the people and things pressuring me to cave and prioritize someone else. I commit to SHOW you my love through my actions. I commit to be there for you, when no one else is. I commit to have your back, no matter the challenges, resistance, ridicule, judgment, misunderstanding, or circumstances you are facing. I commit to offer you my discernment, even when it’s inconvenient. I commit to be radically honest with you, even when it’s tough to hear the truth. I commit to hold your hand through the dark and lonely paths of life, no matter how dark it gets.

I will never abandon you. No matter how many people you lose in this life, you will never lose me.

Sincerely,

Yourself