I Don’t Want to Fall in Love Again

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he place of confusion and angst. I don’t want to be swept off my feet but to remain standing with my hand held firmly, my chin up, and my smile wide and steady.</p><p id="1dd1">I want to build love on a smooth and solid foundation of friendship and affection. I don’t want it blown away by a fierce wind because the foundation was far too fragile. I want a love that is capable of weathering life — the good days and bad, my chronic illness and its meltdowns, my busy mind and restless sleep, my big dreams, and ever-shifting moods.</p><p id="b388">I want a love that appreciates what I have to offer and doesn’t judge my every flaw simply for existing. A love like that can’t be found by chasing it or by contorting ourselves into something other than what we are. A love like that can’t be found in a sea of red flags that wrap around us tightly and pull us under.</p><h2 id="d0c8">A love like that isn’t easy to find.</h2><p id="fa46">But it’s worth it. It’s worth the waiting and the lonely nights. The mistakes and the wondering if it will come. A love like that is magic of our own making — an intentional commitment to love and keep loving.</p><p id="c945">I don’t want to fall in love again. Falling is too easy. The pain is too bright and lasts far too long. The imprint of that pain becomes stronger than the love affair that caused it. It can leave behind a metallic taste of fear, a hesitance to risk our fragile hearts ever again.</p><p id="c653">I want to love again but not to fall into it blindly. To trip. To land and scrape up that fragile organ. To add another scar to the many others.</p><h2 id="42dc">But to rise in love and place my fragile, beating heart in safe hands?</h2><p id="de05">That feels like something I can do. And I can hold a fragile heart safely in my own. I can love again where love is reciprocated, where I’m not left wondering if it will be given only to be taken away. Where reassurance is given freely and th

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e commitment to love is unbroken by life’s hardships.</p><p id="0309">To rise in love and to be met there, at last.</p><div id="0b7b" class="link-block"> <a href="https://readmedium.com/on-the-days-when-the-world-is-too-much-i-am-finally-enough-3a3a9e77eb92"> <div> <div> <h2>On the Days When the World Is Too Much, I Am Finally Enough</h2> <div><h3>To every soul struggling right now, consider this your reminder</h3></div> <div><p>medium.com</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/0*pJ5_-m5t52eWFz1K)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><div id="568a" class="link-block"> <a href="https://readmedium.com/reciprocity-should-be-a-bare-minimum-requirement-300e0d2f57aa"> <div> <div> <h2>Reciprocity Should Be a Bare Minimum Requirement</h2> <div><h3>Consider this a reminder of your worth.</h3></div> <div><p>medium.com</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/0*MctqR_6HTezD0ysa)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><div id="483c" class="link-block"> <a href="https://readmedium.com/my-intuition-is-never-wrong-107f8990acb8"> <div> <div> <h2>My Intuition is Never Wrong</h2> <div><h3>Not Even When I Want it to Be</h3></div> <div><p>medium.com</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/0*gMUcGWt_gnpDJ1rx)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div></article></body>

For anyone who has ever been bruised by love and loss.

Remember the skinned knee of childhood? The bright sting of it. The flood of tears. The vivid pain is imprinted on our memory. The next time we fell, we knew exactly what we were in for.

I fell in love. He fell out of it. I remember the bright sting of it. The flood of tears. A vivid pain imprinted on my memory. I know what I’m in for if I fall again.

I don’t want to fall in love again.

I want to rise in it. I want to be met there. I don’t want to be alone, falling, and waiting for the pain to arrive. I want a hand to hold that won’t so easily drop mine, reaching back instead of forward, leaving me to fall alone.

It’s been easy to leave it all behind. To leave little to chance. To make a cozy space and dream soft dreams in it. I know the risk of falling, and I decided that I just want ease for a little longer. I want a safe place to dream with no threat that my heart will be caught only to be broken into pieces and handed back to me with some of them missing.

There are always pieces missing. I am not the same person who fell in love the last time. It has changed me in ways I cannot fully articulate. It has shaped my life in ways that cannot be undone.

So, it makes sense that I would want to rise in love instead of fall.

I want reciprocity rather than an endless string of promised love soon withdrawn. I want ease and peace in the place of confusion and angst. I don’t want to be swept off my feet but to remain standing with my hand held firmly, my chin up, and my smile wide and steady.

I want to build love on a smooth and solid foundation of friendship and affection. I don’t want it blown away by a fierce wind because the foundation was far too fragile. I want a love that is capable of weathering life — the good days and bad, my chronic illness and its meltdowns, my busy mind and restless sleep, my big dreams, and ever-shifting moods.

I want a love that appreciates what I have to offer and doesn’t judge my every flaw simply for existing. A love like that can’t be found by chasing it or by contorting ourselves into something other than what we are. A love like that can’t be found in a sea of red flags that wrap around us tightly and pull us under.

A love like that isn’t easy to find.

But it’s worth it. It’s worth the waiting and the lonely nights. The mistakes and the wondering if it will come. A love like that is magic of our own making — an intentional commitment to love and keep loving.

I don’t want to fall in love again. Falling is too easy. The pain is too bright and lasts far too long. The imprint of that pain becomes stronger than the love affair that caused it. It can leave behind a metallic taste of fear, a hesitance to risk our fragile hearts ever again.

I want to love again but not to fall into it blindly. To trip. To land and scrape up that fragile organ. To add another scar to the many others.