Dear me,
You have an innate wonder with humanity, like adoration is a habit. Sometimes it rings in your ears faintly, others it barrels towards you like a tidal wave, your humanity and lack thereof.
Keeping calm under pressure is not a dramatic feat, but keeping your composure in the face of horror? That is. And we have it — the ability to not just keep a calm facade, but find home in humanity and its horrors. We expected nothing less, and commanded nothing more.
Self love does not come easy, but ego does, arrogance does and pride does. The difference between self love and being egomaniacal lies in the better part of self-discovery, self-worth and self-assurance. Those of us with a lofty dose of both find peace in the middle of a storm, see the world crumble and think to ourselves, “Would you burn this earth to the ground for the people you love?” For us, the answer is yes. Does that make us a villain? Or is that what we adore about us, that we would stop at nothing for the people we love?
Sometimes though, self love relies on outside validation. Remember when he told you your eyes light up the darkest rooms? That they sparkle like oceans? Do you remember all the things he said that made your heart swell, that grew flowers in vines that slithered their way down from your ears, around your spine and into your heart?
But, without fail, the aspect people love about us most is our love for them. The kind of love that brightens them, that burns them and that feeds them and reaches the darkest parts of them. Love that can make someone love themself. To my younger self, who thinks she isn’t enough, who felt the harsh sting of humanity's more evil actions, who took those to heart as a reflection of herself, let the ache of someone else’s malevolence define her: it's okay to hurt, because you still love anyway. And to present me, who gives her heart freely, needlessly and without question, who needs to remind herself daily that other people’s transgressions are not a reflection of her: let yourself feel the sting of heartbreak, it will leave you with a brighter heart.
And to future me, who reads this again and again to remind herself of the darkest parts of who she is, and the love even they hold, remind yourself that you made it, that others burned you down for themselves, but there is no shame in finding someone worth burning everyone else down for, as long as you remember to plant a garden in their memory.
Love,
Me