Rollercoaster.

I've been going through something for a really long time, and I haven't really thought about how to fix it... I just kept dealing with it, hoping it'd go away. And while this sounds like a bad thing, it was actually something that was keeping me happy. It felt harmless but it was dangerously toxic. And now I'm stuck on an unsteady bridge above burning hot molten lava and I have no way to escape it. Is it time that maybe someone saves me? Or do I burn to death with my dignity still intact?

Anyway, it seems all I ever talk about is love. It's the universal issue we all have that I don't even think we're supposed to. And while I was sitting in the bathtub, listening to romantic music, alone, I thought "What are the odds of falling in love while you're still a teenager? There's people out there still trying to meet their soul mates. Why do I feel pressured to find mine now?" And so naturally, I convinced myself it was for the "experience"... But I am experienced. I've been experienced (by infatuation and lust, anyway). People wait till they're married to have sex and some people don't even start dating till they're in their twenties. How come, as teenagers in this generation, there is such an urge to find "the one"? I mean, I want it too - weirdly enough - but I don't think it's going to happen anytime soon. I don't think I'm going to just meet someone I have things in common with and consider him my husband-to-be, but maybe that's because I'm a hopeless romantic and I try to believe in the concept of soul mates. Loving someone because you love them; even if it doesn't seem right - it feels right.

It's hard to know, though, 100% because I don't know what love is like. I don't know how to feel or what it is and who has felt it for real. I want to be in love, and I tried to convince myself multiple times in relationships that maybe it was love or fate or destiny... But if it was - why aren't we still together? And why did I ever have to question it? I mean, aren't you supposed to just... know?

This is kind of repetitive because I feel like I've said this stuff before, a million times, but I guess what I'm trying to say is that I just want to love. I don't want to have to feel it or think about it. I just want to do it. I want to love someone without worrying about if we're meant to be together for the rest of our lives and take care of someone like a wife would, even if that's not meant for us in the future. I want to know what love is... I want you to show me...

No, but seriously, I want to know what love feels like before I actually fall in love with someone. I want someone to love me and still be able to tell me I'm not the one. I think for the last 17 years of my life, all I ever heard was that we were "too different". No one ever told me "I don't feel anything" and I want someone to say that to me. I want to know, when I fall in love with someone, that I've absolutely fallen head over heels with that person and I don't ever have to think about what the difference is because I already know.

And right now, I do love someone. I love him and he's great and he's everything I want in my life but he's not for me. I've been beating myself up trying to figure out my feelings and scaring myself into thinking "what if I'm in love?" But I'm not. I'm allowed to love him, but I don't have to be in love with him. That's okay.

It confused me for a long time; the fact that people were dating to find a relationship, not necessarily their soul mate. But now it kind of makes sense to me. Maybe it's not that kind of "experience", maybe it's just knowing the difference between what feels right and what feels really right. Maybe we start whenever we decide we're ready to experience the journey.

I never looked at love as something that would make you hurt... I always thought everything was just meant to happen a certain way. I've never had my heart broken by an actual person before, and I never knew that I'd be the first capable of breaking my own heart. Because as bad as I want to fall in love, I've never been ready for it. And maybe the stepping stones we take in our meaningless relationships is what prepares us for the fall. We wait our entire lives for someone to catch us, and this time it doesn't hurt... You just fall, safe & sound, right into their arms.

And you stay there.