Have you ever thought your love could save someone, despite evidence to the contrary? Maybe you found yourself in love with that bad boy/girl with the heart of gold and even though you knew they weren’t good for you you tried to convince yourself that your love could change them. Perhaps you have felt the bone deep feeling of despair when someone you cared about was hell bent on self destruction and no matter how hard you loved them or how much you tried to relieve their pain there was nothing you could do but watch them self destruct. How many times have you been disappointed and disillusioned when you learned that your love -as beautiful and amazing as it was- was not enough?
I used to think that love was the most powerful force in the universe. Some might call that naive but I never felt embarrassed by it. I didn’t hide my belief; in fact, I rather wore it as a badge of honor. My younger self was quite the romantic dreamer as it was. Yet, back then – and even now, though to a lesser extent-I was very careful who I gave my deepest love to. You see, I have long thought of love as being both my greatest strength as well as my greatest weakness. I have usually been friendly and open to a point…and most people never suspected that there were subtle yet powerful walls in place.
The great thing is that when I do love, I don’t love small. The not so great thing is that when I do love, I don’t love small. I don’t know how to love half-assed. No, I have typically been all in, with no boundaries and all of my “stuff” laid out on the table. Perhaps on some level my silent, subtle yet strong walls were the result of realizing how my tendency to feel with great depth could cause me enormous pain if I let the wrong person in. In some ways I suppose that my belief that love was the most powerful force in the universe was a natural one.
I believe there are points in everyone’s life where our most dearly held beliefs are challenged- often in a big way. These crossroad moments in our lives don’t happen just when we are young but also as we progress along life’s journey. Often the older we are, the less prepared we are to re-evaluate those beliefs. After all, we did all of that learning and personal growth through pain stuff in our teens and early 20s, right?
Perhaps that’s why my moment of having to re-examine what I thought were my personal truths blindsided me and brought me to my knees. I found myself in a situation where someone I deeply cared for was on a path to self destruction. My natural tendency has been to fight for the person I care about, to hold on, to love harder. And so I did everything I could to remind my friend of who they were at their core, to express my concern as well as my belief in them, and to offer a shoulder to cry on. I asked them constantly how they were doing and what I could do to help and subjected them to my love over and over again.
At first, there were little successes and moments where this person accepted the balm of love and friendship that I had always offered, but these moments were short lived. I upped my game again and again until things reached a boiling point… and both I and my love were rejected in a most devastating way.
Stunned, angry, sad and confused, I folded into myself and licked my wounds within the shadows of my own being in relative silence. I mourned what seemed like the loss of a friend and I grieved for what could occur….the loss of a beautiful, brilliant individual with an amazing soul. Eventually, I got through these initial reactions and the sharp, excruciating pain transformed into a dull throb which both hurt and was numb at the same time. At least, I thought I had gotten through. But as I replayed the scenario again and again in my head, suddenly my demons whispered a question in my ear.
“What if love ISN’T the most powerful force in the universe?”
This shook me to the core. After all, the power of love was one of my most deeply held beliefs. One day (after ruminating over this for the umpteenth time), I had an epiphany- and not a good one. It is true that what hurt me the most in this situation was watching someone I loved drown in their own quicksand of pain. Yet, when I was really honest with myself, I realized that part of my hurt also stemmed from what my inability to “save” the person I loved said about me. Why wasn’t my love good enough or powerful enough to provide salvation?
I am now able to acknowledge that a small part of myself, perhaps my shadow self, was selfishly making the situation about me and my failure. The truth was that it was never about me. My friend’s predicament had nothing to do with me and in hindsight my need for reassurance and validation from someone who was obviously in no position to provide this was ridiculous at best, and harmful for both parties involved at worst.
These realizations allowed me to let go, in a loving way. To hold a space for the person I cared about without feeling the need to be their salvation. I let them know that I loved them unconditionally, and I was there for them if needed me and then I was mostly silent. I refused to enable their illusions but I also never gave up on them. Furthermore, these realizations allowed me to recognize the more “human” parts of myself with self compassion and without feeling like a victim or martyr.
Now, more than ever, I believe that love can be the most powerful force in the universe, but what that looks like has evolved for me to some degree. It is subtly seductive to believe that love can cure all. Yet I have come to understand that love is a lot like medicine. You could have the most powerful cure in the world but if someone isn’t willing to take it then nothing will change. If you believe in the concept of free will, then while we can offer consenting adults a salvation, we don’t have a right to make the decision for them as to whether or not they consume what we offer. It has to be each individual’s choice, and it has to be made freely.
This doesn’t mean that we should give up on those we care about who are struggling – quite the contrary. You can be there for your loved one, offer your love, empathize, and hold a space for them thus creating a safe environment in which to heal, but ultimately the choice is theirs.
These days, I still love hard. But I also love myself hard. I try to only give those things that I can truly give freely without resentment. When I know resentment will rear its ugly head or that I am venturing into an area that will likely cause me pain (especially if it has in the past), I set boundaries. As Danielle LaPorte asserts, “Open, gentle heart. Big fucking fence.” It is much more practical and comfortable to build fences than to build walls. It is much safer and healthier to build a fence with someone or something you are unsure about than to give them an all access pass to your heart- at least until trust has been built.
As for my friend, he eventually made a choice to step off the path that he was on and several months later reached out to me. In his own way, he acknowledged what had happened between us and thanked me for being his friend. Things aren’t the same as they used to be, but I don’t think that’s a bad thing. I feel much freer and more loving knowing that I am respecting myself and my boundaries and that love does not demand that I solve someone else’s problems.
And what to do with all of the love you have built up in order to save the person you care about? Give it to yourself. Drink down that heady, intoxicating brew and allow yourself to receive all of the love that someone else did not want or could not accept. Revel in your own beauty, recharge from within, and be your own confessor, your own shoulder to cry on, your biggest and most ardent cheerleader. This might be one of the few times that a taste of your medicine is a really good thing.