I cried myself to sleep last night. Not one or two tears running down my face, but a full-blown hissy fit. I have a lump in my throat the size of my fist, and my heart bolted down to my ankles like an elevator on steroids. My hands are up, my guard is down, and my tongue is tied.
The man that I love doesn’t love me back. He held my fragile heart in his perfect hands, and then threw it on the floor and did the Mexican hat dance. One day I was his everything - the most amazing person he had ever met, the most beautiful girl he had ever seen. Nobody had ever looked at me the way he did. And I knew that his feelings for me were real. His touch electrified my body and his words melted my heart. He paraded me around like his most prized possession, and he made me feel like the luckiest girl in the world. And when our eyes met and our lips touched, the clock may have been ticking, but time stood still.
What started out as a mere fascination propagated into a love that was greater than anything I had ever felt before. This man brought out a side of me that I didn’t even know existed, and for the first time in my life, I felt like someone was looking at the real me. He was looking deep into my eyes, peering down into my soul, and he actually liked what he saw. It was no longer me against the world; it was us against the world – and together, we could be great. As time passed and the walls between us started to fall, I knew with all my heart that he was the one I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. But apparently, he didn’t feel the same. And it takes two to tango.
While many things in life come easy for me, sharing the deepest parts of myself with another person has never been one of them. Letting your guard down and opening yourself up to someone else gives them all the more room to break you into pieces. I always thought that by evading any possible vulnerabilities in life, I would have a leg up over the competition; while others were on shaky ground, I would be walking on water. But having broken my own rules and taken part in a game that I swore I would never play, I know that my logic was flawed from the start.
If you go through life playing it safe, you are going to miss out on the feeling that you get when you roll down the windows, blast the music, and feel the wind blowing in your hair. Not only does that feeling surface new parts of yourself, but it also exposes you to a world where limits don’t exist and anything is possible. By committing to embracing vulnerabilities – whether it be through sharing secrets with a friend, taking a business risk, telling someone you love them, or moving to a new city and starting over – you are taking the reins and facing your fear of failure. You are living dangerously, taking a risk. And with great risk comes great reward.
So while last night I felt defeated, rejected, and more broken than ever, this morning I woke up with one, all-consuming question. Never before in my life have I been conquered by defeat. Never before have I surrendered at the first sign of uncertainty or doubt. Never before have I let anything stand in the way of getting what I want. So why should I start now? While embracing vulnerability exposes us to failure, it also exposes us to greatness. And the only force more powerful than fear is hope. So I’m not going to let one glimmer of doubt stand in the way of getting what I want. Sure, the road may get bumpy and the path may be undefined, but with patience, drive, and creativity, there is always a way to get what you want. So I’m not here to surrender - I’m here to fight. I’m here to fight for the man that I love, the man that I want to spend the rest of my life with. And I will not stop until I get what I want. Because like all of the best things in life, love is worth fighting for.
So while you may lose control and expose yourself to failure, I encourage you to embrace vulnerability and to go live dangerously. Go fight for the job you’ve always wanted. Go fight for the love of your life. Go fight for the person that you know you can be. What would you do if fear did not consume you? It’s time to conquer it and go find out.