Dear my younger self,

You used to write letters to your future self every year based off what happened to you in your past. These letters were always centered around the pain that plagued you and the heartbreak that others caused you. They were meant to be warnings for me, a big red sign that read: DO NOT DO THIS AGAIN IT WILL BREAK YOU. But you know what I learned recently? I learned that any advice that strays from the human experience is not based off truth, but rather fear.

We are all little creatures in a beautiful, vast universe – this pain comes with the job title. Living in the future too much caused you an overwhelming amount of anxiety, but living in the past filled you with deep sadness and regret. What you failed to realize back then is that living in the present moment isn’t unproductive – it is peaceful.

I think you missed something very important in all those old letters. You forgot to mention that without sorrow there can not be rapture, without grief there can not be peace, and without heartbreak there can not be love. You were coming from a place of unfathomable hurt. In the end, it was you who needed a letter, not me.

So, this is what I wish I could have told you back then. Never forget you can handle anything life throws your way. It’s okay to feel weak, to break down and cry. It’s okay to have regrets. In fact you should have regrets because if you don’t then that means you’ve never tried anything worth losing yourself in. You are human and your deep capacity to feel is your strength, not your undoing. How lucky are you that you’re able to love the way you do, that you’re able to see the light in the dark, that you’re able to empathize with the sadness of others? How lucky are you that you’re able to laugh wildly, that you’re able to experience unmatched joy, that you’re so grateful sometimes you have to shed your tears in order to express it?

All the heartbreak, all the failures, all the terrible things that happened to you is what’s going to show you which direction to go in. All you have to do is follow the path I carved out for you. And trust me when I say I came out okay on the other side.

I am here today, full of love and hope, because of every good and bad and horrible and amazing thing that has ever happened to you. But I am also here because I refused to give up, because I kept going even when all I could do was crawl, because I envisioned a better future for myself and believed with everything I had in me that it was possible. I will leave you with one final thought: Anything and everything can be a catalyst for change. But it is up to you to take the shattered vase and glue it back together with gold.

TO WRITE ME BACK CLICK HERE

Dear heartbreaker,

You inspired me to fly. By cutting off my wings and pushing me over the edge, I had to learn to soar without anything to hold me up. But without the extra weight of your casual abuse sitting on my shoulders, I was light enough to escape through an unfamiliar sky like a shooting star.

Love will change you. Unreciprocated love will transform you. Your cold absence brought me closer to my own soul until I was able to feel the warmth that shone from within. I learned who I am without your shadow forcing me into tight boxes and neat lines. I am no longer ashamed of the years I spent on you. You taught me how to love. Now it’s time I take the love I had for you and give it back to myself.

Life’s greatest lessons are not learned through textbooks, but through the words and actions of another flesh and bone human with a heart as fragile as yours. You taught me patience (I was always waiting for you to change). You taught me kindness (I was soft for a man who only knew darkness). You taught me vulnerability (I let my thoughts spill onto your lap in the hopes that you would do the same). But most of all, you taught me that no matter how hard you fight for someone, how much you care for them, or how much you love them, it will never be enough if they are unwilling to face even their own reflection in the mirror.

I once heard that we accept the love we think we deserve. I guess that means you always knew you didn’t deserve me, and I’m so sorry to myself for not realizing that until much, much later.

The tides of grief are not always chaotic. It is not always inflicting destruction upon the mind or rushing against the dam we construct within our hearts so as not to feel the hurt. Sometimes the tides of grief are calm, soft, ebbing and flowing just like our joy ebbs and flows. Sometimes it comes when we least expect it, when we think it had went away forever. Like when I don’t realize I’m still looking for you until I see the back of a dark-haired stranger and stop in my tracks, hoping it’s you. Or when I catch the flicker of a hearty laugh that sounds just like yours. Or when someone hugs me and I somehow crumble into their embrace, confusing their arms for yours.

But in spite of the wounds you have inflicted upon me, I am still grateful for you. This human existence is full of bliss and sorrow, laughter and pain, love and heartache, and by the fated coincidence of two souls such as ours briefly merging, I was able to experience the entire spectrum of these emotions within you, one simple human. I am excited to continue on with my life, my heart so broken it is forever cracked open and ready to receive the love of future characters who won’t have to be told to handle me delicately.

So thank you, heartbreaker, for destroying the girl I used to be. Without you, I would have never been inspired to find who I am now.