A love letter from an Anxious woman to an Avoidant Man

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This was the best piece I read today and I am still wondering how?!

 How can words be so  devotional-ly woven? Each letter is beautifully engraved and carries the deep emotional essence of one's individuality and longing, of pain and knowing self, of ones healing journey...

At this point 👉 'my whole body exhales', I felt as if I got the answer to myself which I was searching since long, especially during the breathing practices, I always wondered why is it that I struggle to exhale effortlessly....and Now I know. The pain of love leaving.

Loved it!❤️

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I know you need space.

Time to be in your own energy.

And I respect that.

Your solitude is sacred to you

the same way connection is sacred to me.

I’m not here to take that from you.

But when I don’t hear from you...

when I feel you drifting

something inside me panics.

My nervous system thinks love is leaving again.

Not because of you

but because my body was wired to expect absence.

I never had consistent love.

It was always hot & cold.

My father wasn’t really there.

And my mother taught me to be a “good girl”

who never needed too much.

I learned to smile when I was hurting,

chase love that felt just out of reach.

Now I attach quickly & try harder,

I lose myself trying to keep love from leaving.

I question myself.

I mistake distance for rejection.

So now I struggle to trust the warmth will stay.

When I met you

there was something familiar about the way you didn’t chase me.

A part of me was drawn to it

to the strength, to your fire,

but also to the feeling that I had to earn your attention.

It felt like maybe this time

I could finally be enough to be chosen.

I didn’t see it at first,

but I was replaying the same story

hoping I could rewrite the ending.

I know you’ve got 1000 things going on.

I just need to feel you sometimes.

And I know you’re trying.

You’re working, providing, holding a lot.

I’m not here to make that harder.

I just want to feel that I still matter.

When I criticize or complain,

it’s not because you’re not enough.

It’s because I don’t feel safe.

It’s my wound speaking

the part of me that’s terrified

you’ll disappear like everyone else did.

I know it’s not your job to fix that.

It’s my work. And I’m doing it.

But please know:

when I feel you’re really present with me,

even just for a moment,

my whole body exhales.

I don’t need you to save me.

Just don’t disappear when I’m scared.

Let me know we’re okay.

Let me know I still matter.

Let me know I’m not too much.

Because I’m still learning

that love can be safe

and that I don’t have to earn it.

And that’s all I ever wanted

to be seen, held, and chosen

even when I’m messy.

❤️Follow @blake.coach for more 

Where Art meets education with a purpose

The other day, I made an effort to break the monotonous cycle of visiting the same theatre, meeting the same crowd, by booking myself for an adult play (or at least by the title) – 'The Vagina Monologues', a play by Eve Ensler.

A busiest week at work followed by the weekend where I told myself, "I deserve a treat!"

Leaving home at the peak of my usual nap time, I had lunch and then headed to board a crowded metro, changing the track mid-way to reach somewhere closer to the venue at 4 PM.

I felt good about the pain I took and the awareness that I was slightly opening up to new places, people, or even making choices or decisions that could be exploratory. And the same thoughts sometimes make me feel depressed: "What if I missed the train?" Well, my sweet ex-manager used to tell me that "no one is going anywhere, we are all just moving in circles :D," and that is what I would love to stick to!

Okay! Let's get back to the topic. Yes, if given a choice, I would have never signed up for this particular play! Reason being: sheer sensitivity towards the topic, its wild name, and something I won't be able to or comfortable discussing with my family or neighbors, possibly because I might be judged. Or even with friends, but those are limited and away, who would even not be interested to know which play I attended.

In addition, I noticed how one starts to observe the difference of being a tenant in a city versus being a native of that land. And it brings some sort of panic if one has lived a decade plus in that city or also creates this urge to live like a tourist. After all, we are all tourists of our individual journeys of life.

Finally! What made me purchase those tickets for the play – 'The Vagina Monologues'? The detail about the play on the booking platform and it being categorized under the genre of 'comedy'. But more so because it had conversations between women of varied age, and I, being an independent one living in her midlife, would want to understand and approach that topic with ease and grace. Until very recently, it never occurred to me that for women the only constant is change: that of shape, size, being, roles, everything... and I am one who resisted all those! At least what all was in my control. And all of a sudden, there is a life that took a whole upside-down turn, and I find myself questioning, "Who am I now?" But I can say, I am comfortable in the space I am at.

The play had four ladies performing on the stage, each one from a different age, caste, religion – both as the characters of the play and in their real lives. And each segment of the play captured one common theme, but the core lay in all those two hundred interviews the team/director had done with women from various eras: one who survived wars, family abuse; one who found love and felt loved; one who stayed with her stigma until the age of 72 years; one who found love, expression of self in similar gender; one where they were treated as an object of physical pleasure, etc. What surprised me the most was that this has been running in theatre for the last 23 years, and one of the artists was 80 years young! I loved that lady, and she has my deepest respect for this bold and beautiful part she played.

The whole play was deeply engaging and a rollercoaster of emotions, especially for women in the hall, including me! But I had a hearty laugh!

In the beginning, the cast shared a few insights about the challenges they had to face: how, at times, they were let down at the last minute of performing shows; the difference of opinions across different parts of the country; and being tagged as a "disruption to the law and order situation of the place," etc. But the intent they had saw the light of the day. They believed such acts enable lightness around the topic, address issues like rape, abuse, etc., and help with spreading awareness about one of the simple parts of the female body, which is definitely not a pleasure-giving sex object, but something more phenomenal, as capable as a heart – ready to sacrifice, birth a new life, sensitive, and the most ignored by women themselves. The play supports a massive bunch of abandoned women and those who are sexually abused by funding and building safe accommodations, education, and a respectful life for them.

I salute those men and women who took this on themselves, came up with creative solutions, and are investing a great part of their own lives and skills into such a noble cause, in spite of the restrictive and masked society we live in, the duality where people shy away from owning their own true selves!

Wishing them success!!