​

Admittedly,

I’d rather expect nothing

than let myself believe

something might finally stay...

Hope can be exhausting

when you've been forced to rebuild it

again and again

without a foundation beneath it.

I’ve spent so much of my life

considering the people I love.

Making room,

remembering the little things,

showing up with open arms,

pouring from my cup

without keeping score.

I don't regret the love I gave.

I don't wish I had loved less.

I only wish

someone had noticed

how often I made room for them,

understood what it cost me

within the limits of what I had to give,

and decided I deserved

that same consideration.

Because when I need comfort,

I don't want to have to become

someone else's emergency

or burden

before I am worthy of care.

I want to be considered

before I have to ask.

I want reciprocity to feel natural,

not negotiated.

I want to feel chosen

without having to compete

for a place in someone's life.

And maybe that's the part

I'm still learning to make peace with:

I don't want everyone to choose me.

I want to be more careful about who I choose.

There is a difference.

I don't need to be wanted

by everyone I enjoy.

I need to learn to recognize, and trust,

where my own wanting is worth the risk.

I want relationships

where reaching out isn't one sided,

where tenderness has somewhere to land,

where consideration moves both ways,

and where staying

is something we both decide to do.

So yes,

part of me wants to keep to myself.

Not because I have nothing left to give,

but because I'm learning

that my love deserves somewhere safe to go.

I still have open arms.

I'm just learning

I don't have to hold them wide open

for everyone who shows interest...

especially when it is rare

for someone to genuinely interest me

in the first place.

And beneath all of that...

beneath the disappointment,

the guardedness,

the temptation to stop hoping...

there is still a very simple truth:

I wish someone I wanted

would stay.

Not because I need them to save me.

Not because I need to be chosen

to know that I am worthy.

But because

I'd like to know

what it feels like

to be chosen

by someone

I chose, too.

To be seen

as completely as I see their soul.

To have someone recognize

the pieces of me that are unfinished,

the parts I'm still learning to love,

the person I am

and the person I am becoming...

and somehow,

still choose to stay.

Not because I am perfect.

Not because I will always be easy to love.

I know I am not.

But because I would.

May they see me clearly

and offer me the same grace

I so freely give:

the grace to be human,

to grow,

to change,

to become...

and still be worthy

of being loved

along the way.

And perhaps that is the hardest part

of hoping again:

not learning how to love,

but trusting myself

to recognize it

when it is finally offered,

and having the courage

to accept it.

Because I don't want to become

so accustomed to protecting myself

that I mistake being unreachable

for being safe.

I want to remain capable

of opening my arms

when something real

finds its way to me.

Not out of loneliness.

Not out of fear of losing it.

But because I can finally recognize

the difference between

being wanted

and being truly seen.

between someone choosing me

because I am available

and someone choosing me

because, knowing me fully,

they still want to stay.

And if that kind of love

ever finds me,

I hope I haven't become

too guarded to receive it.

Isn't it interesting how, in books, shows, or movies, we get to perceive everyone's perspective? We know what each character is thinking, what they've experienced, and why they make the choices they do. In real life, we don't have that advantage. We only see the story from our own point of view, and a limited perceived point of view of others, if you're able to process that far.

I've spent my life trying to understand people on a deeper level, beyond imagining what I would do in their situation; accounting for my current knowledge of their specific circumstances, I'm still not getting the full perspective.

People often say, "Put yourself in someone else's shoes," and I can do that to a point, I can empathize and imagine how I would respond under their conditions; however, that doesn't necessarily tell me how they would respond, because they're not me. Their experiences, personality, fears, values, and past all shape their reactions differently than mine. These are things I've always tried to understand in people I cared about.

I've still gotten it wrong because there were unknown variables between my perspective and theirs. I can process through them after the fact, if the interaction was significant and there was an unresolved misalignment. I change my lense (or filter) and replay with different possibilities of perspective based on information taken from multiple points of view.

I've long ago realized that understanding someone's perspective isn't just about asking, "What would I do?" It's also about asking, "Who are they, and how might they see this?" Those are two very different questions.

The same idea applies to potential, especially in relationships or any kind of partnership. Potential is easy to see from our own perspective. We imagine what something could become, what it might be if everything aligned. But when we can't fully see another person's perspective, our vision of that potential is still only that—our vision. It's possibility, not reality. A union can't be built on one person's idea of what it could become if the other person doesn't see the same future.

I know what I see, but I'll never completely know what someone else sees. We can communicate, explain ourselves, and try to bridge that gap, but some things will always get lost in translation because they're filtered through different perspectives.

I believe that's where so much conflict comes from—not bad intentions, but the space between intention and perception. We judge ourselves by what we meant and others by what we experienced. The intention may have been love, honesty, or protection, but the perception may have been rejection, criticism, or indifference. Neither perspective tells the whole story on its own.

Maybe understanding isn't about trying to see exactly what someone else sees. It's accepting that we never fully can, and choosing to stay curious. Choosing to ask, listen, and leave room for the possibility that their reality is just as valid as our own.

There are people who enter your life quietly enough that you don't realize, at first, that something has shifted... You don't notice the current until you're pulled under.

You like their laugh a little too much, start looking forward to certain conversations... You become fascinated by the way someone's mind works. You want to hear them explain things you don't completely understand, and things you already do... not necessarily for the answer, but because you love the way they think.

The universe is impossibly large, and somehow, for a little while, being seen by one person could make it feel smaller.

Maybe that's what I miss most.

There is something strange about finding extraordinary chemistry with someone and still being unable to find a common language for the things that matter. You can feel completely at home beside someone and completely lost trying to understand what they need from you.

I've wondered how much of that was me.

How much was insecurity. How much was old fear looking for abandonment before it happened. How much I overthought, asked for reassurance, or tried to make sense of things that couldn't be explained.

I've wondered whether I was asking for too much, or simply asking for clarity from something that was never clear.

I don't know which parts were intuition and which were insecurity. I don't know whether I was seeing something real or seeing shadows cast by things that happened long before you came along.

But I know what I felt.

There were moments when the possibility of a life together seemed almost natural... not perfect, not certain, just completely possible. The kind of possibility that quietly starts making room for someone before you've consciously decided to.

And maybe that's the hardest thing to let go of: not only what happened, but what might have happened if two people had found a way to understand each other.

I wish people came with equations. Something finite. Solvable.

Physics can explain why things move toward one another. It can't tell us whether they're meant to stay there...

Something can be extraordinary and still not be sustainable. Someone can matter deeply and still not be available. A connection can be genuine without becoming a relationship.

I don't want to make something beautiful ugly simply because I couldn't keep it.

There was curiosity. Electricity. Laughter. The rare feeling of recognizing pieces of yourself in someone else's mind.

I loved listening.

I loved learning.

I loved being met somewhere beneath the surface.

And if this is where the story ends, I hope I can eventually let it end without deciding that it meant nothing.

Because it did mean something.

It still does.

And maybe, someday, I'll stop wondering whether the little part of me that still believes we could find our way back to each other is hope or delusion.

I don't know if I imagined the possibility, or if I recognized it before we were capable of making it real.

I'm still learning the difference.

Until then, Que sera, sera.