Here’s to The Ones Who Love

Think about that one thing you love.

Think about how much work you’ve put into it. Think about how it sits in the pit of your stomach, and how it dances on your fingertips as you cover the smile it brings you.

And then remind yourself to never cover that smile. You love for a reason. You love with passion, with every strand of your being. Don’t fear that love, don’t hide that love, let it fill you, let it mend you, let it be you.

Because what would life be without the things we love? What would life be if we found ourselves cowering in fear of how deeply we feel?

Please, never cower.

And please don’t let someone make you cower – because your love is what makes your life, and what makes you. Your love is never silly. Your love is never wrong. Your love is genuine and unique just to you, and only you have the right to question it.

So please, express it. Feel it. Let it burst from your heart like rosebuds, thornless, bare, and beautiful.

Let it sweep you in its arms and carry you through your sorrows, through your darkness, through all the pain you feel through any of life’s endeavours.

And don’t give up on it.

Don’t give up on your love, for whatever it may be, because your love is true, and your passion will follow. If you lack inspiration, listen to the racing of your everlasting heart. Your body will remind you of what your mind cannot.

Because sometimes, you just have to allow yourself to feel it. To nurture to it, to listen to it in all of your vulnerability.

And that’s just it – Love is vulnerable. But love is real and can be anything.

But please, I ask of you, whether your love be for another, or for what you do, love yourself. 

It’s a hard request, but if you do not accept your own beauty, how can you truly appreciate beauty at all?

If you don’t love yourself, how can you ever fully love what you do? How can you ever appreciate how long and hard you’ve worked?

Because I know how hard you’ve worked. Whether you’ve worked on loving yourself, a hobby, or someone else, you’ve worked really damn hard to get to where you are.

Give yourself credit. 

And that thing you do? That thing that makes your chest feel like it’s going to burst? That thing that causes an automatic smile to appear on your lips?

Keep doing it. 

I don’t care if you think you’re not good enough, because you’ll never be good enough if you don’t try. You’ll never be good enough if you don’t continue pouring painstakingly long hours into what you love, and you know what? You do it because you love it. You do it for you, hardships and all.

Whether it’s good, bad, or just plain mediocre, your love for it, that feeling you feel, is what makes it infinitely valuable. Your passion holds more value than your supposed worth to society, to those who judge you, to those who want your love to be caged and tucked away.

Your passion is what drives you, it’s unique and raw and everything that truly matters.

I don’t care how many people tell you to stop loving like you do. I don’t care how many times you tell yourself to stop loving like you do, because your love matters. 

Please don’t hide it away. Let it fill you rather than break you. Let it drive you forward, rather than bring you down. Let it bring you closer to yourself, rather than farther away.

And let it be your light in this dark world, because your love will keep you warm on the coldest and darkest days.

And maybe I’ll be huddled besides you, my heart open and bare, my love fuming and twirling in the darkness, lighting the path ahead.

My hope is that it will light your way too.

My hope is that someday, we can all light each other’s ways with abandon.

So again I ask – Love. Love with all you have, because your love is all you have.

Embrace it and live with a full and confident heart.

And then, the light will follow.

What do you love? Who do you love? Tell me your story by leaving a comment below!