LONELINESS

February 12, 2005

"In love, no one can harm anyone else; we are each of us responsible for our own feelings and cannot blame someone else for what we feel… I am convinced that no one loses anyone, because no one owns anyone. That is the true experience of freedom: having the most important thing in the world without owning it."- Paulo Coelho, 11 Minutes

Loneliness comes at certain times in my life. It comes after a day spent running around trying to do different things at once. It happens after a week full of listening to different stories. Sometimes it comes like a gentle yet sweet pain during a cloudy day, when all the world seems to be on the verge of mourning. Rarely does it come after a happy and fruitful day. Like now.

I cannot begin to describe the ache that is in me. I cannot begin to imagine what bottomless pain has lodged in my heart. It pains me so much I no longer feel it. It doesn’t even seem like a feeling anymore. It is there. And it haunts me at the least moment I expect it to. I cannot cry. For crying doesn’t make the pain any less. Tears elude me at the loneliest times. Isn’t it weird? They say letting it all out will help. It doesn’t. And I’m not sure anybody can understand.

I am not so arrogant as to claim that I am the loneliest person in the world. Nor do I want my loneliness to be an excuse for loving less. I am born lonely, and hard to accept that may be, it is there. I can only pray for the grace to transcend it and transform my loneliness to love.

I have a different understanding of love. I believe that I have loved so much and understood so much of loving that the moment I love someone, I let go. At first, I do it unconsciously. Yet when I look back at the people I have loved, it seems like I keep on leaving them. Letting them go. It is a painful process and oftentimes I am tempted to cling, to fight to keep the person within my grasp. I spend many tormented nights agonizing over this. Am I losing out on a good thing? Will I have regrets? And I have to fight to keep from falling into the temptation of believing that I am just a coward. Oftentimes I ask myself that maybe I am just afraid of commitment, of embracing the unknown, of getting hurt.

But I sincerely believe with all my heart that I let go because I love. I am not afraid to commit. I am not afraid to get hurt. After all, letting go brings with it the loneliness that few people dare to embrace. And it hurts for many. And it hurts me more. I am not hesitant to embrace the unknown. I have gambled my life for two years not knowing where it will lead me, not even knowing if I am capable nor deserving. I have climbed mountains with only a bit of strength for the long hike, confident that I can make it. I have loved people I am not supposed to love, would be a waste of time to love and are not deserving of my love. In this case, is there really a person who is not deserving of love? I don’t think so. If I choose the one I love, then I am not truly loving. For love knows no bounds, it doesn’t discriminate, nor conforms to what men call proper.

I am not being irresponsible in my belief. I have loved more than I ever thought possible. I have hurt more than I thought I can endure. I have let go of people I love when doing so seems to be the least rational and logical thing to do. I have embraced the loneliness that goes with it. I have leaped over the abyss of uncertainty knowing that love would see me through. My love. My peace.

I cannot say that I am stronger because of this. But in my loneliness I find solace in the knowledge that the one I love has grown stronger because I set them free. I find comfort watching from a distance how they stumble yet get enough courage to be independent because I have not bound them with my smothering affection. I am happy knowing that they will LIVE because I love them enough to teach them how.

Does this mean I will not let someone love me too? I don’t know. I somehow have this feeling that I am not meant to be loved that way. I cannot imagine being bound by a person. No matter how he might profess to love me. I think a person like that will make me lose respect. Love for me is freedom. But then again, there is freedom in surrender. That I let go that I may be loved. It is beautiful. But it might not be for me.

Sometimes a song can make me cry. It resonates with the feeling of loneliness that I always carry within me. I think all songwriters are lonely people. How else can they make people cry? It is the music of one soul touching another. A broken heart looking for its missing piece, a spurned lover groping to understand why he is not enough, a child seeking for understanding, a clown who dreams to find himself and the long list of hopeful lovers praying for someone to love. People might think this weird. They do not see that I struggle so much in this business called love. They do not see that I smile because I am in pain and smiling seems to be the only way to forget. Oftentimes I am tempted to abandon the struggle, to give up the fight. Yet I know that by giving up I am losing my own self. So I trudge on, a weary one man army. All in the name of love.