“Problems arise in that one has to find a balance between what people need from you and what you need for yourself.”

-Jessye Norman

I’ve got to keep reminding myself that all I can do is be a good friend and a good person, and it’s up to the other people I encounter to meet me in the middle. Sometimes when I’m not getting it back it really fucks with my head and makes me feel a loneliness that resonates deep down to my bones. I don’t want to stop giving of myself because I think it’s important to try to be a light for other people in this world no matter how much they can offer to you in return. I must remind myself, though, to hold onto some boundaries and not allow people to take advantage of my kindness. I need to realize when it’s time to back off and take care of myself first.

It was so much easier when I was an angry person. I could shut off that oversensitive part of myself and hold onto that anger to ride me through my emotions. If you want to truly experience healing; however, you need to be willing to sit with your emotions and try your best to observe them rather than getting caught up in them. You can’t constantly go along for the ride. That’s the part I’m always working on; learning to become an observer of my own experiences.

But we can’t only observe and monitor our emotions from a logical place either. Passion stems from emotion, and I personally want to keep experiencing passion and joy without constantly overthinking everything and ruining the good that may have come from it.

“Happiness is not a matter of intensity but of balance and order and rhythm and harmony.”

– Thomas Merton

Balance. Life is about striving for it. Learning to go with the ebb and the flow of it.