Red Paint on a White Wall

So as of late I've been doing a lot of internal discovery. I tend to be fairly self aware as far as feelings and thoughts go, but recently its been as if things have been put into a more vivid spectrum of reality. A lot of big ideas have been on my mind that I will probably share in other posts. But what I'm going to mind-vomit over today/night is LOVE. Awww... I know, its not February, and I'll probably talk about it again, but its easier to write about topics when they're on my mind rather than suppressing them for a long time and forgetting the important crap I really wanted to say.

Love plays no games. People may play games with one another and toss Love around, but that only complicates things. Love doesn't play like that. It simply presents itself and we must make choices from there. Whether romantic or friend or family-based. Its a "yes" or "no" question each time, for true love cannot be conditional. Unfortunately, Love is confusing. People, in their imperfection do not always have the wisdom as to what to do with it. Its like a drop of vinegar in a pile of baking soda. Things well up and spill out. Things you never knew existed. Or things you've denied and shoved down for a long time finally reach the surface, unable to be contained any longer.

I remember seeing this happen in one of my best friends one late night as he and I talked. He cracked his chest open a little bit and everything poured out. The confusion. The worry. The stress. The feelings. The happiness. The nerves. The strength and the weakness. The humanness. They all mixed together into one jumbled mess of words that could only be described as Love. I resonated with him. Some of the same fears and concerns he expressed were the things I too felt when I had someone to have feelings for.

So Love is a frustrating yet wonderful thing. Its as if it has an uncontrollable way of working itself into one's mind and refusing to leave until something major shifts it out of place. However, with me, things have been odd these days. In the course of discovering more of myself and just exactly how my inner workings operate, I'm finding that while being single is an amazing thing (given the status of my last relationship, ew), something else is growing within me.

With Autumn being here and the seasons changing, a whole new side of me has started emerging. Perhaps its the side of me I always knew existed. Or maybe it was the side of me I kept locked away. Regardless of the truth, I found myself strongly embracing the artsy part of me. This was mainly highlighted by my taste of music branching out. New band names entered my vocabulary such as ColdPlay, Death Cab for Cutie, Mumford and Sons, Blue October. Music is so important to me, as I mentioned a few posts ago, and these artists especially have been transforming a piece of me in ways only music can do. My self-discovering coupled with the new music had made me feel more in touch with emotions, more apt to say what I feel, unafraid to say what I really think, and satisfied being single without relational hindrances.

A female friend of mine told me its an attractive quality when a guy is content and not desperate for a woman. Though I certainly haven't started desiring men in case you're hopeful, male readers. I've just been finding peace, gradually, more and more. And yet, with all the love songs that pass through my ears, I can't help but harboring certain feelings of romance at the same time. Yet for once, they don't really have a place to land. Like they're vegetables growing in a garden that I'm storing away. Or outbursts of undirected romance that I splash onto a blank wall, creating an abstract portrait of my heart. Its like turning all my insides to the outside.

Someday I think I'll be able to share these things. Though I tend to feel like a clamshell. Shut tight after continuous rejection and disappointment, clouded with gritty sand. One day a pearl will come out. And maybe... just maybe I'll share the vegetables and the painting and the pearl with someone. Someone like me. Someone who doesn't need me at all. They'll just want me. And I'll want them. Really, that is the essence of love. Choice. Not needing, but wanting. This is best seen from a spiritual perspective. It may seem odd to think that God doesn't need us. But it is true. And its what makes everything about Him so beautiful. He has no need, only a burning want and desire for us. That is true love.