The Love We Deserve

This weekend we celebrated our 9th annual Fall Fest, when I heard my mom explain to someone why we have this celebration, I realized that many don’t know why it is so important to me. In 2008, my fiancé was killed by a driver under the influence of drugs. In May of the following year, my next to oldest nephew passed away. His birthday was 10–13 and October 2009 was the first birthday of his that we celebrated without him. It was one of the most difficult and saddest times of my life. I keep a picture of myself from that day: in it, I am tragically skinny, with dark circles under my eyes, heartbreak visible on my face, to remind myself of the temporary state of emotions and anything else that we experience. I do not remember exactly how or why my family decided to get together for his birthday that first year, other than the fact that we all understood without saying it, that what we were trying to hold was too heavy for any of us to bear individually. We needed to keep each other close, safe, and, up until we had regained the strength to walk alone.

Grief doesn’t ever go away but over time, part of the void that their absence leaves, is filled with fond recollections and reflections. Slowly, smiles start to come more often when you think of them than tears. You heal some, you grow more, you find ways to honor their past with your being in the present. It changes you in so many ways but the most impactful for me has been that I don’t take my loved ones, or my own life for granted. This year, Richard’s birthday was on a full moon in my sun sign of Pisces. I keep certain practices based on the lunar cycles, one of which is charging my crystals. Last Saturday, I had been working late and when I came up from my office, Frankie saged and had everything set up to charge in the moonlight, exactly the way I would have.

I used to feel parts of my dynamic personality were too much for some people. The fact is that parts of who I am are indeed “too much” for some people — those aren’t my people. You are never too much for someone capable of holding space for you. Upon seeing the set up and being relieved that I didn’t have to stay up even later, I was in deep gratitude for a partner who is wholly supportive and respectful of all of me: of my strengths, my weaknesses, my opinions, my passions, my projects, my growth, and my autonomy. If something is important to me, it is important to him, as it should be. I have had the capacity to give that kind of love for sometime, but for too long, I settled for relationships: friendship, romantic, familial, and otherwise, that didn’t fully honor my innate completeness.

There was a time when I engaged in relationships where the level of love, acceptance, and emotional intimacy, I craved was absent or significantly less than what I wanted. They were incapable of loving me fully as they had yet to learn how to love themselves in such a manner; they were judgmental of me because they were still judgmental of themselves and everyone else. They gave the best that they could, and I have an appreciation for everyone I’ve loved and learned from, but thanks to shadow work and years of self-therapy, I decided about five years ago, to only engage in relationships that are consistently and reciprocally: loving, respectful, supportive, and where it is safe to be vulnerable. As Stephen Chbosky wrote in The Perks of Being a Wallflower, “We accept the love we think we deserve…” I did that for a while, for too long. I am not sure if I found myself settling because I subconsciously thought I wasn’t deserving of the kind of relationship I truly wanted, or maybe I didn’t believe that it couldn’t exist. I don’t focus on what was holding me back from authentic relationships, I focused on building and maintaining relationships based on my ideals, not my past of my programming. I had to reconnect with the part of myself that remembers what we all innately deserve — unconditional love; it is what we are here to experience. Once I started showering myself in my own love and silencing my inner critic, my capacity to give others unconditional love and acceptance grew; now I am able to connect with everyone with whom I choose to engage, on a purer, deeper level.

I remember how well both Danny and Richard loved in that way. They were both liked so much because when you were in their presence, you knew you were loved, heard, seen, and accepted. The conscious partnership I co-create with Frankie, honors the memories of two members of my soul family in a way that only unconditional love and acceptance can. The love I shared with them both will always be a part of me, in this life and the subsequent. The unique way they made so many people feel with their true love, lack of judgment, and allowance for vulnerability, I strive to emulate and honor. One way I honor their memories is with our end of Summer/Fall celebration. I am grateful and fortunate to be loved, understood, and supported by some pretty amazing people and I feel wish that for everyone. Even strong people experience suffering, many times life is so busy we aren’t even aware of what people are struggling with or growing through; we’re not alone and we’re not meant to go through those hardships on our own. Frankie and I have check-ins from time to time, it is one of the practices that keeps our relationship strong; it’s a safe space you can create at anytime and anywhere. Even though I don’t get to spend as much one on one time with everyone as I’d like, the Fall Fest is the check in for all our people: know that we care about, love, accept, and respect you (as is), thank you for being a part of our hearts and lives.