Love the people who treat you right, pray for the ones who don't

An old man once said, 

"There comes a time in your life, 
when you walk away from all the drama and people who create it. 

You surround yourself with people who make you laugh. 

Forget the bad, and focus on the good. 

Love the people who treat you right, pray for the ones who don't. 

Life is too short to be anything but happy. 

Falling down is a part of life, getting back up is living."

I love that quote above.  Such wisdom and courage within those words.  Words only someone who has walked away from people and drama would understand.  Words only someone who is surrounded by those who create joy could of comprehend it's importance.  Words only someone who has experienced the bad could have the clarity to differentiate the good, and feel blessed for both.  Words of someone who has been residing in an atmosphere of love and hate, of happiness and sorrow, of falling down a few times, but getting up more could say.  These are the words of someone who has lived, who had the courage to live.

In more ways than one, I need to embrace the words of an old man who has learned much through his older eyes upon his own journey.  I have much to learn, much to express, and much to give - and I need to discover the best ways of doing all three to benefit myself and those I love in my life. 

That need to walk away from drama and those that I am hurt by seems to be very relevant lately. I am great at walking away from the drama - I seem to fail, however, in letting it go within my heart.  I have a hard time letting go. Once someone has entered my heart, it seems I am unable to find the key to let them out.  And right now I am so desperately needing some of them to exit.  My mind consistently is in a tug of war with my heart.  My mind knows I should let go, but my heart still has those feelings of love, of caring, of compassion.  I am caught up every waking moment.  I drive home from work, in the comfort of my car, crying the entire way home at the thought of missing, of longing, of needing.  And for this, I beat myself up for.  I need to release for myself; my holding on is not of thought or consequence to them. But those that I have allowed within my heart, while their physical presence is not apparent, their essence still lingers as if they never left.

I write to express my thoughts.  I often have great difficulty in verbally expressing my thoughts in terms of conflict, of pain.  My mind races with all the items scattered similar to fall leaves scattered on the ground.  No rhyme, no reason to others. At times, there is no rhyme or reason even to myself.  Herein lies the difficulty. Because by the time my mouth has caught up to my mind, I have said something I possibly regret.  I tend to apologize for my words.  The last thing I want to do is hurt someone with my words.  In prefacing my words with "I hope this does not insult you..." typically it leads the other person to be offended and not even listen.  I wish I could speak more eloquently.  I wish I could be able to express myself in other methods besides paper and pen, or keyboard and monitor. I have shut down recently, unable to talk with anyone about the needs of my heart, my mind, and soul.  And sadly, even writing is difficult, and riddled with the fear I am writing the same words over and over without realizing it...I am trying to work things out, but there is such a thing as beating a dead horse...am I doing that?

I don't know if tomorrow will offer a different view from my heart.  I don't know if tomorrow I will wake up, and everything I have written will no longer be true.  I don't know if tomorrow I will finally, FINALLY, feel like myself again.  I don't know if I will be able to pick myself up, dust off the yesterdays, and walk again, one step in front of the other, until I am able to run with lighthearted remembrances, knowing I am moving toward something for myself rather than running away from something that withholds shadows of the past, and someone I can no longer have, but am still in love with.

And so I sit, in heartache. It seems at this point, the only thing I have been able to accomplish is the ability to pray for him; pray he is happy, pray he is doing okay.  Pray he has been able to do what he needs to do, for himself, and that his today is not filled with as much pain as mine.  This is an ongoing, every day prayer, several times a day.