Point of View

Sometimes late at night, when it’s too quiet to pretend, I worry if I believe in anything at all or at least in anything beautiful.

I believe in change because it is permanent.
I believe in pain because it is sometimes physical.
I believe in anger because it can consume you.
I believe in friends because it’s not fun to have a good time alone.
I believe in dreams because it makes you go on even when it falters the very essence of living for the moment.
But I am not sure I can believe in either love or trust.
I could not understand these two things that most people build their dreams on.

Love fails to be unconditional by that one condition itself. It ends when we fall out of it. Then, we claim it never was love. But love shouldn’t die. It is forever. But when it becomes a routine (like saying "I love you" for instance), love does die. When love turns selfish, confusing and burdensome, it isn’t beautiful anymore.

As for trust, it was self-explanatory until I doubted it. When curiosity gives way to suspicion, betrayal isn’t far behind. For every failed judgment we ask ourselves: "Did I trust too little or too much?". It is difficult to keep mum and not ask every question so as not to break the trust, only to realize too late that something you could have known had you only asked. Where does love and trust start and end?

I have seen people disappointed over unfulfilling relationships. I have seen passion turn into poison. I have grieved with them for the love they lost or never found. We seem to love so much, and yet we feel something is lacking.

I think all people have at one point in their lives experienced the painful realization of a love unrequited. Even with all the discouragement, even with all the well-intentioned advice from friends, falling in love is a no-going-back event. Unfortunately, time can’t be reversed.

Now, falling in love in itself is doubted by people around you. They cannot feel the warmth that consumes you. They cannot ache with the turbulent and confusing anxiety and joy that grip you. They do not know that mental stress you experience trying to rationalize your emotions. They cannot believe that you do not want to be in love with a person who doesn’t love you back.

Oftentimes, people in love are painted as puppies following their loved ones at a distance and enjoying it. Oftentimes, people in love are misunderstood. Who can enjoy running around with your heart on your sleeve? It’s like trying to cross a tightrope and always falling into jagged cliffs because you are nervous, oh so nervous! Loving and loving without getting any response can be destructive to anyone. It is a thousand deaths every time.

Love is not sustained by hope but by wishes. There’s a difference. No matter how perverse, people suffering from unrequited love try to get out of it while secretly wishing that there is a sign somewhere to show it isn’t hopeless. In desperation, they can even imagine signs if only to remain sane.

How can you love a brick wall? A dead end? A slavery without any sign of salvation? How foolish! How unreasonable! Unfortunately, how human too!

"Why won’t he or she love me? What is wrong with me?", scattered thoughts echoing such pain are not exactly abnormal। Even the best-looking, best-hearted people can’t always expect others to love them back। Why? People sometimes need to feel unloved by everyone so that they learn to love themselves.

There is nothing wrong with unrequited love. It happens all the time. I won’t delude you into thinking that if he or she can’t love you back, he or she is not worth it. In fact, believe that this person is. That he or she is worth it all: the headaches, the anxiety, and the embarrassment. This sounds funny but the world is round for a reason.

We are all part of a circle. If you love her/him and she/he loves someone else, just think of whom you’re hurting by loving her/him. It’s a cycle. Whose love are you not returning?

I know we can love deeply, tenderly and lastingly. I have seen such love and I have felt such love myself. I learned that, aside from love and trust, a fulfilling relationship begins when two people make their time together their number one priority. If we hope to find love, we must first find time for loving. Many couples experienced a tragic moment together that taught them to value their time together.

I used to ask myself where the love between थिस person and I had gone. Maybe it’s because we forgot that we are the ones who make it. Love was not out there. It was somewhere between us and we failed to see it. People really do change. Our hurtful and infantile arguments illustrated how we, instead of looking for love, looked for flaws instead. That instead of finding reasons to love deeper, we found reasons to drift away. We spent the relationship struggling to change each other’s minds and realized it a little too late.

We must accept the realities around the circumstances and learn to accept different points of view. थिस person became my eye-opener. But at least I was made to believe in love and trust. I have felt so much pain during ठाट relationship. It was hard to accept that I have loved someone who stopped loving me.

Now, I couldn’t help but ask myself why I no longer believe in love and trust. Why can’t I give myself a chance to be in love again? Maybe I’m just too scared. Or perhaps, maybe because I have been waiting for a perfect moment, a perfect someone, and a perfect me. Maybe because I have always felt that beliefs ought to be perfect.

At the end of the day, when all is said and done, loving without being loved back is the best thing to do because feeling so much pain, I learn to heal; knowing so much fear, I learn to stand up, carrying so much sadness, I learn to glorify in joy.

Love is not destroyed by a single failure or won by a single caress. It is a lifetime venture in which we’re always learning, discovering and growing. Lastly, this may be a cliché but there is someone who is right for you (and maybe for me), and even if she/he is not, he/she would still be right because loving doesn’t make sense until you accept it and make it real.