Letting go

Sometimes to love is uncomfortable. Sometimes to act in love means letting go of something that is most precious. Sometimes to love it breaks your heart and makes you cry.

To love with an open hand is something I have always professed to do and yet it's been my recent experience that in the midst of facing loss I wanted to cling, grip tight, and hold on to a relationship that has brought me joy, pain, happiness, comfort, and truly loving companionship over the last few years. I profess to love with an open hand stating that "I don't want to hold you back or keep you from anything that is your true heart's desire or what you feel is best for you through my attachment or selfishness".

That doesn't mean that I can't love you with the utmost devotion, passion, and loyalty: it just means that you are free to choose in this relationship what you feel is best and right for you at all times. "I love you, I am here for you, I want what's best for you, always" I have heard myself say many times.

But I am here to tell you that it is one thing to profess it...and another thing entirely to walk in the footsteps of what you profess to believe. It hurts like hell.

Strangely there is a bittersweet joy in my knowing that I have loved so much and so purely that I am able to let go. There's a beauty in my discovering that I am capable of doing that. That beauty is combined with an extreme sense of gratitude, love and admiration for the joy and the trials and the embracing and the growth over the last several years that has been the fruit of this beautiful relationship with this wonderful human being.

But like the end of a great vacation, or a really good book, it's now time to move on. And doing that with love and respect and honor has been one of the greatest challenges I have faced in my life. I'm happy to say, with tears in my eyes that I met the challenge.

I love you, I thank you, I release you.

Peace friends.