Rising from the heart.

I recently went through a big heartbreak. The irony of this heartbreak is that it was a delayed heartbreak. An 8 months later kind of heartbreak that had been sitting there, waiting for me to have the space to feel it. Emotions are smart like that— they play the waiting game, and then seep through the cracks as soon as they find their opening.

I deeply loved this soul. Parts of me still do. But on a late August night under the Aquarius full moon, I became runoff from their river, which— in a very real way, quickly veered away from me in a different direction.

For the first time in years (and many other lifetimes, I’m sure), I felt a very real sense of rejection from the one person who had never fully rejected me before. But it was in that moment that I felt him firmly choose himself. I would like to file this into the category of “hard pills to swallow.”

In many ways, I’d felt it coming.

It had been a wild ride.

But wow.

Wow.

Wow.

A deep pain stung my chest. I knew the love was deep, but the love left within me was deeper than I’d realized. And beyond this isolated event of the heart, I felt a lifetime of other rejection wounds bubbling to my surface.

I sobbed. For hours. Well into the morning light, audibly cursing at God and the universe and anyone else from the other side who would hear about my pain. I gripped my sides wondering where all of this emotion had been hiding.

Why had I chosen this? Why had I let myself feel this deeply?

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The thing about life, is that it doesn’t give you what you want, it gives you what you need.

I’ve always been a feeler, about everything. And my want has always been to love and be loved back in all of the ways I yearned. Each flaw, every up and down, and all the silly and wild about me— I wanted to be loved.

But my need is to grow. My need is to make choices, some good, and some arguably not so great, to create the growth my soul yearns for, and follow that path with fierceness and trust.

“our SOUL desires to clearly see, overcome and grow into greater expansion, more than it desires to recreate the past...”

I can conceptualize this idea. But I can also conceptualize that many things in life are tough, but heartbreak really stings, even when it’s seemingly right. And holding onto it, or past versions of yourself within an outgrown love space is much more common than you think.

————

For months, for years, I had been clinging to my past— clinging to a wonderful soul who made me feel safe and loved. Who I deeply wanted in many ways, but it never seemed to fully line up.

And as this person— who I know I’ll always be attached to by an invisible string— so eloquently said to me, we each had blinders on, shielding us from the ways we had been holding each other back. Heartbreak is a catalyst for change.

————

Love expands us. Love stings. Love breaks us open. It teaches us compassion. It not so gently reminds us of life’s impermanence, and of certain patterns we may need to heal within ourselves.

It weighs heavy for however long it’s meant to, until it drips off of us, allowing us to renew— with the forever imprints of those who once lit our hearts on fire.

Not all love (even the most special) lasts a lifetime.

But there is one thing that I know for sure:

love will always make you grow.

🤍 always ::::::

~ Gab Rising