Alone You Are Lost. Together You Are Home.

Dating is not for everyone. There are so many ways a relationship can fail, it's amazing that we are not all alone.

You will always be too much of something for someone: too needy, too fiercely #independent, too optimistic, too small, too loud, too soft, too wild, too #passionate. Apologize for mistakes. Apologize for unintentionally hurting someone - profusely. But don't apologize for being who you are.

With that said, relationships fail not only because it is the wrong person, but also if you yourself are not yet the person you need to be.

You can make all the excuses for why you aren't in a place to be in a relationship. The honest truth is, whether you can admit it to yourself or not, if you are not capable of loving and giving up a part of yourself, you cannot love another person the way they need to be loved. You must always leave people better than how you found them.

Everyone seeks insight into love's deepest mysteries - how it feels when you find it, how it changes you, where to look for it. The potential for love exists in corners, in the most unlikely as well as the most obvious places. It's something you never imagined existed, something magical, a little scary when you think about it, and bigger than you ever dreamed. The unforgettable truth about love is that it is plentiful as oxygen. You simply have to breathe it in.

In my experience, love is chancy. When I lived in Arizona, everyone was obsessed with love. #Phoenix is a city full of saguaros, golf balls, transplants, and people with broken hearts. I have had my share of plenty of heartbreaks myself living there. I don't think as humans we can love each other without complications. Broken hearts have meant, for me, that you tried for something. Really there are all sorts of men out there. Eventually someone comes into your life and won't take everything from you. He doesn't care if you shave your legs every day, he already loves your body and already knows your entire life story. And there's a certain way he'll listen to you, lean in, and respond in a way that says "I have all the time in the world for you, my love." You can look into his eyes and feel the certainty that is there. The permission to have someone adore you for as long as you want them to is certainly acceptable terms.

:• Of all the music I have heard, love is what calms my soul. Sending you love notes from the Music City • Location: Grand Ole Opry l Nashville, TN ::

The one thing I know is that feelings are rarely mutual, so when they are, drop everything, forget belongings and expectations, forget the games, the days between texts, the hard to gets because this is it. It is what the entire world is after and if you've stumbled upon it by chance, by accident, take a deep breath and step forward. Let the rules, opinions and common sense crash down. When you find someone who loves the way you do, it isn't that you finally met. You have been in each other all along.

Eventually, love found you. That's your partner. That is the perfect person for you. Alone you are lost. Together you are home ♥

Right or Wrong. Loving Well is An Exit Strategy.

I am going to do the opposite and talk about preservation of love in a different context - the break up. There's never a good time. Most of us don't go into a #relationship planning an exit strategy. I have counseled and advised friends going through this difficult ordeal. I assure you I have at some point in my life experienced heartbreaking loss. Truth be told, for the past several days, I am currently in the midst of my own heart ache and sadness. In the end, I've found a certain comfort and I brokered my own private agreement with love.

Here's what I want you to remember.

Even if your time with this person has come to an end, their romantic life has not, and there will be other relationships that they can apply these learnings. No matter how unhappy you may be with your relationship or break up, don't let them sour on love or relationships altogether. We all have to realize: right now, there's someone out there breaking up with a person we'll one day date ourselves (or even marry). And just as we don't want them burned so hard they put up walls we can never get through, let's all try to do the same in return. Pay it forward by ending things gracefully, so they can love openly again, and hope that the person who might be dumping your future wife/hubby has the #maturity to do the same.

Let us balance the equation of loving badly with loving well so we can be better caretakers of the heart. We all have so much love in our hearts that we should not keep it to ourselves.

We spend much more time on what's going wrong than on what's going right. The news is almost entirely about problems and rarely about successes. Every person that walks through your life is different. And must always be judged for them, their merit. Someone may make you feel so unwanted now. But you have the option to always reinvent what you want. You have to take risks and fail. Should the opportunity present itself, it can scare you to death, reappear and disappear without explanation. And if you are afraid, you are not yourself.

I strongly believe we accept the love we think we deserve.

I appreciate the things that are molding me to be a better woman. Even if it hurts me or I don't understand it, I need it for who I am becoming. Keep asking yourself, how can I be better? So do good. Handle that break up with care. It will come back to you in unexpected ways ♥

• We spend much more time on what's going wrong than on what's going right • Location: San Clemente, CA

Flawed Connectivity

It is not about existing. It is not about isolation. It is about a connection to each other.

bon_vivi_ant_eats • Love can float in quietly like the ocean waves ushering in morning tide and illuminate your days

• Location: Puerto Penasco l Mexico

I guess I am on a mission to talk about love openly. I believe in definitely making an effort to support one another's relationships. Love certainly does not have to be like the movies, with fireworks, goose bumps and soaring background music. It can be that. It can also be so much quieter. I believe love floats into your life like dandelion seeds, as if everyone blew on them to send out wishes.

But sometimes, finding love takes work, #determination, persistence, and a #willingness to wait and wait and wait. Remember how I sent Myles McDreamy that message that sat for a month in the inbox? Just wait...

Wait, wait, and wait with the patience of a Buddhist monk fly fishing.

You know, the thing about human life - there's no control group, no way to ever know how any of us would have turned out if any variables had been changed. The very fact that this world is so challenging is exactly WHY you sometimes must reach out to find comfort. It is not about existing. It is not about isolation. It is about a #connection to each other. We each seek someone to have enough #compasson to make us feel safe within our broken need with enough wisdom to hold on to #hope.

We all have days where we feel we can't survive. Sometimes dreams are shattered. Relationships may fall apart. Loved ones hurt us. Sickness may overtake us. Finances may worry us. To be honest, I don't know if I have the words to make you feel better.

Life isn't always perfect. It isn't a fairytale or storybook. Life doesn't come easy. It is a short word, easy to spell but difficult to define. Life is impossible to not live. Just look back at how in a matter of 24 hours your world changes. Risk taking is inherently failure-prone otherwise it would be a sure-thing taking. If you give faith a fighting chance, you will be strong enough to let go and wise enough to wait for what you deserve.

It Takes The One Time.

Taking a risk, an unheard of leap against reason, your own character, rules of etiquette, and traditional dating wisdom...it takes the one time. Finding love usually contains some element of the totally unexpected, #uncertainty. It can take you places you never imagined, changing you from a social butterfly to a content domesticated nester. Don't look for a certain kind of person, a lawyer or a well sculpted model or an Ivy League athlete. It's possible you might find them, but not find love. Instead, just look for a feeling. When it comes to love, as with kissing, it is best to close your eyes. You have to be open to whoever is out there and they show up in the strangest places most of the time. My relationship with Myles symbolizes that in life if you want to get your dreams to come true, you have to take action. You have to step up to the plate and take a swing. You have to take risks and fail.

Never forget three types of people in your life: who helped you in your difficult times, who left you in your difficult times, and who put you in difficult times. That is my idea of varying degrees of difficulties.

We can spend our time and energy judging what is wrong and missing or we can spend our time and energy appreciating what is right and possible. One approach leads to stress and fear, the other leads to peace and purpose.

I have found that people may hurt you in attempt to heal themselves.

We make horrible mistakes. We all have chapters we would rather keep unpublished. Until you heal the wounds of your past, you are going to bleed. You can bandage the bleeding with food, alchohol, drugs, work, sex, and even obssessive workouts. But eventually, it will all ooze through and stain your life. You have to be brave enough to open the wounds, stick your hand inside, and pull out the core of the pain.

Most people will agree that actions prove who someone is, words just prove who they want to be. Often we forget that we are all deeply flawed and I bet everyone of us thinks we are the better person in any type of situation. I'm as guilty as the next person. We all have hurt someone tremendously, whether by intent or accident. We all have loved someone tremendously, whether by intent or accident. It is a human trait and a deep responsibility. We make horrible mistakes. It's how we learn. We breathe love. It's how we learn. But you cannot have a healthy relationship with people who are wearing a mask. No one heals themselves by wounding another. It is okay to be angry. It is never okay to be cruel. Just because you are offended or hurt, does not mean you are right. Pride makes things impossible. Experience calls everything a risk. And reason will tell you it's pointless.

Remember, broken crayons still color. It is far wiser to love people, not things. Use things, not people.

Each of us underestimates our own power and overestimates the other's. The things that irritate us about others can lead us to an understanding about ourselves. That's how you scratch each other's backs. Trust your heart. We cannot help others without helping ourselves. We cannot help ourselves without helping others.

Often, we forget that we can let someone love us just the way we are - as #flawed as we might be, as unattractive as we sometimes feel, and as unaccomplished as we think we are. To believe that we must hide all the parts of us that are #broken, out of fear that someone else is incapable of loving what is less than perfect, is to believe that sunlight is incapable of entering a broken window to illuminate a dark room. Keep working on yourself. For yourself. By yourself. Wear the beauty and strength that lies within you. Your flaws are perfect for the heart that is meant to love you ♥