Needing
I've always hated feeling like I was emotionally "needed" by someone else.
Growing up, I had some interesting dynamics with important people in my life that either formed or exacerbated my hatred of being needed. But, on some level, I also believed that loving someone meant needing them and letting them need you. I guess you could say I had a love-hate relationship with the concept of love. Because love means mutual needing...right?
No. That's not love. If you need me, emotionally, your "love" for me is tainted. In your mind, I exist, on some level, to fill a void. If you need me, it's because part of you is empty and you don't want to fix it - you want me to. But the truth is, I can't.
On some level, I thought that being needy meant that I was letting people love me, that love meant letting people swoop in and take care of me. So they could fill their own voids through rescuing me. I thought that letting myself be needy meant that I was allowing others to boost their own egos. And that was love. Right?
Wrong. That's not love. Keeping myself small in the hope that it'll make other people feel big is NOT love. Thinking that I was only worthwhile if I could "rescue" the ones I care about? That's not love either.
I may still not know what love is, but the list of things I know it is not is growing. And that gets me closer to understanding the truth about love.
Love is not needing. I don't want to be needed and I don't want to need others. I want to love and be loved. Whatever that means.
Growing up, I had some interesting dynamics with important people in my life that either formed or exacerbated my hatred of being needed. But, on some level, I also believed that loving someone meant needing them and letting them need you. I guess you could say I had a love-hate relationship with the concept of love. Because love means mutual needing...right?
No. That's not love. If you need me, emotionally, your "love" for me is tainted. In your mind, I exist, on some level, to fill a void. If you need me, it's because part of you is empty and you don't want to fix it - you want me to. But the truth is, I can't.
On some level, I thought that being needy meant that I was letting people love me, that love meant letting people swoop in and take care of me. So they could fill their own voids through rescuing me. I thought that letting myself be needy meant that I was allowing others to boost their own egos. And that was love. Right?
Wrong. That's not love. Keeping myself small in the hope that it'll make other people feel big is NOT love. Thinking that I was only worthwhile if I could "rescue" the ones I care about? That's not love either.
I may still not know what love is, but the list of things I know it is not is growing. And that gets me closer to understanding the truth about love.
Love is not needing. I don't want to be needed and I don't want to need others. I want to love and be loved. Whatever that means.
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