That’s why I won’t get vulnerable. Don’t you dare get comfortable. Heartbreak is impossible, feelings doing somersaults. I’m not ready for therapy, to take accountability. Right now it’s about me, me, and only ’bout me. As much as I’d like to change the title of this blog I have to be consistent in using the song name. Really I’d only change one of the two words and I’m sure you can figure out which. In case you couldn’t tell this song is about heartbreak, about ending a relationship. While my relationship ended a year ago almost exactly, when I listen to this song it still resonates.

Relationships ending, whether it be romantic, platonic, whatever always sucks. In my opinion it always sucks more for one person too, the person who didn’t want it to end, or wasn’t ready for it to end. The line “that’s why I won’t get vulnerable.” really hits as you’re transitioning out of a season of your life, especially a season that’s been going on for the last 6 or 7 years. Almost my entire adult hood was spent in this season, so as it changes it’s a scary feeling. As you begin to recover you don’t want to be vulnerable with people anymore, your walls are as sturdy as they’ve ever been.

“Don’t you dare get comfortable.” is an interesting line to follow one about vulnerability, because most people are extremely uncomfortable being vulnerable. At least I know I am. So much so I use this blog to let out the heaviest of feelings because often when I talk about them out loud I cry. Don’t get me wrong I don’t think it’s a bad thing to cry, but as a straight guy you’re raised to think you’re not supposed to cry. For me crying is like an overflow valve, if I don’t let it out that way it’s only a matter of time before I explode, and often when we explode with emotion I feel like it gets directed at the wrong people. The people we love, who just want to help. It makes sense because they’re the closest so of course they’ll be hit by the most shrapnel. Isn’t crying just meant to be an overflow valve? It let’s out just enough for you to begin to sort your feelings out.

Which brings us to the line I resonate with the most, “heartbreak is impossible, feelings doing somersaults.” While heartbreak isn’t actually impossible, in fact it happens constantly in some form or another, your feelings do actual somersaults in your body when you’re going through it. The confusion as to what went wrong, the panic that it’s over, the desperate attempt to hold it together. Heartbreak is what I imagine whiplash feels like. One minute you’re sad, then angry, feelings of regret. You go through just about every emotion, but most of them happen fast. The ones that take the longest to come around are the positive ones. Gratitude for everything the relationship taught you. Happiness that even though that season is over the season you’re beginning in now feels more like home, more like where you’re supposed to be.

Of course none of the positive feelings, the feelings of being put back together come without taking accountability in some form. While I did do therapy even though I too wasn’t ready for it after the break up, I don’t think that’s where the accountability came into play. I think the accountability comes long after the dust has settled. When you’re able to look back with a little less bias and a little more what the fuck happened? For me? I was selfish. I was self absorbed and living in my own world, only concerned about my own feelings. The goal now is to try to avoid doing that in future relationships.

Until those relationships come it is about me. Me and only ’bout me. I believe two people can work on themselves while in a relationship together and also hold that relationship together. HOWEVER, I also believe you need to be a certain level of put together before you can enter that relationship and continue the work together. How was I supposed to be put together enough to continue the work together when the relationship started a week before my 21st birthday? I was basically a child when I entered that relationship. 7 years later I’m not who I was then. 7 years from today I’ll be different too. While I don’t necessarily believe in “the one” I do believe at a certain point you find that person whose path is almost perfectly parallel to yours. You both grow at a similar pace, off in the same direction. Unfortunately for some that isn’t the case. While for a long time I blamed “Brett”, “Brett” didn’t act alone and it takes two people to make a relationship work. It also takes two people to make a relationship fail.

Where the skies are gold not gray, J.

P.S. This was actually supposed to be a blog about how I’m unsure how to be vulnerable again. Better luck next time.