♛You’re not yet 20 years old? There is plenty of time for you! There is no rush. Appreciate the other flowers blooming in the garden around you, let their happiness be your happiness. See if you can learn from their example.

There is an awful pressure in this modern age that is similar to the pressure of my mortal years, that being single is somehow considered as “a failure” or “missing out.” I can’t agree with this judgment, and I hope you don’t either.

I have been in enough relationships to tell you that they are wonderful, but they are not all rainbows and

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all the time. It’s a part-time job! It takes effort! Being in a relationship is not an end point, it’s the beginning of a shared chapter with someone.

But I won’t lie to you, you might not ever find love. Or it may be right around the corner. Who can tell?

Let go of any feelings of inadequacy for this, if you feel it. Too many people think of life as a series of required chapters or items on a checklist that must be accomplished, and therefore, the failure to achieve them implies a failure in you.

Absolutely not so. “Failure.” “Success.” Let go of society’s narrow definition of these concepts. It’s far worse to settle for having someone in your life who goes through the motions of loving you, but doesn’t. Someone you don’t love. Someone you project your fantasies onto. Someone you want so badly to love you the way you need to be loved. So many people fall into this trap; locked to someone they end up despising sooner or later.

All the loves of my life were found when I pushed past my comfort zone.*  One thing is certain, love won’t find you if you close yourself off from the possibility and opportunity. I found Louis in pursuit of keeping my diet strictly evildoer, and there he was, too dignified to do it himself, throwing himself to the wolves in the hopes that they would slay him. Something led me there, among all the other dens of sin I might have gone to that night. Did fate lead me to him? I like to think so.

*Not that I have much of a comfort zone to begin with *shrugs*

You are whole as you are. Look at your triumphs in this life, look how far you’ve come. Look where you want to go, what you want to do. Give yourself some love.

And then love may just find you.