To the Person who has to Earn Everyone’s Love

To the Person who has to Earn Everyone’s Love,

It’s hard, isn’t it?

You spend all your time making choices, choosing your words, and over thinking your actions just so that you can appease them. Just so that maybe, just maybe, they will

approve of you,

see your worth,

want you.

But, they don’t.

No matter how hard you try, how much you want, you can’t make them love you. And, the sad part is you sit back and watch them give it so freely to the others around you. People who don’t have to try.

The same people they come to and complain to you about, ask you for advice, and ironically seek your guidance for.

People who don’t have to work for their love. People who can just be themselves, honestly and wholly. People who can completely and brokenly be who they are and never have to worry about earning their love from them.

People who aren’t you.

No, that isn’t you.

You are the one who analyzes everything you say, everything you do. You bite your tongue, put on a smile, open your arms. You want nothing more from them that their love. You don’t want to be taken care of. You don’t want them for what they can offer you. You don’t ask for anything more. All you want is simply them.

But, you don’t get it.

Maybe it’s because you do try too hard.

Maybe it’s because you can’t be yourself in fear of losing what little you hold onto.

Maybe it’s because you are not as worthy as you thought.

The truth is, I don’t know why they won’t love you.

Because, I am you.

It could be that we expect too much out of them. We expect them to love us, when that’s not how love works. Maybe we’ve just spent our lives with our expectations a little too high. Striving for a comfort we can’t force to happen.

I wish I could tell you that one day you will realize you had their love all along. I wish I could say that they will come around. I wish I could offer you more than just these words.

But I can’t.

All I know, is that your worth is not based off of their affection for you. There are people out there who love you, broken and whole, worthy or not. Maybe you haven’t found them yet; but, they are there.

And those are the people who deserve what you have.