Romantic Love Is Not The Only Love Worth Living For, There Is More.

 It's too late, 

And it's tragic, I won’t feel your magic, no,

Out of sight, out of mind,

Out of touch with, the one I love,

How do I say I'm sorry?

How do I get more time?

How do I say I love you?

Maybe in another life.

This is a chorus from Spesihle, a song by Thabsie, a female artist from South Africa. I heard this song a few weeks back and I just fell in love with it. It has an amazing rhythm and the words are just perfect. The song is generally about loose. Thabsie, through words, expresses the pain and anguish of losing a person you love and care about, either through death or a breakup.

When I first heard the song I was at a happy place in my life, I had found love after a long while. You know that first phase of a romantic relationship, where everything is perfect and somehow your senses are puff, gone, yes that one I was there. A beautiful high, I can still feel some goosebumps when I remember our first date, it was magical and intense for me. At that moment nothing could go wrong, he was perfect and I was on top of the world. I had found him, the one I liked and he liked me back, at this time and age you have to agree that is a big deal. 

How our little magical world came crumbling down two weeks later, I do not know. I still can't point my finger at it, all I know is I did not want to listen to the Spesihle anymore. It was a reminder of what I had and now had lost. I know it was a short time but I still did get hurt, I was happy with him and I had hopes for him. 

I did cry a lot and asked myself many questions like, what did I say or do wrong? Did I scare him off with my boldness and honesty? Did I not put it down right? Heck, I just could not figure out why we did not work out. 

In a span of two weeks my love had changed his mind about us. He suggested we just be friends. Of course, I was not okay with it but it's not like I had so much of a choice. I have made my peace with his decision, they say only a fool does not change his mind. But for a minute I felt lost and helpless, I mean what kind of bad luck do I have with love, I would ask myself, forgetting all the other 'loves' in my life. 

So like most of us do, I decided to crawl back to my shell, make myself feel miserable about myself, and curse myself. I do not know about you but as for me, when I love, I lay myself bare for them to see me, let them in my soul and show them every part of me. The bad, the good, the crazy,  you name it, I let them see. So when a relationship does not work out, I am left feeling naked and exposed, especially if the other person did not open up or give as much as I did.

Do I regret this encounter? not at all. Despite how it ended, at some point, I felt genuinely happy and loved. I would have wanted it to last a bit longer but I am learning to be content with every moment I get and making the best out of it, no matter how short the time is. I do not grieve failed relationships for long, though because I learned one precious lesson in early 2019 when I got myself a major character development and that lesson is the main point of this blog.

I learned that romantic Love is just one kind of love, there are so many other kinds of love that bring more meaning to our life than we would like to acknowledge. These types of love make us whole even when we feel broken, they give us hope and serve us so much grace. It is so sad that when our romantic relationships do not work out, we feel like the world is ending and forget that other people have been there for us all along.

These people can be our parents, our siblings, our friends, our kids, our neighbors, you name them. They have accepted us and loved us effortlessly even when we disregard their presence in our lives and their contribution to our growth. 

I  hope we all learn and allow ourselves to give those relationships as much as we give into romantic relationships and just maybe we will not be scared of rejection and failure in our romantic relationships. We will know and trust that we have our other relationships to catch us when we fall. 

Don't let one failed type of love make you feel alone, unloved and unwanted. Refocus your heart, your time, and your energy on people who have always been there and I promise you, you will find at least one type of love worth living for, even if it's just self-love. When we start appreciating and investing in these other types of love, we will realize romance is just the icing on the cake. 

Kare.