Pain can be blinding. For me, pain often shows up or expresses itself as anger, and anger can easily blind us or make us “see red”. But pain remains blinding for me even once the anger has blown off. As long as the wounds are there, unhealed, I cannot see the full picture, I cannot see in a balanced way, I cannot see clearly. And thus I cannot see or act (or love) in a wholly balanced way.
I have more love to give now than I have had in a long time, maybe ever. An open, centered kind of love. Yet I’m giving it out in a more controlled, probably balanced, way than in a long time, maybe ever.
For roughly fifteen years, I often gave out more love than I got in return, draining myself, clinging to relationships, or doggedly trying to connect with people even when they weren’t the “right fit”. Not always — in these past two decades I have also met some of my dearest friends and maintained some of my closest & healthiest relationships — but often enough to show a pattern or tendency. A tendency or pattern due to loneliness: I’d choose be with the “wrong people” or in relationships where I was giving much more than I was receiving rather than be completely alone. Trying to chose the “lesser pain”.
This year, mainly between May & August 2025, three of my dearest friends let me down in very painful and disappointing ways. These painful events, on top of the usual, general flakiness of many acquaintances, broke something for me. Almost like the adding up of many cracks in a hard surface, until one or two final, deeper cracks shatter the rock or the shell. These painful let-downs by some close friends, though, happened alongside some concrete proofs of love and availability and presence from other close friends. I think that contrast was the real wake-up call for me. What gave me the strength, or courage, to focus on the friends who were really available & present. It also gave me the strength to address the lack of mutuality with some of those close friends who had let me down, the courage to face conflict with them, with two possible outcomes: either the loss of the friendship or the improved balance/mutuality within the relationship.
As I’ve said before, 2025 has been a year of healing for me. Some of that healing has come from abrupt, even painful, shake-ups or wake-up calls. Some of it has come from the steady proofs and presence of loving people in my life. Some of it has come from the solo trips which have allowed me to rediscover my own strengths and to really live in the present moment, to really be present here & now. The result has been an increase in clarity and centeredness for me. And an improved balance between how much I’m wiling to give and how much I need in return. (And I don’t mean this transactionally, but within the context or from the viewpoint of healthy relationships.)
A lot of the pain is healed and thus I can see, and love, more clearly again.
The Little Prince and the Fox 