Here’s the deal:
I don’t want to be vulnerable. I don’t want to put myself out past my comfort zone. I don’t want to tell the boy I like them. I don’t want to jump anymore. I don’t want to be the person who does the thing first.

I don’t want to be strong or independent or resilient.

But what do you do when it seems you need to be all those things?

I’ve spent a lot of my adulthood learning balance. 

(I think I’ve come to find most adults spend most of their time learning balance.)

I’ve tried to the best of my ability to be positive. To find light and truth and hope.

In regards to a lot of the different aspects of living I’ve tried to be a human who leads by example.

One of the best compliments I have ever received was from an assistant in my classroom who said I had never asked her to do something she hadn’t see me do myself at least once.

But for the last few weeks (maybe longer, probably longer) I haven’t wanted to live in those places.

I’ve become a standard I am incapable of living up too.

I stepped into Meg about 5 years ago and now it seems too big.

The funny thing is, I’ve always been the person I was five years, I’ve always been kind and loving and helpful.

I’ve always had the almost inability to receive. 

But, right now, it seems as if it’s manifesting in the ability to want to not give. 

And in the fear of getting hurt again.
I think part of the reason I work with tiny humans is because that can’t hurt me in ways I am incapable of fixing. Sure they can hit me and bite me and yell in my ear. 

And sometimes they leave and my heart hurts.

But, they can’t HURT me.

As long as I give them snuggles and pat them to sleep and give them cheese sticks and sometime skittles, we are on the same page.
I haven’t been able to actually write the past few weeks. Nothing has felt real or true or right.

I haven’t been using my voice.

So, I guess in this jumble of words I do have a point. A realization that is the point B to the beginning point A:

I’m real.

I’m hope and love and kindness and I try to pass those out.

But when I feel incapable of those-I’m still real.

I’m not depressed or sad or any of those other synonyms.

I’m just me. 

Learning balance.

““Real isn’t how you are made,’ said the Skin Horse. ‘It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.’

‘Does it hurt?’ asked the Rabbit. 

‘Sometimes,’ said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. ‘When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.’ 

‘Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,’ he asked, ‘or bit by bit?’ 

‘It doesn’t happen all at once,’ said the Skin Horse. ‘You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.” (Velveteen rabbit)

I guess what I want to say is this:

To whom it may concern:

When you’ve reached the point where you don’t want to give out love, or hope or vulnerability. When you are wondering if it’s worth it. If you are wondering if you can handle more hurt or failure or being resilient:

Know you are real.

You’ve become.

You got this.

Love,

Meghan

Meg

Me.