Intentions

It's so hard settling for what you already have when you realise all the things you could have.

When you realise your friends aren't your friends, they're just the leftovers of your past. It sounds horrid to put like that, but it's true. People change, regardless of what they want. And we all change at different rates, so sometimes we leave people behind. Timing is funny, sometimes we click again, sometimes we don't, and that's all there is.

When you look in your closet and you find mountains of clothes, none of which really work for you anymore. Clothing is important, it's superficial, but it's how we present ourselves to the world. People form an opinion of us just by looking at us, and if we just stand there in our awkward, nondescript clothing, uncomfortable and unsure, we aren't happy, and we aren't going to be clicking.

When the person you thought you could maybe one day love doesn't turn out to be the person you thought, or maybe just hoped. We try. It's human nature, we crave love, and we try to hold on, but sometimes it's just not an option anymore. You give and you give and sometime's there's nothing left to give, and there's no more second chances.

There's a saying that my brother has said a million times, one that I just put down to his delinquent tendencies and his rage blackouts. 'Kill Your Family, Kill Your Friends, Kill Yourself." When I actually asked him what it was, he explained that it wasn't some angry emo catchcry, it was actually derived from some religious or cultural belief, I can't remember now.

Basically, it was about starting fresh. You take away your family, the beliefs and values they instilled, the good and the bad memories, any regrets, resentment, failures, anything that affected you. Then, you take away your friends, what you try and be for them, what compromises you make, what you go along with. Then, when all you have left is you, you start stripping it off.

The lies we tell ourselves to make things seem better, the way we justify our motives, our jealous feelings, our insecure thoughts, the things that keep us awake at night, angry dizzy thoughts that we count, pretending they're sheep. We strip ourselves bare, peel back the layers of clothing, of skin, of muscle and bone, until we're no longer a physical presence. What are you behind it all?

Then, when you're clean and fresh and vulnerable, you start again. You become someone you like, someone you understand, someone you can rely on. Then you go to your family, you learn to love them again, you learn to respect them again, you allow yourself to let in their morals and values and beliefs through a filter, and if you've been on the right track, they don't change so much.

You reasses your friends, you build a solid support team, people who become your world. They complement you. They make you happy beyond comprehension. You're different but you're united through common threads- ideas, thoughts, actions, it draws us in.

And maybe, if we do it right, we aren't 'settling' for anything anymore. We win. There's no compromise, because nobody should ever lower their standards- you compromise your life, you compromise your happiness. No compromising, no settling. And then we're on the road again.