ImageA friend of mine posted something on Facebook today …   part of it is posted below:

“I fall in “LIKE” easily…. But it’s very hard for me to fall in “LOVE”…. Let me explain.

In the beginning people show you the best side of them, the side they know you’ll like… They always seem almost perfect and you can’t believe your luck. You can’t believe someone who’s almost perfect and single is giving you an opportunity…. and that’s why I fell in “LIKE” really easily…. Because I liked what they were showing me in the beginning. I started thinking this person’s great, amazing, almost perfect and I can see a future….. 
Here’s where it changed…. They’ll do something, say something or start to change their character in a way where you’re like “hold on this isn’t the person I liked”…. 
Too many people are “temporary” or “throw away” because they’re fake or can’t be truly themselves in the beginning. And that’s why I find it hard to fall in “LOVE”.
I just wanted someone who’s consistently the same. No switching and changing on me.”

This rung a chord with me … 

People will say what they think you want to hear in order to get what they want.   I have fallen for some wonderful old lines “Im not like that” “let me show you what it feels to be loved” .. and in the end they have been just words.   

I do not think I am a particularly complex person .. simple things make me happy … I like peace, I like to laugh, I like to feel secure and wanted.

I cannot stand being constantly let down, disappointed, not listened to or feel like I am being used…. or in one case, like a secret that was too embarrassing to admit to.   Yet, in a relationship, I find that this is often how I feel.

I made a conscious decision to take time out for myself a couple of years ago .. I needed the time to concentrate on fixing me rather than trying to always be the support for someone else.  It is a decision I do not regret, it has made me see myself in a different light, what I need, what I want and to let things go that used to play on my mind.    

I have been very lucky with the close friends that I have, who have understood that sometimes I just need to be alone .. to potter, to do nothing, to think … to be me… but if I have needed them or wanted company, they have been there with their silent, but very appreciated, support.

I have a very different life to the one I had a year ago … I have no stress, no worry, I have peace in my heart and in my mind . and it is truly a beautiful thing to realise that you wake up happy every morning.

Maybe I am destined to remain single … I am certainly not worried about whether I meet someone or not .. but I do know that when, and IF, I do meet someone it will not be someone who sets my soul on fire for a short time … it will be someone who makes me feel the embers always, someone I can rely on.  Someone who gives me peace.

For me, that is love.