A Blissful Exhilaration

Hi, Joy!

I am writing this letter to you even though you will never have the chance to read this; even though, you’ll never have a chance to hear anything from me.

Do you remember how we met? It was the start of a new academic year. I was fine with the people around me and you were happy with the people around you. We never really had something that could connect us. You were outgoing, friendly, and talkative. I was happy with a few friends. I don’t talk to people much. I was quiet. Looking back at it now, we never really had something in common. I guess that should’ve spoken volume.

It was a messy start. One interaction garnered much unwanted attention. I guess that should’ve spoken volume.

Maybe, at some point, behaviorists are right,. Because as much as my pride wants to deny it, my personality started revolving around yours.

You were an eye-opener. You introduced me to the things that I never knew that I could do. You made me want more from what I have until nothing was enough. From there, everything started going downhill. We both wanted more. I guess that’s something that we learned to have in common. You wanted more; more life; more fun; more dance; and more places to go. I wanted more; more achievements; more validation; and more recognition.

Psychologists, notably Freud and Jung, believed that our personality emerged from the unconscious and that certain facets of it remain hidden from awareness. They all had various ideas about the breadth of the oblivious, but these views paved the way for psychoanalysis and the understanding of what goes on inside our skulls.

“The shoe that fits one person pinches another; there is no universal recipe for living.” ― Carl Jung

We never really had anything in common, honestly. You were always the blissful joy, and I was always the achiever, and it was okay. The attention was yours, and everyone was second-guessing about me, and it was okay. The small pang in my chest was fine.

I never hated you. I was okay with my progress, and I am happy with yours because I already embraced the fact that we will never have anything in common.

As the years passed by, we were fine. We were having lots of fun together, building ourselves with great distance. We met new people along the way. However, it wasn’t always like that. If I knew that us being happy with our own lives would be the beginning of our end, I wish I didn’t settle for it.

I tell myself daily that things cannot get any worse. I've sunk as far as I possibly could. But after that, the earth widens once more and continues to engulf me. You put me there. I was buried alive after you dug my tomb. I've been longing for a while. I discovered a feeling I had never realized I had. Anger I picked up from you. Nothing, it seemed to me, could make things better. Nothing to explain what you did or why you did it, therefore I have no idea how or why you did it.

You've hurt me a great deal. Justice doesn't exist in nature, therefore I'll keep going through the pain. However, I've come to the realization that I need to address it, stand up for myself, whether it's in my head or not, and face you and everything you stand for. I can get rid of all my other worries if I can only get rid of this one.

But at the end of the day, I was also at fault. I chose to settle. I deserved what I tolerated.

I believed in you and appreciated you. I never really made any out of the ordinary requests, but if I knew, I wouldn't have allowed this to happen. I do have something to be grateful to you for, though, at the end of the day. I've come to realize you can't offer someone something they don't want. You had the audacity to make that very plain to me. I've come to see that you are toxic to me and have prevented me from moving forward for a very long time.

I've discovered that thinking about you is the most self-loving thing I can do. Since I love myself more than ever and am aware that I don't want my body to serve as a mausoleum for my spirit, I can now confidently assert that I am doing myself something good by facing everything inside of me. Everything includes relearning how to live, so I don't need to be frightened to live.

Sincerely,
Your only best friend.

Word Count: 784