When You’re Not The One Who Settles

 Abigail Keenan
Abigail Keenan

When you’re not the one who settles, good things take more time, they come slowly and they teach you the art of waiting and the art of patience, because when you choose not to settle, the things you’re looking for won’t fall into your lap, they will require you to walk and stumble until you reach them and they will require to fail a few times before you get them right.

When you’re not the one who settles, love won’t easily find you. It will be challenging because you’re challenging, you don’t sit back and watch someone mistreat you, you don’t stay quiet when someone disrespects you and you don’t stay when you should leave. So you keep leaving until you find a place to stay; a place that feels like home, a place that doesn’t make you feel like you’re settling.

And it’s harder to find a happy home than a broken home and the road may be long, and you may get lost a few times but as long as you keep going, you will eventually find that home with a perfect parking spot waiting for you.

When you’re not the one who settles, you ask a lot of questions with answers that might hurt you and you look for the truth; the truth that others evade, the truth that others shove aside to live a lie and the truth that others are afraid of. But you ask for it because you know it will set you free even if it’s ruthless.

Because it takes courage not to settle, it takes strength and it takes resilience.

When you’re not the one who settles, you might feel like you’re different, you might feel like everyone else is ahead of you, leading different lives, speaking different languages and walking in a different direction and sometimes you question if you should just follow the crowd instead of traveling alone;

but then you remember how it felt when you were one of them, when you were happily confused, when you were satisfied with dissatisfaction when you were content with mediocrity and then you realize that you’re not cut out to settle for average, that you’re always looking for greatness, that you’re always looking for ways to shine and that you’re always running towards the light.

When you’re not the one who settles, people might think you’re a fool. A fool for dreaming bigger, a fool for waiting to find your fairytale, a fool for taking an unfamiliar road and a fool for expecting to live a life that will make you happy. People think you’re a fool for wanting to be happy.

When you’re not the one who settles, you have to realize that more often than not, you will be alone and there will be times when you will long to feel understood and no one will really understand you but trust that there are many non-settlers out there driving on the same road, their journey is different from yours, they might be closer to their destination, they might be stuck in traffic, they might be trying to meet you half-way, but they’re on the road and someday you will find them and the road won’t be as lonely and it won’t be as foreign.

But until you find them, keep driving, keep looking for greatness, keep looking for fascinating love and keep not settling.  Thought Catalog Logo Mark

Writing makes me feel alive. Words heal me.

Keep up with Rania on Instagram

More From Thought Catalog