Find someone who doesn’t look at you with confusion or surprise when you contradict yourself because they know exactly where you’re coming from and they find it endearing.

Find someone who understands that you may not always say or do the right things but they love you anyway because of your spontaneity, your impulsiveness and how you embrace your mess and your imperfections. Find someone who embraces your imperfections even more.

Find someone who asks you questions instead of judging you, someone who tries to figure you out instead of giving up on you and someone who finds reasons to get close instead of excuses to run away.

Find someone who gets your crazy, who gets the messy parts of your mind, the troubled parts of your heart and how you try to make sense of things and make sense of yourself. Find someone who likes your crazy because they’re crazy in their own way too, because a touch of madness is necessary for an exciting life.

Find someone who doesn’t want to silence your eccentric voice, find someone who lets you speak even louder.

Find someone who doesn’t inhibit the unconventional parts of you because of society, their parents, their friends or their status. Find someone who is proud to have you the way you are, who doesn’t want you to fit in another box or belong to another group.

Find someone who doesn’t care about where you belong because you belong to them and that’s all that matters.

Find someone who doesn’t use your differences as a barrier; someone who doesn’t care if you don’t express yourself the same way they do or that you still don’t know how to color inside the lines. Find someone who lets you be who you are while you’re trying to be better, someone who doesn’t make you insecure about your looks, your job, your culture or your beliefs. Find someone who still thinks you’re the best when the whole world thinks you’re crazy.

Find someone who doesn’t think you’re strange but thinks you’re unique and extraordinary.

Find someone who is not afraid of how outspoken you are, how romantic you are and how passionate you are. Find someone who doesn’t try to put out the fire inside you, find someone who lets you sparkle instead.

Because your beauty is in what makes you different, in the little things you make your own, in the qualities that can only be found in your depth and in the details that can only be seen when you zoom in, the words you say when no one is listening, the things that you do when no one is watching and the person you really are when you’re all alone.

Find someone who doesn’t think your close-up is full of flaws, find someone who thinks you’re picture-perfect, who loves the natural picture without any filters, without retouching and someone who doesn’t really care about how many people will like that picture because they love it anyway and nobody can convince them otherwise. 

Rania Naim is a poet and author of the new book All The Words I Should Have Said, available here.