Sometimes The Reason Why You Can’t Let Go Is Because You’ve Lost Sight Of Who You Are

You can’t let them go because even though they are no longer in your life, you are keeping them alive in your mind.

It’s been weeks, months, maybe even years, since things have changed. The text messages that used to put a smile on your face. The late-night phone calls you stayed up and waited for. The inside jokes that never got any less funny. The videos they tagged you in whenever something reminded them of you. The kisses that always left you wanting more. They all stopped coming through-gone for good. But, that hasn’t stopped you from re-reading every old conversation a hundred times. It hasn’t changed the fact that you still lie wide awake at 2 A.M with your phone on loud beside your pillow. It doesn’t explain why you still smile to yourself on the way to work or school when you think of something they once said. It doesn’t delete all of the posts you share on Facebook just so that they’ll see, in hopes that they’ll think of you too. It doesn’t erase the taste of their lips from your memory. But, you have to come to terms with reality, because the only person keeping the memory of them alive is you.

You can’t let them go because even though they have become nothing but a ghost to you, you are trying your hardest to bring them back to life.

The person you thought you knew inside out has become just another stranger. And it hurts like hell, because how can everything turn into nothing just like that? Because how could you have ended up being so wrong about someone you thought you loved? But the truth is, people change. Love changes people. Loss changes people. Heartbreak changes people. Life changes people. And I know they played such an important part in shaping the person you are today too, maybe for the better or maybe for the worse, but they aren’t the same person they used to be. They aren’t the same person that’s been living in your mind for all this time. They aren’t the same person that promised you a future. They aren’t the same person that you let yourself fall for. And nothing you do will ever change that. There’s no secret concoction of ‘I miss you’ s, ‘Let’s talk’s or ‘Come over’s that will ever bring them back. No desperate amount of unopened Snapchats, messages left on read or drunk voicemails will open up their eyes to see that in losing who they once were, they also lost the best thing that could have ever happened to them.

You can’t let them go because even though they were only a part of your past, you keep hoping that they can still be a part of your future.

Strolling down memory lane can be a bitch, especially when you can’t see the “dead end” sign straight ahead. You want to think that history will repeat itself. You still believe that they’ll realize everything they’ve been missing, that one day they’ll find their way back to you. But, you’re hoping for another ‘what if’ instead of seeing ‘what is’. Because the truth is, people come and go for a reason. Not everyone is meant to stay in your life, and that’s okay. Some people are brought to us to open our eyes to new horizons, others to teach us harsh realities we needed to see. And while I know you’re pining for your epic Noah and Allie love story, you need to accept the possibility that they were only ever meant to exist within the chapters leading you to the new people you were always destined to be with.

You can’t let them go because even though you keep holding on to them, you are forgetting to hold on to yourself.

They’ve consumed your mind in the worst way possible. You’ve torn down parts of yourself to build them castles. You’ve created a world where your happiness depends on other people and without realizing it, you’ve let go of yourself in the process. You’ve forgotten the person you were before them. The person who dreamed, the person who knew their worth. You’ve spent so much time and energy putting your faith in someone else, when the only person you’ve ever needed to have faith in is yourself. Because while people may come and go, you are your own constant. Because while letting go of others is an inevitable part of life, the one person you must never let go of is yourself. You are strong enough to say goodbye to things that aren’t right for you. You are able to survive the toughest of heartbreaks. You will find your path to happiness, whether others are there to join you or not.

You can let them go because even though it might break you, you will always be enough to put yourself back together.