Our Weakest Spots

“Nature has cunning ways of finding our weakest spot. […] We rip out so much of ourselves to be cured of things faster, that we go bankrupt by the age of thirty and have less to offer each time we start with someone new. But to make yourself feel nothing so as not to feel anything—what a waste!”

- excerpt from Call me by Your Name

I am 30 and in all honesty, I feel bankrupt. When I first heard this excerpt from Call Me By Your Name, I felt so deeply and personally connected to it that I rewound, rewrote and recited it multiple times over. As I age, it turns out nature indeed has cunning ways of finding my weakest spots.

To feel romantically bankrupt by 30 may suggest I am a serial dater. If anything, I am a serial single. With limited experience in dating, I have found myself in one serious relationship and a series of false starts. It only takes one bad apple to turn you off apples, right? Well, in one fell swoop, I had become emotionally bankrupt and left jaded, closed off & single. Naturally, I vowed to be fiercely single and date myself for—well—ever. Six years later & I’m still falling in love with myself. While it was all worth it, it was six years of pushing people away in the falsely named game of self-preservation. Or that’s what I told myself… but really I was just afraid of getting hurt. I was afraid I would lose myself in a relationship that was going nowhere. I was afraid of being vulnerable & exposed. I was afraid falling in love with someone & out of love with myself. I was choosing myself. I was safe alone & that’s how it would stay.

Don’t get me wrong, typically when I write about love and relationships, it’s from a place of celebration not bankruptcy. I relished in my solitude for almost six years but then my grandmother passed away & in some Back to the Future type shit… my future flashed before my eyes. On the cusp of turning 30, I was suddenly confronted with mortality and the reminder of how important family was to me. If I remained seriously single forever—who would be by my side when I die?

This shift within me was massive. I started thinking about having a family & with that came relationship thoughts. Although I didn’t join the dating apps or change my social habits, I made an agreement with myself that I would no longer push good things and good people away.

At my best, I am fiercely loyal, romantic and kind. At my worst, I am stubborn, jealous, and sensitive. I feel things deeply, take things personally and cut people off at the first sign of trouble (read that as intimacy, vulnerability & change.) I had developed a thick skin to avoid being hurt and in exchange, the skin acted as armour defending me from any feeling at all. But like a soft & sensitive peach, with age, I soften. I have begun to develop weak spots & I’m afraid I can’t ignore feeling as easily as I once did. I find myself in vulnerable situations that I would have previously run from. I used to think of these vulnerabilities as weaknesses… scarifications that would hold on to me wherever I went and pass on to whomever I loved.

In the past year, I can admit I’ve fallen in love twice and naturally… my heart’s also been broken twice. With the work I’ve been doing (therapy, life coaching, self-help, meditation, crystals… literally anything I can get my hands on) my perspective has shifted from a victimized place of resentment toward one of reward, reverence and gratitude for my ability to feel. On one occasion, I was burned and abandoned at the expression of my feelings—it was too much for him. I was too much for him. My feelings were too much for him. Feelings were too much for him. While I wore those scars on my skin into the next love, I realized it was never about me.

Once you can look at the scars less as injuries and more as decorations… loving, dating & loss become a beautiful exploration of self and others

Quite honestly, I’m still reeling from my recent love loss, but while I lived it… it was special. I know this by the way I was able to really lean in, feel the feels & really fall in to it. While the free fall can be freeing in the moment, the higher you fall from, the harder you fall. In the time since my grandma passed away, each time I start with someone new I have a bit more space to fill. I am expanding & my heart has more room for someone to find a spot to settle in. This is a vulnerable place to be. It's an open invite for someone to hurt me again but I suppose the rewards are worth the risk.

Now here I am, 30. Each time I start new with someone, I try to reflect on the past & the growth it brought me. I try to reflect on the ghosts of my past and the love I felt regardless of the endings. I try to let my future flash before my eyes and consider the vastness that lies before me. I consider the benefits of experience versus safety. What is worth more in my account? What will get me out of the hole of bankruptcy? I’m still figuring all of this shit out and it definitely terrifies me. There are still days where I feel bankrupt and numb, days where safety feels better than vulnerability. To be vulnerable is one of the scariest things to experience but simultaneously one of the most rewarding.

We rip out so much of ourselves to be cured of things faster, that we go bankrupt by the age of thirty and have less to offer each time we start with someone new… or do we? Is what we are offering less? Or is it more? More pain, more scars, greater expectations of disappointment? The fine line to distinguish here is that to make yourself feel nothing so as to not feel anything is impossible. Trust me, I’ve tried it. The feeling you're left with is emptiness—what a waste. You must consider how you heal the wounds that will inevitably and naturally come with loving vulnerably… are they scars or decorations?