Unsent Letter: 01

It sickens me to read them all. My stomach drops with each letter I read.
I feel insecure. I feel like my heart is being ripped apart with every love you had shown her; with every similar words you have said to her, that you're saying to me too. And yet I continue scrolling down. I keep reading your posts to each other. I keep looking at photographs I wish doesn't exist because it makes everything real; because no matter how much I want to deny them, they serve as your memories. But I continue looking anyway, knowing full well that what I'm doing only gives me a self-inflicting pain. I never knew I'd become a masochist.

I wish I could delete them all. I wish I could delete her. But I can't go back to the past and undo everything. If I could, given the things that i know now, I'd  redo so many things. I'd never let you go that first moment we met. But I am no superwoman. I can't do that. So now, I am left with no other choice but to try and ignore these unwarranted insecurities I feel.

Still, I can't deny the fact that it's killing me. It's killing me how I absolutely know that I'm never going to be able to compete with what you two had. She gave you many firsts that you may again experience with me but I know it won't feel as amazing as what you felt with her. And the thought that you may be happy with me now but still it can't compete with the happiness you felt before makes me very sad. Almost depressed.

I won't be able to fill the hole she left in your heart...or will I? But...am I just that then? A filler? Someone you need to fill in that emptiness. Or am I greater than the love you felt for her?

What am I to you? What's my role? Who am I supposed to be when I'm with you? Because no matter how much I don't want to feel this, I feel like a replacement, and it sucks so much. So. fucking. much.

Don’t let go. I have so many issues and insecurities but I promise I am trying my best to fight them off, and with you holding my hand I’m a lot stronger.

Don’t let go even if I push you away. Especially if I push you away. Because that’s when I’m most vulnerable and broken that I want everyone to leave me so they can’t see how damaged I am.

Don’t let go even if I say I hate you. I don’t. You’re holding my hand. You’re helping me. Why would I hate you? That’s just me saying I need you. That’s me saying hold me closer.

So please be patient with me. I know I’m being selfish. I know I don’t deserve you. I know you’re too good for me. I would let you go if you want. I won’t stop you. But you have me as long as you want me and I’d take what I can get.

I need you, even just to breathe. I don’t know if that’s healthy but it is for me. I need you because no one else had held my hand like you do. I need you because with you I’m better. I need you because you are my light.

I just…I love you and if that’s wrong then I don’t want to be right.

Why I befriend my inner demons?

Many know me as a quiet, reserved and shy person. I’m always calm, even when I’m mad, which I rarely am. I’m never violent. I’ve only raised my voice a couple of times, and most of those moments were because I was standing in the middle of the class tasked by my professor to report on something. Other than that, I could count on one hand the other times I have raised my voice out of anger. I am what they would call calm, cool and collected, which is always adjacent to being called as a happy person, right? Someone who always sees the positive in every situation. Someone who does have problems but deals with them excellently.

            

Well, they are right. I handle my problems very well. And by that I mean I don’t handle them at all. I don’t search for solutions. I don’t classify them. I don’t address them, look at each angle, analyse, and then formulate a perfect solution. No. What I do instead is face them head on. I do not plan an attack. In the wise words of Ironman, I only have one plan; attack. That’s it. I don’t think about them at all. I just go full on and face them.

But the thing is, I attack them with kindness.

You see, these problems have souls. They come from one thing. They emerge because of one thing. And every problem we have comes from one place and one place only.

It’s within us. And within us, there are demons. These demons have many names. They can be called hate, jealousy, insecurity, anger, madness, craziness or just total lack of humanity. Whatever we want to call them, they’re still one and the same. And like us, they all have souls.  

          

These demons have souls, and whether they are worthy of saving, it’s upon us to decide.

           

If we incarcerate them or destroy them so they won’t ever come back, we’re right. But if we talk to them, help them and know where they’re coming from, we are giving them the chance to reform and change. And if we do that, we’re also right.

            

Either way, we are right. Either way we choose, we have to fight. Right? Isn’t that what humans do, we fight an endless stream of demons? And we’ve been doing so since the beginning of times.

           

But if you ask me, I’m tired of fighting. I’m tired of destroying. I’m tired of being mad; a person filled with utter hatred blinded by fear and cowardice. I am tired of that me. I’ve been tired of that for quite some time now. So what I’m doing, instead, whenever I have problems, whenever I am in the brink of anger and the only way I could get that out of my system is to destroy something—I try with all my might to calm myself down, cry if I need to, and then sit down then…talk to myself.

            

I talk to the demons I have inside me. I sit with them with a cup of coffee in hand and ask them how they’ve become what they are. I get into their minds, their souls. I get inside their heads and know them. I relate myself to them. I ask them why, how and when. I figure them out.

            

And once I get them to talk back, to pour their heart out in me, once I have their attention and I got their trust—well, it’s easier to listen to them, understand them and tell them that nothing will ever come out of what they’re letting me do but total self-destruction. And since they’re inside of me, if I destroy myself, they’ll be destroyed too.

            

Demons don’t want that. They want to live. They’re parasites. They feed off from someone’s fears; from the seven deadly sins, so to say. They do everything just so they could destroy you. But if you do something as little but as unexpected as to listen to them and talk to them, you’d be surprised that these demons—your inner demons—are not so bad at all as long as you fought the urge to succumb to them.

Once you’re at peace with yourself and accept the fact that everyone has demons inside of them, you don’t allow them anymore to have the power to take you over. They can instead be your companion, a constant reminder that you are not a saint, that you are not meant to be unless that’s your calling, that you are a human being and human beings are not perfect, that you are not perfect and that it’s okay to not be okay all the time. If you start being that kind of person, then you’ve won.

These demons that used to haunt you will now serve as your long lost friends. They will always be there, hanging inside your head, hanging around your heart, but you don’t give them a single ounce of power. Because you talk to them and you get to know them and their story and why they are there. Once you know their soul, you’ll know yours. Believe me, it’s freeing to accept ones inner demons. You have them and you alone control them. You don’t allow it to control you. Never again. Not anymore.

So, befriending your inner demons will never be easy. Those who are only brave enough to accept their faults are the only ones who survive.

So if you have problems now and you’re still standing, kudos to you. You’re not bowing down to your inner demons. You’re fighting them back in a way you only know how. And whatever ways you choose, like I said, you are right.

I only chose this way because I’m tired of the angst. It’s stressful to get angry. I feel much better when I talk to them. I still get mad and insecure and confused and sometimes, I lose myself. What take me back to myself are, ironically, my demons too. By just the sheer knowledge that they’re there allows me to take my sight back and know my purpose.

To talk to them and befriend them, and then reform them if you can because you know, even demons deserve attention. And it should come from you.