throwing back the one you've been fishing for

Have you ever been on a journey that feels like it keeps going and going and going, and all you want is to reach the destination? While you've grown to love and appreciate many aspects of that journey along the way, you're also acutely aware that it's yet to take you right to that destination that you're SO very clear on. You're not miserable on the journey, quite the contrary, you've embraced it. Yet you can picture that destination so clearly; you are even dialed into how it's going to feel when you arrive. So when you find hints of those feelings along the way it's like little breadcrumbs allowing you the hope that perhaps you are getting closer. Yet each time you pick up a breadcrumb with the hope your destination is just around the corner, you hit another dead end. And every time you do it's another round of emotion, grief, and sadness for the loss of "what could've been" or more specifically an acceptance of another dead end and a need to pick yourself up, dust off once again, and keep wandering the path looking for more breadcrumbs.

This is the best way I can describe what dating for 26 years has felt like.

I often say to myself - everyone has something they yearn for and I guess finding my person is mine. For many women it's seeking someone to create children with or even be able to have children. That has not been my cross to bare. Yet I have so much empathy for anyone who's held onto that dream and had a miscarriage. Because I often feel like I've been "trying to get pregnant" for 26 years. And here I am...still single. (I don't mean to "compare" merely to create an anlalogy to something that feels similiarly painful)

I don't write any of this for pity - again, I'm very clear we all long for something and we all suffer in our own way - through our health (mental or physical), our relationships, our career, etc. We all have vision and aspirations for what could be and it's tough for anyone to not quite be there. So for me, I merely wanted to sit with the feelings and write truth. To aknowledge the tough parts of the "journey" with raw, honest emotion.

Yesterday I had to throw a fish back into the pond, who from every measure I've grown so clear on these past five years of who I want to attract as a mate/partner was the fish I've been fishing for. More accurately he asked to be 'unhooked,' as while the connection felt mutually right, the timing wasn't quite right. He's still on his journey back from divorce and the gap is too great right now between where he is and where I am. Right guy; wrong time.

The growth for me - aceepting this, leading with my truth, and what I know I want AND deserve: Someone who is as ready as I am AND someone who is as amazing as this man. Both, and. And yet, it still FEELS LIKE SHIT. To have grown so much, to have attracted, and then recognized your fish as your desired fish, to then have to toss it back in because he's not done swimming around in his own work yet.

So today is about being vulnerable and brave by honoring all the feels - the amazing high of holding a beautiful bud of a rose in your hand for a moment, long enough to know exactly how rare, beautiful and right it is, and then to be strong enough to let it go and put your faith back into the journey. Once again, finding gratitude in what each breadcrumb leaves you with.