To Be Honest

by Nelle Starling

an if you hurt, i hurt, kind of love.

letting go means you loved yourself more than to keep holding on to something that hurt more than it didn’t.

love yourself when things are hard, when you make mistakes, when you give up before trying, when you don’t workout for the second day in a row, when you lay in bed all day, when all you feel is sadness, when a promise is hard to keep, when you don’t know what to say, when you say too much, when you fail, when you don’t want to. love yourself even when you don’t feel like it

repeat after me: loving them shouldn’t hurt.

or maybe it’s the hopeful part of me that thinks you will come back while i’m sleeping even though you’ve been gone for months.

people come and go and i don’t think my heart will ever be okay with this.

it’s okay to be sad and not have the energy to hide it. you won’t heal if you keep touching where it hurts.