Letting Go

People tend to come and go in your lifetime, they will be with you for awhile and then leave, or you will be with them for awhile and then you will leave. It hurts when the people you get really close to have to leave your life temporarily or permanently.
When a really close friend of mine had to leave I couldn't understand why it hurt so much, and a simple answer like "you guys were close and he meant a lot to you" wouldn't cut it for me.
I think the true reason why it hurts so much when someone leaves is because when you meet someone new you really do give them a piece of your heart, and they usually return the gesture with a piece of theirs.
Now spiritually and metaphorically speaking, your heart yearns to stay whole. That's why when someone leaves your heart will feel as though its on the point of breaking.
But another amazing thing about your heart is that it heals. It heals because it mixes in with the new piece, it learns from it and it makes your heart stronger. It makes the heart better and more wise. And to me, most importantly, it offers a promise of hope. Hope that the memories will be remembered and the happiness will be savored. Hope that in the world you have friends who care about you. With each new piece of heart that melds into your own, you will come to find that you aren't really the owner of your own heart. You are just the keeper, the guardian, and it is up to you if you let your self become vulnerable to what happens when you give away a piece of your heart.

Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket--safe, dark, motionless, airless--it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable. (C.S. Lewis, Four Loves)

Will you stay in the dark and not take risks? Or will you take the risk of brokenness and love as we were meant to love?

-GJ Frye