Emotional, yes, but Honest

I cannot say honestly that I'm a good person, but I can say that I don't want to demean others.  I don't get pleasure from belittling people.  When I have criticism, it's usually because I see no one correct a behavior I consider inappropriate.  When I'm standoffish or seem cruel it's usually because I'm self-conscious and wary of being backstabbed as has happened in the past.

Yet the real question is where does this tendency to doubt myself so much come from?  Why do I feel responsible for the failures of my peers?  Why do I feel like a failure for my inability to successfully inspire others to better themselves?  Why don't I have a hands off approach that some of my peers seem to?  Why do I take criticism and failure so deeply personal?  I will always struggle with this in my career.  It is not a problem on the surface and does not interfere with my professional lifestyle except insomuch as it prevents me from seizing the most of my potential.

In the romantic department it keeps me from happiness.  Romantically I am a wreck.  I sway back and forth between wanting to be single and wanting a soul mate and settling for a someone.  Sometimes I feel like I have no support system in my life and I crave another human being I can be forthright and honest with.  In this world there's so little that's honest left.  A lot of what is out there is in denial and shallow and petty and scares me to death.  What's wrong with this world?

And when it comes to the path I've chosen, there is really nothing in this world I could do with a completely clear conscience.  Every single benefit comes at a price whether in time, in character, in money, or in blood.  Even in a relationship I wonder should I sacrifice stability for the highs and lows of wild romance?  Or should I stolidly force myself to love someone who would be a stable partner?  It sounds so boring and so cold.

There's only one life, I want to give it my all.  I cannot continually be wrapped around the axle about every mistake I make along the way.  Victory does not come easily to any of us.  Everyone has their Achilles Heel.  But this doesn't answer my question of love.

It isn't that I think there aren't multiple chances for love in this life, or rather the right chance will come along and a choice will be laid out.  I believe lasting love requires sacrifice it's just that women are generally better at and better suited to making this sacrifice.  I haven't sacrificed anything I couldn't get back for a man yet, and thankfully those men I've not ended up with have been not the right one.  Yet I wonder if there will come a time when that sacrifice will be asked of me, and I wonder if I will be willing to make such a sacrifice.  If I continue to guard myself, I might never let anyone in.  My tendency to get hurt tells me there is still feeling under the scar tissue of my heart.  It is not a dead muscle yet, and I know it's easy to say at the young age of twenty-one there are eons for me to find "the One."

Life comes at you fast though, and in only two months I will be twenty-two, and then in Germany and then... who knows?  Career, deployment perhaps; acclimating to a culture immersion.  The list goes on and on.  Love might not have a place in my life at this time, but if it's not something I am clear to myself I want someday, than I will never make room in my life for love.  If I really was heartless than I would be satisfied with this outcome and put myself peacefully to work towards my other goals and dreams.  But I am feverish with the desire to find a someone to spend the rest of my life with.  I do not seek someone to complete me, but someone who understands me in a way that even my family does not understand me, and who learns to love me with all my flaws in the most obnoxious joy the most wretched anger and the deepest despair.  And I know that no one can do that if I'm sitting here occupied with insecurity.  I know it's only a small - though strong - part of me that wants to hide.  But hiding is over, it's time to be open again to the shrapnel of this emotion.

Whether brief or with a surprising longevity, I'm setting my foundation of confidence.  It will not be a simple project, there's a lot of debris here.  It's like an abandoned outpost, overgrown and isolated.  There's work to be done and I'm set to doing this work.  It's no easy task.  It's just no easy task.