You won't find love in a person, you'll find it in a field

It took heartbreak for me to realise the trap I’d set for myself…

Losing my lover meant losing love.

He had become my only access to that state. My soul supply. My dealer.

Somewhere along the way, I had become dependent on his affection.

How do you choose, when given the option between love or honouring your boundaries?

For most of my life, I would choose the former.

I’d take connection over self-esteem.

I would shape myself to other people, dial down my inner knowing, and go along with it.

But this time, something inside me was crying for recognition. Some deep part of me that was wounded.

I listened to my heart. And I ended the relationship.

In my naïveté, I thought choosing myself and honouring my boundaries would be a straightforward path. Because it was the ‘right’ thing.

But it threw me into weeks of suffering.

Just five months ago, I wasn’t expecting to meet anyone.

I was in a place of openness and non-attachment, building my business.

So when a self-aware human crossed my path, I was curious to explore what might unfold.

I entered with honest intentions (honest).

But how quickly and deeply I fell for that intoxicating feeling: love.

That warmth, that belonging, that intimacy.

A permanent sense of home, wherever you are.

If I could guess what heroin feels like, this would be it.

See, in relationships, I felt like I was given permission to love.

To be open in my affection, physically, emotionally and energetically.

Growing up in the closet, I felt hyper-vigilent about feeling or expressing love with others, in case it was misconstrued.

God forbid some boy thought I was hitting on them: I would be outed, humiliated.

I learnt that it was safer to have walls up.

To keep some parts of me hidden from view.

But in a relationship?

I could let it all down.

Drop into some deeper state.

Allow myself to feel love and to be loving.

I loved that feeling.

That’s why, when a long-term relationship ended five years ago, I was crestfallen.

In our years together, I had merged with him.

Our friends were the same, we did the same things, we spent most of our time together.

Without him, I wondered: who am I?

I spent the following years untangling myself and answering that question.

So I thought I would know better, this time round.

But as the months rolled by in this new relationship, unconsciously I fell into old patterns.

Focusing my energy on one person.

Feeling fulfilled by them.

Becoming dependent on the dopamine hit of a text message. The oxytocin of a hug.

When it ended, it felt like love was ripped out of my life too.

How could my day feel so different without this person?

Why did the weather seem so bleak?

My mind, desperately seeking stability, ran through an endless stream of bargaining thoughts.

I could make this work. I could change myself. I could call him.

Meanwhile my heart was breaking.

So much pain, so much hurt, so much wounding from past experiences bubbling to the surface.

I would take myself into nature, perch by a rock or sit under a tree, and cry.

Wail.

Or sink, far far below the earth.

Where my body felt heavy, collapsing under gravity.

No motivation for my work, for creating.

As much as possible I tried to witness these experiences rather than identify with them.

And in self-inquiry, I had to ask myself…

What had happened?

And then.

I realised.

I had externalised love.

I had come to believe that love came from this person.

And now this person had gone, there was no love.

What a trap!

I’d heard “how in the hell can you love somebody else if you don’t love yourself first”.

If you’ve watched Ru Paul, how can you not.

But these were just words.

And in words, I thought I loved myself.

I was caring. I looked after my body. I tended to my inner voice.

I was applying the love languages to myself. Seeing love in my behaviour.

But I wasn’t paying attention to the feeling of love and cultivating that.

Love is within us.

Love comes through us.

Love is felt.

In meditation, I took myself back to those moments where I felt love.

I invited them into my body and intensified them.

And I saw that I had been given a glimpse of love through this person.

A wonderful, eternal glimpse.

But I had identified him with the feeling.

I realise now that love is much more like a field than a thing.

It’s a radio station.

And when I was around him, I was tuned in.

I was able to turn over from the station of presence, which was of the mind, to something much deeper: love, of the heart.

He gave me the frequency.

Such was his gift for me.

It’s been over a month now.

And I have been tuning into love without him, little by little.

Learning to give myself the love that I felt I could only give to him or receive from him.

Learning to open up to intimacy with friendships that I felt was off limits.

Learning to open my heart at the pace it wants to, allowing it to close and feel pain as it needs to.

That’s being in the field of love.

It’s a beautiful thing to share that field with someone dear to you.

But it’s a terrible thing to think that it lives in them.

This break-up has been a painful lesson, far deeper than I ever imagined.

But the gift is timeless.

I have felt love. And now I can bring that to myself.

I am loving awareness.