They met outdoors, where the sun shines and trees blossom in
the spring
huge in the park unhindered by man. It was a sweet relationship that
didn’t’ last
The funny thing about being young is you see what you want
to see. You talk about things teens talk
about, looking at the world through the eyes of youth and innocence. This is part of the beauty of youth, the imaginary
mind of seeing all things possible, of believing in fairy tale endings.
We grow up and meet some of those past love interests that
slipped through the grasps of our fingertips in the past. And as adults, through the trials and
tribulations of experiences, we have matured and changed, some of us anyways.
Our value systems may have changed. Some people, no doubt, change more than
others, some develop more character, fine tune their value systems and become
more compassionate. Adults we knew as
children can become catalysts for change in our world; champions for causes for
helping fellow human beings have opportunities to advance their lives so that
there is no semblance of a caste system anywhere. Some adults are content just
existing, enjoying moment by moment. The range of ways we approach our lives is
as diverse as people are unique. But what we evolved into is quite often not
what any of us envisioned as teens.
Thus teen love interests were usually not meant to last. Connecting
with these old love interests can be precious and can be disheartening. Waking
up to the realities that, when you were young and innocent, you were like so
many youth today, only seeing people through the eyes of idealism and not
realism is a hard fact to face. You were human!
You were fallible to wanting to believe something that was not true. Age
truly does sharpen your intuition and make you a better judge of character and
what matters to you and yes, to those other potential long ago ‘love interests.” Seeing that those people you thought were so
wonderful are on quite different paths of how they define happiness from you and
right and wrong is important so you do not live with regret. The kid that was arrogant may still be or not
be at all. The one that seemed insecure may have grown into a man quite full of
himself. The girl that was the prettiest may now be someone who is focused on
more important things. Seeing these
changes can impact us in positive ways.
Someone told me awhile back that I saw them through youthful
eyes still. Looking back, they were right; I see them through idealist eyes,
the way I wanted to see them, not for who they are. I thought they had changed, maybe they had or
maybe they were that way all along and my innocence never picked up the signs. I wanted my value system today to be theirs so
that a bond would still exist and we could be friends. When the morality and
character are so vastly different, the odds of having a friendship dissipate. Relationships don’t work that way. People are
meant to move in and out of your life, not everyone can stay. Learn what you can about past relationships
and how you viewed those people as a youth but let go of those innocent eyes,
of looking at past lovers through dream-struck visions because the reality is
they are flawed individuals too. Their paths may have been meant to cross over
yours again but may not be meant to stay.
