on self-respect (and journalling)

heartbreak interview #3

on the rooftop of our house, back in late may – before i made my escape – i interviewed my friend Q. Q was one of the early guiny-pigs at the beginning of this project, willing to get me warm in my interview clothes, so to speak. i got to shoot all of my questions on him and during the span of our conversation he told med his story about the girl who’d broken his heart, three times, during their long, drawn-out, on-and-off situationship. 

after the interview was over, i asked him if he thought i’d missed any questions that he thought i should add

and he said, in his rolling german accent, that: 

maybe you should ask people how they got out of their heartbreak

and it felt so obviously self-evident

(of course that question should be there)

it was after all the very heartbeat of this whole project:

how did the heartbreak make you feel and how did you get over it? 

so i took his suggestion with me

but i also made sure to ask him his question back to him

how did you get out of your heartbreak?

he chuckles, gazing out over the rooftops glowing gold from the last rays of the sun

i dont know if i am completely over her, he admits, half-smiling

but i think three things: 

friends, 

you need to talk it out and get it out of you 

distance, 

to the person, obviously

and the third cornerstone is maybe doing some sort of psychological work. going to a psychologist, or a coach…

but for me journalling about it was important, he continues

it gets you more aware of yourself and trains you to listen to your emotions, get rid of limiting beliefs and such

so yeah

friends, distance, and journalling 

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friends, distance, and journalling 

you could say that’s the cocktail recipe for this next phase of my summer

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and how is my carrie bradshaw summer going? you may ask

well, lets get on with it:

i’d left the north, where i’d spent a week with my friend elle

spending the next traveling all over the country to visit more

three in the north 

five in the south 

and i think the big shift came when i arrived south, to big-city living again

but before that i had a switch of trains in stockholm, and met up with my old patriot friend (for those of you who’ve been around since the very infancy of a love letter to you – you already know all about her) 

i hadn’t seen her for five months, and we’d decided to meet up at my standard quick-coffee-dates-in-between-trains spot, located just beside the station but outside on the sunny side-walk, very parisienne 

after she came up, hugged me, saw me

she exclaimed:

you look just like carrie bradshaw

i laughed

maybe its because ive been rewatching the show but everything about you, the hair, your life…

screams carrie 

and that shot my ego right through the roof

---

we talked for three hours

(had a lot to cover)

said goodbye

and i travelled onwards, farther south 

to big-city-living again

i was to stay in my oldest childhood friend’s apartment – let’s call her E – while she and our other friend – L – went on holiday

and i’d have the place for myself for two weeks

but before they left, all three of us spent a weekend together

talking, crying, laughing, dancing

being hungover and watching sex and the city 

and it was incredible, to be in this new, safe place

around friends i’d known since i was a child 

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but here’s the thing

L and i hadn’t seen each other since high school

(a lot of years ago)

where we had been friends but not particularly close 

(she was the it-girl type and i was the crying in the bathroom in between classes type)

and when E left us alone to work, we got a whole day to catch up

and i remember how in awe i felt, of how you can re-connect with someone in that way, by just two people being open, curious, vulnerable

that morning – over breakfast, coffee, lunch, a city stroll – we came each other so much closer 

that kind of instant soul connection you can have with some people

and i opened up to her about my heartbreak, of course

and she opened up about hers, relatively fresh 

and she said a lot of things. now i didn’t interview her properly, but a lot of the things she said about the topic hit close to home

and i remembered to ask her Qs question: 

how did you get over your heartbreak?

she told me one thing in particular:

i think what helped me most was journalling about it, she said, setting down her coffee cup on the breakfast table

i would set a time each week, light a candle, and just let out everything i’d been holding inside

every thought every feeling

everything

and it always made me feel so much better, afterwards, she says

her eyes sparkling with energy

i could just let go and continue on trying to live my best life 

---

after our conversation she gave me a bunch of journalling prompts to try

and that’s what i spent the next two weeks doing

journalling

i filled up half of my thick, venetian, leatherbound notebook

discovering and learning so many things about myself i wouldn’t have otherwise

like Q said, like L said

putting pen to paper was important

and so i split my time between stillness and adventure, meditating and clubbing, doing yoga and vintage shopping; waking up to the sunrise to journal and walking home in the sunrise from a night out 

(balance)

but i also spent a lot of time thinking 

about how i wanted to live my life

about how i had previously lived it

and i remember thinking a lot about self-respect

because in one of me and Ls conversations, we’d touched on the subject in relation to heartbreak. and whenever i hear that word – self-respect – i can not not think of that glorious essay by joan didion: 

To live without self-respect is to lie awake some night, beyond the reach of warm milk, phenobarbital, and the sleeping hand on the coverlet, counting up the sins of commission and omission, the trusts betrayed, the promises subtly broken, the gifts irrevocably wasted through sloth or cowardice or carelessness. However long we postpone it, we eventually lie down alone in that notoriously uncomfortable bed, the one we make ourselves. Whether or not we sleep in it depends, of course, on whether or not we respect ourselves. 

me and L had talked about how both of us, in our respective relationships, had ignored the voice of our own self-respect, and lied down in that notoriously uncomfortable bed didion spoke of

and i remember how badly i felt, L said

when i realized i had put his worth in front of mine

ignoring what my intuition had told me in favour of prioritizing him 

abandoning my own self-respect

and her admission hit home because there were so many times in my relationship to Him that i’d ignored that sharp sure nudge of my own self-respect speaking to me

i told L about one specific situation, when i had somehow, fresh after another rejection, still ended up in His bed

a bed i shouldn’t have ended up in

finding myself lying next to the person who a mere 24 hours earlier had broken my heart

(for the second time)

and i remember lying there, i told her

not being able to sleep 

anxiety pulsating through every fiber of my body 

head spinning of the excuses i came up with in the effort to bargain myself into the conviction that i could, in good conscience, lay there

but i chose to ignore the nudge that was speaking to me, willingly making myself a victim to self-deception

and the price i paid?

my dignity

and i thought of didion

of me lying down in that historically comfortable bed, the one we’d made uncomfortable

and i did not get any sleep that night because i did not respect myeslf

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didion writes: to give us back to ourselves—there lies the great, the singular power of self-respect.

and i had begun giving myself back to myself 

during my two big-city weeks

i had begun doing things that i wanted to do

cooking meals that i wanted to eat, listening to music i liked, going out by myself simply because i wanted to 

and that feeling? 

fucking delectable  

because walking through a world where you respect yourself, where you carry your head high and know that you have the power to do whatever you want – say yes, say no, choose to speak to that stranger or not – that’s an energy, a sense of intrinsic worth no self-deception could ever offer you. self-respect can never be faked, didion writes: but [it] can be developed, trained, coaxed forth. and i was developing mine like i was on training wheels; articulating yes or no like a child just having discovered the importance of the words

i was articulating myself overtly clear because i’d decided to leave no one in the dark, guessing

my self-respect would speak bluntly for me

and it was from the power of this newly found confidence that i gathered up the courage to finally make that dreaded call i’d been procrastinating for days

the one where i was announcing my decision to pause my contact with Him

so i called one evening, sitting before the open french balcony windows, gazing out over the railway tracks, like i’d envisioned

the horizon growing darker as the sun sank below the innumerable tracks 

he picked up

and i started explaining myself 

i’ve never had to pause,

or take a break in a relationship before, i tell him 

so i don’t really know how to do this 

i could hear his breathing through the phone, heavy, tired

and with new force i urged forth:  

it’s so strange to want to distance yourself from the person you once thought of as the most important person in your life, the one you thought of as the strongest connection you’ve ever experienced, i said

simply because all the things lying above that bond is just…

i trailed away

too complicated

he sighed

we were quiet for a long time

existing in that stillness that felt too massive to disturb with words

and when he spoke again he did not say

i know

it sucks

it will get better 

he just sighed my name, in that way i’ve heard so many times before 

a soft, reverent, crushing exhalation from deep inside his lounges 

and i knew

i had honoured my self-respect by vocalizing what i needed, 

and that was enough 

---

so lets leave our coneversation at that

not everything needs to be memorialized in words; and some moments can just remain like that, private, between two people

without needing to hear the reply 

---

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another reply i did not hear

was carries own

when she in one episode, season two, asks herself the question: 

did i ever really love Big, or was i addicted to the pain?

and i hit pause right then and there 

because when i heard that

it landed like a stone 

because i’d begun asking myself the same question

(maybe slightly different)

was my love real? or did i just love being taken on an emotional rollercoaster?

because with Us, the highs were highs and the lows were low

no equilibrium

and after a while, i think, you begin to think of the steady and stable as boring

in her live at the jazz café set, olivia dean (who i’d been obsessed with all summer), talks about this steadiness in relation to how her song slowly came to be; born from the realization that her younger self, the person who was in a very tumultuous, dramatic, “sexy” relationship – was just unhappy

and ive decided now that i want to fall in love in a normal, ordinary, beautiful way, she explains

a love growing steady

slowly 

and that’s what im thinking about now 

that maybe love should be more good than bad

it’s an overwhelming idea, really

that love doesn’t have to be difficult 

i really dont think it’s supposed to be that hard

a friend of mine says, curled up on my couch, at 1 am on a wednesday  

i really think it should be the easiest thing you’ve ever experienced

and i find myself wanting to argue with her

to counter that love is about hard work, effort, compromising, etc

but now i begin to wonder if i’m wrong

because in all my other relationships, to dear friends,

love isn’t hard

on the contrary

it’s effortless

the bad doesn’t outweigh the good and the good is so good because it just feels effortless

secure

and if something bad ever pops up

it’s only temporary because i know it can so easily be fixed

(good communication)

and that

the genuine secure, comforting, warm and rosy feeling 

that is everything to me, at the moment

that, 

and

friends and journalling

friends and journalling and distance

next i’m travelling to london

making the distance even greater

to see friends i haven’t seen for a year 

and live into the next installment of this vagabond summer 

and im feeling so grateful, for the time i’ve gotten to spend here

living by myself, learning about myself

it feels like i’ve aged a year during these two weeks

i told E&L over the phone one morning

and i mean that

it’s not the same insecure girl who stepped inside this door who will step out of it

so here’s to friends, strangers 

to all of the vulnerable mind-shattering conversations i’ve had over morning coffees, sticky bartops, and sunset rooftops

to the wonderful possibility that we can always deepen our connection to the people around us

its incredible, to think about

that we can always come each-other closer

and that having self-respect

can only ever facilitate that.

love,

e.