It Wouldn’t Matter A Year From Now.

*I want you to know that it’s perfectly okay for you to sit and admire this beautiful picture of mine.*

Recently I’ve been in the habit of over sharing with a select few members of the population. By select few, I mean one person but allow me to exaggerate for a minute will ya?

In the spirit of sharing, I would very reluctantly tell you beautiful people a super cool, semi deep and possibly weird story. Here it goes…

In the Summer of 2015, I made it a habit to write myself letters. I suppose this makes me somewhat mentally retarded as it is the silent, less profound version of talking to myself. Anyway, all of my letters were beautifully composed in my notes and they were all surprisingly well written considering the fact that they were for my eyes only. ‘So what did these letters entail?’ You may ask. Well, I was about to explain in the next chapter if only you waited.

If each year of my life was a new chapter of my autobiography and I could name them, 2015 would be called “the beginning of the end”. This is because at that point in my life, I knew that my tolerance levels for ignorance had peaked and so, I began to write myself out of my situation.

We all deal with things differently and so, we heal differently. I don’t like people constantly telling me I deserve better because I’d hate to eventually depend on validation from anybody. Which is why I’d much rather come to the realisation on my own and then constantly speak words of encouragement and affirmation to myself until I begin to believe them. It’s how I heal, it’s how I grow. I did all of this without stepping out of my situation and although it looked dumb af, it worked haha. Trust the process ladies and gentlemen.

So back to the title of this post. ALL of my letters to myself started with ‘Hey baby’ but most importantly, ended with ‘it wouldn’t matter a year from now. I love you’. I LOVE YOU. Do you love you? Would this really matter a year from now?

One thing I absolutely love about life is how dynamic everything is. We all live in a world where pain is relative and emotions are temporary. Life is fluid – priorities go from being at the bottom of the list to making it to the top or vice Versa as the years go by. Things are constantly being put into perspective and our realities are constantly being redefined. That thing that gave you sleepless nights for months no longer seems relevant. Remember that toy you lost and cried over for days? Or that relationship you were so invested in, breaking up was your biggest fear. Isn’t it funny how you literally feel nothing for said person now?

In June 2010, I was convinced that I had found the love of my life. He wasn’t Yoruba but we were going to make it work, we were going to get married, we were going to have a family and our first daughter was going to be called Nkem. Imagine the state of my fragile heart when communication seized. I was in shambles but guess what, I was also convinced in December 2010 that I had found the real love of my life…and again in 2011 summer, 2011 Christmas, 2012 summer, 2012 Christmas…are we noticing a trend here? The point is none of the previous loves of my life mattered months after so, I would often feel stupid for stressing and overreacting and just letting certain things bother me a lot more than they should have.

IT WOULDN’T MATTER A YEAR FROM NOW.

I have since learnt that there is no point stressing and overthinking and overanalysing situations. No point giving up and losing hope and shrinking myself because of temporary set backs. This is because most of the time, my current problems aren’t relevant in the grand scheme of things and in situations where they are, I think logically for a suitable strategy and move on.

Life is too short to focus on the things that wouldn’t matter a year from now especially when it comes to relationships (seeing as my blog is mostly centered around this topic). So I have grown to love loving people. As it is just as permanent as it is temporary. I really have gotten to a point where how I feel about someone is independent of how they feel about me. None of that ‘do they feel the same’ ‘maybe I should not say this so they don’t think that’. I just love recklessly while enjoying the connection and the surge of emotions. I would love the hell out of you whether you like it or not so don’t make me fall in the first place 😒. That is until the day my fragile heart can’t handle unrequited love and I mope around for a bit, analyse where I went wrong, write a few poems and eventually move to the next love experience. At the end of the day, none of my past hurt would matter by the time I’m ready for my new love and I would have learned so much, I’d come back a better lover than I was. Life is beautiful isn’t it?

You gotta live life and experience experiences. Really converse in conversations and fal inlove with love like your life depended on it. No matter what the outcome turns out to be, 90% of it wouldn’t matter a year from now. Don’t get me wrong, it wouldn’t disappear automatically but, you grow out of it. You grow out of hate, out of self loathing, out of regret etc. It’s a learning experience, a learning curve and you come out a better version of your old self each time which is amazing.

P.s. I don’t condone living life like there aren’t sometimes permanent consequences for your actions. What I’m saying is for every situation that looks bad, it is important to remind yourself not to dwell on it for too long. This is mostly because dwelling on the negatives never ends well but also because in a year from now, it probably wouldn’t matter. A better use of your time could be devising a solution or determining what went wrong so the same incident doesn’t occur twice.

Remember, it wouldn’t matter a year from now.
I LOVE YOU
A.