The Lego House | This relationship was built to be broken

“I’m gonna pick up the pieces and build a lego house. If things go wrong, we can knock it down.”

- Lego House by Ed Sheeran

I love that song. And today, it sparked this realization for me… I’ve been in this relationship for 10 years come February… and I’ve been building a lego house of a home with him. I’ve been building something I could just knock down and walk away from if things went wrong.

It wasn’t exactly intentional, it’s just been a string of not-quite-deep-enough commitments to dreams followed by spirals of self-sabotage. I realized it’s really scary and difficult for me to truly open up to receiving love. It’s hard to feel like I really deserve it, and even harder to accept it knowingly. I get this feeling like I should be ashamed for noticing the love and wanting it (like those songs about girls who are so beautiful and the dude’s whole world and she doesn’t even realize it, and her not knowing it is totally romantic and beautiful to him- which just… wtf? but it’s a thing, right? Every teen romance movie ever has set us up for this).

So, Opening Up To Receive Love Has Been Really Uncomfortable…

And I think at the same time I have this massive fear (like most humans) of not being loved, of being alone- going unnoticed. I think in a lot of ways my relationship experience has been waves of “I don’t deserve this” with splashes of “please don’t let this end” and then these massive storms of “there’s no way this can last, let’s stop it now before someone gets hurt.” And then we bicker, we blow a couple hundred (or thousand, ahem) dollars we don’t really have… and we make up and start all over again.

What’s Really Crazy To Me About This, Though, Is How Many People Can Relate!

I thought I was alone in this embarrassing mess. One of the biggest things I struggle with in myself is that I feel like a horrible wife. I make selfish, impulsive decisions. I have really high expectations, and not a lot of patience. I’m hard on myself, and more recently I’ve learned that I’m not as good at expressing appreciation directly as I am at writing it out or talking about what I appreciate with others.

When I feel like something is missing in my relationship, I feel like I’m going to die or something. It’s soul-crushing. It’s this crazy wild storm and I can’t breathe and I panic. So to reflect and realize I’ve been more selfish and cold than I realized in the past, that just breaks my heart. I never want to be the cause for him to feel that way and I’m disappointed in myself for selfishly diving into every whim without a genuine second thought for him.

(Another lesson I learned? Feeling guilty for/while/after doing a selfish thing is NOT the same as considering the other person and making thoughtful decisions. Feeling like crap doesn’t make up for behaving poorly.)

So… What Do You Do When You’ve Been A Poor Life Partner?

Well, what I do is step back and decide on my values, my big “why” and the sort of life I’d like to live. I think about the type of partner I want to be in life, how I want to feel in my relationship and who I want to be. I think about why I choose to be with him, and what his desires, expectations, and needs are (and if I don’t know, I ask).

This was a really big bunch of pride for me to swallow. It meant relearning a few things about myself that I had really tied into my identity. It meant releasing some selfish beliefs and opening up to the possibility of there being other perspectives that are also true and good. It meant stopping thinking I know everything and actually taking a moment to truly listen.

I don’t want a lego house.
I want a sturdy, well-insulated cabin in the woods on a solid foundation.

It’s time to start treating my life the way I would treat that dream come true- and one place I’m starting to do that more intentionally is in my marriage.

I want a beautiful cabin in the woods on a beautiful piece of land near the lake (or including the lake, totally open to the whole lake, Universe!) and I want to have a legacy and a home to pass down. I want to be the kind of wife who is present, who is humble and thoughtful, patient, who speaks with love (not that there’s never any fire, I’m still allowed to feel angry, frustrated, etc. sometimes- I’m human! And feminine power is incredible- and there is very much an aspect of ferocity in it that I think is important in life).

I want to be the kind of wife who lifts my husband up, who brings more light and joy into his world and who inspires a sense of creative peace- like anything is possible, but also we are safe here and our roots can grow strong and deep. I want to be the kind of person who knows who she is and what she loves, always. I want to be the kind of person who is mindful, present in the moment with eyes wide open. There’s nothing wrong with dreaming, I love to dream, but I want to live my life wide awake- no more feeling like money and time and love all just flutter past me in the wind and vanish before I’ve even had the chance to notice it in my hand.

Looking At Where I’m Coming From…

I’ve struggled seeing my parents in relationships. It’s frustrating to watch- and I don’t have kids so I try not to judge too harshly. But at the same time? Both of my parents neglected me growing up because the person they were in a relationship with took higher priority.

This is an area of forgiveness I am still working on in my heart. I didn’t believe it impacted me until very recently, when I finally let myself see that I was struggling to receive love and other forms of abundance and light. I can bring so much joy and love to a situation, but then I can leave it feeling empty and cold and scared- because I never open up and let the love flow back into me.

With my parents, I wanted to make them proud. I was a great student, I was a “good kid,” I pretty much sat in my room and read books and wrote stories and did homework through my entire childhood. That was literally it. I loved it. But part of what I loved about it was that my parents loved to brag about how good I was, how sweet and well-behaved and smart and accomplished. How I loved hanging out with sweet little old ladies, and their friends knew me as someone with a heart of gold. It was all true, and that’s still very true to who I am and what I treasure in life. But at the same time, this was the sort of stuff that earned love and attention in my childhood. My sister was much more adventurous, and the kids younger than us have all been pretty normal kids- actually playing and causing mischief and destruction and such, and I’ve seen my parents feel frustrated and dissatisfied with them.

So… I have this gut reaction to just sit by myself and fill any longing on my own. I thought this was a strength- I’m resilient and I know myself and I’m generally aware of what’s going on in my head and heart… but what I didn’t realize is that I need to do it all by myself without any help. I can’t accept the help, I can’t open up and let it in. And that’s not a strength, that’s a weakness and a recipe for pain and disconnect.

I’m Waking Up To These Truths About Myself
Just Days Before My 24th Birthday…

And after the wildly chaotic and selfish year of 23, I’ve decided to set the intention of making 24 a year of grounding habits. Stability. Foundation. I love adventure and creativity- that’s not going anywhere! But it doesn’t have to be so all-or-nothing.

I’ve been building up a morning routine, an evening routine, a writing routine, and even improving my diet to include more product and fresh foods- and less dairy and junk for months now. This time? I just want to stick to it. Because I’ve done this before dozens of times. Since I was 16, I’ve always loved routines- I just stop them as soon as I get comfortable. I feel like “okay, awesome I did it! I’m the kind of person who does this thing! Cool!” and then I did it so I can check that box off and stop doing it. (Ooops.) This time it’s different- because the chaos and the selfishness and the non-commitment have broken my heart and hurt those I care most about so many times. I don’t want to choose that anymore, so I won’t.

24 is the foundation.

I’ve dug myself a pretty fabulous hole, right? So now I’ll fill it with concrete habits, routines, and rituals that actually serve me- I’ll start taking the steps to build the life I truly want to be living. I’ll start building my relationships in a way that allows the love to flow both ways- no more lego houses to topple over the second I’m afraid or something isn’t quite right.

I Want To Know What I Can Do When I Truly Love And Care For The Life I’m Blessed With.
When I Live In Mindful Gratitude And Grace. When I Show Up To The Dream Every Single Day.
I Want To Know How I Can Feel When I’ve Truly Done And Been My Best.

Be gentle with this look inside my heart.
I hope it helps you in some way.

With love,
Jessica

Behind The Scenes | This Was A Tough Post To Write, And Here’s Why:

Something I actually really don’t like talking about publicly is my relationship. Despite how much I lean toward vulnerability and sharing the tough stuff, I’ve also had it beat into my brain that you should never talk about your marriage negatively to anyone, ever. Buuuut, as a child who grew up watching men beat her mother, I’m team talk-about-it-when-bad-stuff-is-happening! Because I know at first my mom thought nothing of what was going on, she thought it was normal, that everyone was like that sometimes. And you know why? Because we don’t have the conversation because the wise women in our lives have pressed upon us the importance of never sharing the secrets of our marriage with the world.

And there’s also the fact that this marriage is a relationship between two people, right? So when I share, I’m not just sharing my story. I’m sharing his too- and it feels a little wrong to share his story without him. But as I write my book and learn to tell the story of my childhood and who I am, I’m learning that I am allowed to share my perspective, my story, always. It belongs to me. Others can tell their own perspectives, or not, however they choose. And ultimately, my husband doesn’t mind my sharing anyway. It’s just this nagging voice I have in my head that says it’s wrong to share this stuff.

Well. I think it matters. So I’m sharing.