Love is stronger than fear.
This quote is written on the first vaporizer I bought years ago. It’s a kind of hippie-ish company (unsurprisingly), so I didn’t think much of it until recently for unrelated reasons. It brought me a lot of comfort due to some tribulations in my personal life, but then it brought me comfort today.
I woke up this morning completely morose and afraid, though I felt a little better when I had my friend over and we just hung out. But I’d made some social commitments for the evening and felt ambivalent about going to them because I just didn’t feel motivated to leave the house.
But I had RSVP’ed and didn’t want to flake so I went. I’m very glad I did. First, I went to a meeting of the Philadelphia South Asian Coalition. I’d never been before but everyone was so nice and when we went around introducing ourselves they asked for pronouns. And then we spent some time complaining about clueless white people. (If you’re white and reading this, don’t worry, the people we were talking about were like… actually really dumb lol.)
Then I took an Uber to meet a friend and in the car ended up with an older black man (the driver) and two college girls, one of whom I think was a WLW because she referred to her marriage rights. We all commiserated and as each person got off, we wished them to take care and stay safe. Today is a dark day but solidarity is popping up like weeds in cracks.
Then I met up with this old friend of mine who I haven’t seen or heard from in three years. He just happened to be in the city and was leaving tomorrow so getting to see him was serendipitous. I was really delighted to see him and strengthen our friendship. We did a lot of catching up and commiserated. It just felt like it was meant to happen today.
So to get to the point, people are important. Really fucking important. I am going to be okay because of the people in my life. I have been blessed to cultivate a group of excellent people—all of whom I actively found over the years—who completely accept me for who I am and want me to be happy. And if I put a little effort into looking, I can apparently find new good people too.
It’s easy to become a total misanthrope today (which I am, by default) and I know I’m lucky because I live in a big, overwhelmingly liberal city. But people online are real people, too, even if they don’t feel that way. We’re all real and here on Earth together and we love each other. I know we genuinely want each other to be happy and feel safe. Even if you feel alone where you are right now, you ARE loved. You are part of an enormous community of people who recognize what’s wrong in the world and care enough to live their love through their principles and actions. I shed tears when I think of people who don’t feel that love. I wish I could show you how real it is.
No one can make you feel happy or safe, but when you have those people in your life… You’ll know. Find them. Make it your life’s goal to surround yourself with excellent people. It’s not easy, but nothing in life is ever easy, no matter the circumstances. It’ll be the best thing you do for yourself. I feel blessed every day because I have the people I have in my life. Sometimes I just randomly tear up because I don’t know what I did in a past life to deserve them.
It may take a while to figure it out. I’m nearly 26 and it took me a while to find my groove. Most of my friends are queer and the ones who aren’t get it. And even if they don’t get it, they want to learn because they love me. None of you deserves anything less than this.
I am afraid. But I have a lot of love in my life. Abundant love. I see it in all the communities I frequent, off and online. I saw it this morning when people from my online communities started the day by asking each other “Are you okay?” I saw it in the evening in the Uber I took. We’re all here for each other. It’s real. Love is real. It’s the number one thing that matters and it’s stronger than fear.