ᗩ GOOᗪ ᑕOᑎᐯEᖇᔕᗩTIOᑎᗩᒪIᔕT I've been 🤫 on #TheMateHunt. Last year forced me to sit with myself, without what I thought was my life but were coping mechanisms. Stripped of those, what did I have? Lots of wounds. I'm glad 2020 is over. I've been back on & off dating apps . It's a thing I do when I'm feeling hopeful & want to grow the feeling. When I uninstall, I'm retreating wounded. I've been isolating a lot. Thankful for a valid excuse to stay out of other people's noise. I tire easily around other people's noise & other people are noisy with their unmanaged feelings. It's hard to see a man beyond his misbehaviour. Because I have burn marks from empathising with men, I feel muddied. It's cleaner not to engage. I'm prying loose gaslighting around this. Accepting I have the right to write off the male gender. It lets me understand the empty space under. Loneliness, yes, but not as much as imagined. Not enough to pay the price of male misbehaviour. A desire, not need for companionship. Companionship isn't a crutch, cage or solution to loneliness. It is a different bird altogether. What does it require? Someone whose company is inspiring, entertaining, relaxing, fun. That's when I reinstall the app. I find myself less brittle. Make no mistake, DM sliders, inappropriate messagers, condescending misogynists still exist. I weed them out. I even let myself feel rage. These rages now linger less. I don't have to uninstall to escape the horrors because they don't horrify me as much. Right now, I'm having some nice conversations. I don't think about them when I go about my day. But in leisure, I find myself tap-tapping a witty comment, a new thought, a curious expression of interest. After all, good conversations are inspiring, entertaining, relaxing, fun. And men are some of those people with whom I can have these conversations. Maybe you can only converse with others when you've first spoken to yourself a lot. 📸: @tjcoulagi ---------------------------------------------------- This week I'm exploring our relationship with fear, what scares us & what it says about us. Join the discussion in my Stories & on my Live at 10PM IST on 10Mar under #1deaLive #ScaredyCat. https://www.instagram.com/p/CMMmpXNlv0e/?igshid=vambnqqorv6t
