I Love You isn’t I’m Sorry

Last year in my meditation class we worked on the aspect of trust disowned. This was a hard one for me to get to because I didn’t feel like I had any trust issues. Boy was I wrong!

After sitting for several minutes feeling the “voice” of trust disowned, it sat right in front of me, knee to knee. My dad’s presence was so strong all I could do was hold my breath, then cry. My childhood memories flooding my body. How could joy and pain exist in the same memory? How did it take me until 36 to realize I had developed an unhealthy view of trust? How did I never realize that “I love you” didn’t really make up for the heartbreak and broken promises?

As I sat there with that feeling, with the realization of broken trust reaching deep inside of me. I started to understand where it began and how broken trust still manifests in my life as an adult. I have built relationships on the same premise of broken trust. Building on the “they love me, so it’s ok” mindset. Convincing myself that if things appeared to be ok then everything was good.

I was continually hurting myself by nurturing the unhealthy feelings I dreaded so much as a child. The phone call that never came. The weekend sleepovers that never happened. The waiting and waiting and waiting. Over the course of my life, I’ve let boyfriends, husband, parents and friends take a piece of my trust and crumble it only to hand it back to me with an “I love you”. And while I still carried the hurt, they went about life like everything was ok, failing to truly acknowledge the pain that was caused.

As time passed, the pain would ease and I would let my guard down and begin to trust their words and kindness again; only to find myself, once again, crying until I fell asleep then waking to an “I love you”. But “I love you” isn’t “I’m sorry”. “I love you” doesn’t acknowledge the pain. “I love you” as a way of fixing things only diminishes the love and continues to break the trust. I love you shouldn’t be used to bandaid a hurtful situation.

I am learning every day that everyone has been hurt in some way. The saying, hurt people, hurt people didn’t mean much until now. So many are struggling with their own feelings of broken trust and other hurts. Healing begins with recognizing the symptoms and triggers.

Everyone has feelings and those feelings should be acknowledged, no matter how hard it is. A sincere apology, with actions to back it up, goes so much farther and builds trust faster than a quick “I love you”.

Love at its purest is kindness, truthfulness, passion and respect. Isn’t that what we all want? To be loved in the most pure way?

I love you isn’t I’m sorry. Make sure you know which one you really mean to say.

To know where you came from makes it easier to get where you’re going Quincy Jones