To those who hate, thank you!

I was asked to name my friends that I would call on to have a hello or a hang out.

I started blurting out names of all the hearts I adore so much.  I didn't get through them all, it took too long for me to remember names, so when my eyes started to raise to the ceiling to try to think my way out of the brain injured 'duh', he cut me off.

Only problem was, it was for the evils of law, so I was forced to divulge their names on paper.

As I wrote, I started to think about the phrase:

If you can count on one hand five good friends, then you are lucky.

 
I realized I have more people I can call friends than I have fingers on both hands.

Throughout my life, I've been a people pleaser.

What I learned by looking at this friend list, is that these are the only people I need to please.

Not necessarily so much that I need to, but these are the names of people that deserve my love.

I had to go through this list and add phone numbers and I kept it for myself so I could inform them that they've been named.

I looked at the list all day yesterday.  It was so beautiful.

It was so incredible that I could look at the people I love and know that I'm loved back.

It was comforting to hear each of their voices say, "You don't have to be sorry.  I'll fight for you in any way I can!"

It was amazing to feel that I have such a solid group of friends, that I will never have to worry about being lonely.

There was another phrase I heard today that hit home, oh so well.  It went something like this:

People who are busy pleasing everyone around them will find that they're so busy worrying about what others think of them, that they're actually the loneliest people on earth.

I get it now.

There were many years where I wasn't one of the 'cool kids'.  I felt hurt that people didn't contact me instead of me always being the person to call them to initiate a hello, or that I wasn't special enough to be invited to the outings I saw on Facebook.

I thought that if I just kept being super nice to the people that I wanted to be friends with, they'd see that I was worthy!

I was very lonely and could never find that confirmation that I was loveable.  I just wanted so badly to be loved that I spread myself very thin, leaving nothing to fill myself up.

I've stopped trying to please people.

I've realized that the only people I can please are the ones who want me to.

... bow-chicka-bow-bow hehe ...

Anyway, seeing this list in front of me, I now know where to place my energy of people pleasing.

I can now see that all the love I give will be returned in kind by these people.

I don't need to collect hearts anymore.  I'm filled.  I'm fortunate.

I also have the hen-peckers and rah-rah-trannies to thank.  If they hadn't shown me how much hatred they're capable of expressing, I may have never had to start collecting hearts from scratch again.

I want you to know, that you'll never please everyone.  You can't possibly do that.

Choose who you're going to spend your time and energy on.  We only have so much in us to give, so save it for someone who will give back and refill your supply.

Write down the people that you love, that you know you can count on to love you back.

If you can count them on one hand, you're doing very well.

If you can't, maybe now is the time to start changing what you think is a friend.

I've had to do it, and it's really not so bad.

I got so much more out of it than I ever knew I would.

i know that i deserve love, and i accept it now