I had heard Tracy McMillan say, “you have to marry yourself first”.
One particularly painful day where I was needing some reassurance, feeling empty because my support group was elsewhere and I was alone and disconnected … Tracy’s words popped back into my head.
I took a moment in the middle of the pain (because that’s where we learn the most) and asked myself, “if there was someone else here right now, what would I be wanting from them?”. I imagined the words they would speak to me that would comfort me…and then gave them to myself.
And that’s when magic happened.
In that moment, I learned how to be there and support myself…which changed everything.
I started being able to connect with people on new healthy levels and in new healthy ways because I didn’t have to struggle to not look needy anymore. I wasn’t “needing” anything from them, I was able to just be there in the moment, connecting with them.
Feelings of rejection that had triggered me so strongly for so many years, became manageable and minuscule in comparison to what I had felt before.
Being alone wasn’t scary anymore and I became able to enjoy life and engage and do hard things.
I just needed to say “I do” to me.