Opening up your heart

After graduating from college, I spent the summer in Aspen, Colorado. It's no secret that Aspen is a beautiful place. Some of my favorite time was spent down at the river, climbing on rocks and logs, watching the water, thinking.

While in college, I had made a semi-conscious decision not to pursue any serious relationships. With that behind me, it felt like it was time to shift gears and open myself to something. I had been a solitary person for so long that it wasn't an easy transition.

There was a James Taylor song that spoke to me then - I still like it. It sparked a question in my mind, and surfaced some feelings. Here's what I wrote at the time:

"The secret of life
is enjoying the passage of time"
With that I do fine.

It's the next part:
"The secret of love
is in opening up your heart."

But where do I start?

Start by sharing:
Caring enough to express a feeling,
Revealing, perhaps, a weakness.
Exploring, perhaps, a fault.

Allowing another the chance
To help me, to serve me,
Observe me as I am.
Not as I think I am
Or should be.

Could be that in opening my heart
I open a chasm
Longing to be filled,
Thrilled by the being of another.

Try it.

Pry it
open.

The rhythm is pretty funky, reading this now, but maybe that's what I needed: something to shake me up a little.

With these words of self-encouragement, I started opening up, spending more time with other people, getting involved in conversations, allowing myself to care. Toward the end of the summer, I found someone who interested me. I even asked her out a few times (a big step for me). She was a willing participant, though non-committal to anything beyond a few dates. The summer ended and I had to be on my way, and she on hers.

You couldn't call it a deep relationship, but it was still painful to leave behind. I couldn't open my heart without removing some emotional armor first. With the armor off, I was vulnerable, and it hurt. I recorded my feelings in some ramblings on the airplane ride back home. Here's an excerpt:

...

Just a little melancholy.
Sad that my slowly opening heart
Is losing the light
That coaxed it open.

Though I know there will be other lights,
The present darkness shocks
In the suddenness of its coming.
Shocks in the starkness
Of the contrast between light and dark.

And, though the shock is bearable,
My heart's door groans on its hinges,
Longing to remain open.

...

I'm happy to say that I was able to keep the door ajar long enough for the much brighter light that soon appeared on my doorstep. I'm grateful for the events of that summer that prepared me to receive it.

I know some people get the door slammed on them so many times that it ends up looking like one of those big-city apartment dweller doors you see in movies with a battery of deadbolts, chains and locks. I don't know what to tell them, except that it's okay to feel afraid, as James Taylor says, but don't let that stand in your way.