You Need To Listen To Yourself

Currently, the Notes app on my phone is brimming with lists upon lists upon lists. Poems drunkenly typed after 3AM burrito binges, random ideas from amazingly long showers, philosophical revelations inspired by outstandingly boring classroom lectures…basically shit I think about that I feel is worthwhile enough at the time to record. This Notes app is my scatterbrained-mini-diary. Snippets of my mind day-to-day.

Recently while perusing this app, I had a serendipitous moment. A note I had written months previous was offering some words I really needed to hear:

There are some things you just know with your soul. And some people. Pay attention to these things and to these people because they will make you feel at home and like you are exactly where you are meant to be.

It was like my past self had known that future me would really need to hear these words at some point. The timing was perfect.

You see…there have been a handful of people who, in the past few years, have fallen out of my life. People I had, at one point or another, considered very close to me. In most of these relationships, whether romantic or platonic, I consciously chose to stop pursuing the person.

As I have gotten older I have really begun to value quality over quantity in most aspects of my life, especially in my relationships with people. Lately, I have been a strong advocate for letting go of relationships that do more harm than good in my life.

But just before rediscovering this in my scatter-brained-diary-Notes-app, I ran into one of the people that I had chosen to no longer pursue to keep in my life, and I began to question myself…“Did I make the right choice?” “Did I burn any bridges?” “Am I a bad person for not wanting this person in my life?”

I began to doubt my reasons for choosing to build other relationships/friendships that came more naturally to me. (Enter Past Me’s note.)

“Yes!” My Present Self said when I read this note again because I know the EXACT feeling I had when I wrote it. It was after one of the first dates I had with my current significant other—one of those wonderful life moments where you feel instantly connected to another person.

Sometimes you meet people whose presence feels like a warm, homey, hug. And sometimes you’ll encounter the opposite. Choosing to spend time with people who build you up and make you feel more like yourself is not wrong. Sometimes you just need to focus on what makes you happy, what builds you, who surrounds you with love.

And sometimes you have to listen to your Past Self’s notes. You know yourself better than you think.