Sometimes we say I ’ M  F I N E when we don’t mean it.
Sometimes we C H A N G E our minds and don’t tell the world.
Sometimes we run A W A Y to find our way back home.

Sometimes we just do what’s best for ourselves.

Call it selfish, self-preservation, or self-love. It’s all the same.

In Don Miguel Ruiz’s book, The Four Agreements, his second agreement is Don’t Take Anything Personally. Nothing others do is because of you. It is because of themselves. All people live in their own dream, in their own mind. They are in a completely different world from the one we live in. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream.

When we take something personally, we make the assumption that they know what is in our world, and we try to impose our world on their world. 

Unopened messages and unreturned calls reflect me, not you. Half smiles and unmet gazes shouldn’t be taken personally. Declining invitations and changing my mind is my way of protecting the little girl inside me. Opting to say I’m fine when I don’t actually mean it is sometimes the only way to hold back the tears. Running away, getting out of here, stepping back from it all sometimes is the way we give our hearts and our minds the space it needs to connect again.

I’m unlearning what I grew up believing a friendship was. That friendship is keeping your friends updated about your life, opening up about all your demons, fears and worries, and allowing them to support you. I choose to not respond to messages, I choose to say I’m fine when I don’t mean it out of selfishness, self-preservation and self-love. Because sometimes talking it through doesn’t help me overcome my demons, fears, and worries. It doesn’t get me back to baseline.

Sometimes talking is just for the sake of maintaining a friendship. It’s giving someone the chance to support you when you know in your heart that only you can support yourself right now. It’s updating them about your life to show closeness and understanding of one another. It’s trying to put your demons into words when there aren’t any compilations of words that will ever fully resonate with someone else. Someone else living an entirely different reality from your own. But I’m unlearning this. I’m learning that it’s okay to keep things to yourself. To be selfish. To self-preserve. To self-love.

Webster’s dictionary defines selfish as “concerned chiefly with one’s own personal profit or pleasure.” But it also defines self-preservation as “the protection of oneself from harm” and self-love as “the regard for own’s own well-being and happiness.”

There’s such a strong negative connotation to the word selfish. Yet there’s a protective feeling when talking about self-preservation, and a warm, fuzzy feeling when talking self-love. But at the end of the day, it all means the same thing: Putting ourselves first. Some things you discover you have to tackle on your own. Some things that would cost more effort trying to explain to someone else than if you battled it by yourself. Some things you can’t even see in yourself, let alone be able to explain it to someone else.

It’s okay to put ourselves first. It’s okay to keep others at a distance as we battle our demons. It’s okay to be an island for a while until you find your way back to shore. There are some battles we just need to take on ourselves. Some journeys we need to venture out on our own.

So don’t take things personally. There are a million thoughts, counterthoughts, affirmations and doubts behind every word, every action. We can never fully understand someone else’s reality. All we can do is live our own and be there for one another when our realities mingle.

When we hold space for one another, it means allowing someone to show up any way they need to, not in the easiest way it would be for you to support them. Support could mean creating a space where we keep our minds and bodies distracted. Or support could simply mean silence. It’s agenda-less. It’s where our realities come together, mingle, dance, and maybe part ways. It’s where we allow one another to show up in the ways we need to, not the ways we were expected to.

I’m beyond grateful for the community I’ve found here in San Francisco. For the openness, the acceptance, and the abundance of love. For the spaces we have held for one another to be our most authentic selves and to speak what’s on our minds and on our hearts. We’ll always be there for each other, today, tomorrow, 50 years from now.

Wherever our individual journeys lead us. Before, during and after every battle I face, I know they’ll be there if I need them just as I’ll always be there for them. Friendship isn’t selecting the battles you want to be a part of it. It isn’t choosing only the victories and avoiding the defeats. It isn’t asking someone to fight a certain way. It isn’t always being the thing that helps them win. It’s showing up for yourself. It’s showing up for your friends when they need you, in whatever way they need you. It’s having your own back. And having theirs.

We can’t win someone else’s battles for them. All for can hope for is to win a few battles of our own.