Where Is Safety?

The one who survives by making the lives
Of others worthwhile
She’s coming apart
Right before my eyes
The one who depends on the services she renders
To those who come knocking
She’s seeing too clearly what she can’t be
What understanding defies

She says I need not to need
Or else a love with intuition
Someone who reaches out to my weakness
And won’t let go
I need not to need
I’ve always been the tower
But now I feel like I’m the flower trying to bloom in snow

She turns up the light
Anticipating night falling tenderly around her
Watches the dusk
The words won’t come
She carries the act so convincingly
The fact is sometimes she believes it
That she can be happy with the way things are
Be happy with the things she’s done

And yet I need not to need
Or else a love with intuition
Someone who reaches out to my weakness
And won’t let go
I need not to need
I’ve always been the tower
But now I feel like I’m the flower trying to bloom in snow

Reach out, hold back
Where is safety
Reach out and hold back
Where is the one who can change me
Where is the one
The one

Reach out, hold back
Where is safety
Reach out and hold back
Where is the one who can save me
Where is the one
The one

I need not to need
Or else a love with intuition
Someone who reaches out to my weakness
And won’t let go
I need not to need
I’ve always been the tower
But now I feel like I’m the flower trying to bloom in snow

I feel like I’m the flower trying to bloom in snow
The danger and the power
The friend and the foe

"The Tower" by Vienna Teng

My best friend said I reminded him of this song.

I admit that when it comes to my heart and my self, I am a very cautious person.

Is that bad? I guess it is.

I have no problems with roller coasters, no matter how high. Or jumping off of airplanes. Or being catapulted into the air. I am always willing to face those challenges. But I’ve always found it difficult to open myself up to someone else. Why would anyone care who I am or how I feel?

I always believed or at least wanted to believe that I didn’t need anyone else; that I can happy on my own. I’m not being delusional. I simply need to believe that I don’t need anyone else to survive…to be happy. However, I have been proved wrong over and over again. Despite all the bad things I have experienced in my life, I have learned that I do need people in my life.

I just don’t want to be alone…

Sometimes, it makes me sick to admit that. I don’t want to need people. I need to know that I will survive were I to end up alone. But I’m afraid. I’m afraid I won’t make it… But I’m also afraid that if I were to let people in, they’ll run away.

All of me is not the person people see. I try so hard to hold it together and keep myself in check. If someone says something hurtful, I won’t admit it…even if it’s my best friend. I don’t need them to feel bad and apologize. I’m a hypocrite really. I want to be close to people, but I’m not willing to open myself up to them.

Almost every single time I have done that, I have been stabbed in the back. I don’t want to experience that kind of pain anymore. The one person who closest to me, I trust him with all my heart. I really do. But there’s this little voice in the back of my head that speaks up every time I’m about to tell him something else private about myself. This little voice keeps telling me to be careful, not to trust.

I’m damaged goods. Broken.

I’m unwilling to take that step forward towards full recovery because it requires me to jump over an abyss. I don’t trust myself completely to make it. I’m afraid to take the risk.

There are people, my best friend in particular, on the other side who have already successfully made the leap, beckoning me to join them. With my unwillingness, will they eventually give up? Will they realize I’m not worth the effort? Will they leave me behind?

Is it even safe on the other side?

Where is safety?