Dear hopeful,

Your story made me really sad, and I can only say that I sympathize with your pain, and hope that time will bring you some relief and answers. Maybe it’s not the most helpful thing in the moment to give this whole story more romantic and sad tone, but it did remind me of something that is really popular as a term in the new age community- twin flames. It is a challenging, very passionate relationship with someone, very different from us.. Most of the time (after the initial phase) it’s painful, and not always has the happy ending. But it’s ultimate goal is to make us grow beyond our ego, insecurities, to heal us in the end.

And I am not sure I believe in the concept of twin flames… 🙂 But from what I understood from your story, you are both victims of your own past-you with your own insecurities, him with his inability to get detached from a traditional environment. The only way for your relationship to have grown further is if both of you could have found a way to break free from these issues that held you back in life in general, not just in your romance. But. as the twin flame agenda says, you both have to do it in your own terms, and in your own time.

Don’t you think that now should be your time? To wake up. To look into your heart. You matter, you are loved. You are love. You have so much to offer to the world, and the world needs you. This happened for a reason maybe, and very often great personal growth comes from big pain.

I won’t give my view for the Asian tradition of fixed marriages and how it affects millions of people, more than enough is said already on this subject.. I am sure this guy loved you best way he could, but many of them fall under the pressure of the family. Especially if they are not living abroad or are enough financially independent. This is a fight that is not up you, and I can assure you that you cannot find the right words or gain a ‘quality’ that will change a whole pattern of certain society. So at least you can do now is ‘skip’ the destructive self-blaming thinking.. There was only so much you could do. You can be sad, cry, grieve and give your self some time to heal and grow from this stronger. But never for a second dare to think that this whole thing happened because you could have done something to prevent it. As I said, these relationships take the input of the two people to work out, and you would have lost his at some point.

I believe when you truly love someone, you always love them in some form, no matter what. But in time you can learn to love someone ‘from a distance’ and be grateful for that person, even if it didn’t work out and it’s over. It takes some time and some soul searching, but I believe it’s possible to get there, and move on from the pain… Love again and trust again.

I sincerely wish you all the best, and I hope you can refocus your attention from the loss you suffered in the past, towards the love for yourself, and the need to shift in the present better than you were before..