How to love me properly.
On instructions for my heart. Alternate title: JUST LOVE ME DAMMIT!
This past week a friend sent me a writing prompt on Instagram that said “Write a poem on instructions on how to love you properly.” I instantly wanted to open a new note on my phone and get to typing but stopped myself. This was the second time I read and would attempt this prompt. The first time was while in a relationship where I did not feel like I was being loved properly. It was hard writing the list then because it reiterated that I was selling myself short in love and losing myself to keep someone else happy. I felt I had laid out the playbook for my heart and my teammate refused to read it. “I don’t know what more you want from me,” I’d hear after clearly saying what was missing for me.
I’ve always felt like I was asking for too much in relationships until I finally realized I have just been asking the wrong people. People who were unable or unwilling to love me in the way my heart needed, though they relished in my love for them.
I love big. My love is felt strongly and deeply. I do not wish to shy away from love. I want to embrace it fully and wholly, welcoming it with intention.
For the past couple of years, I’ve stated to lovers and friends that I don’t want to be in another serious relationship any time soon. That was an easy decision to make. Each moment of realization of how heartbreaking love had been for me, how fragile both my heart and mind were—I couldn’t in good faith proceed with building that connection with another. I had become jaded. Bitter, even. And hardened at the thought of loving another in that way. But now that I am in a better place mentally and emotionally, the idea of an endless string of temporary lovers exhausts me and I know that one day soon I’ll long for my person.
Though I currently struggle to believe that my person is out there, I hope to one day wake up like days before when I am hopeful that they will find me. While poetry isn’t my usual medium of writing, following the prompt I wrote a list poem on instructions for how to love me.
How to love me properly.
See me. All of me. Not just the parts that brought you to me.
Seek to understand me. To learn me.
Be gentle with me, especially when I am not being gentle with myself.
Consider me, not above all else, but I’d like to feel like a priority.
Care for me.
Wipe away my tears.
Ground me when my mind tries to take me from here.
Affirm me.
Appreciate me.
Correct me in love.
Be honest with me even when that honesty is hard.
Communicate with me when misunderstandings arise.
Compromise in ways that let me know I’m not alone in this.
Write to me, even if only in a post-it note that reads “I love you.”
Acknowledge your shortcomings as you notice mine.
Believe me and don’t invalidate my struggle.
Hug and hold me tightly when you see that I need it.
Make love to me like my body is the elixir to all your pain.
Support me.
Be yourself.
Don’t cage me in.
Live your own life.
Shower me with forehead kisses and reminders that everything will be okay when I forget that.
Don’t make me feel like too much when my world is suffocating me.
Keep your promises and commitments and own when you can’t.
Don’t intentionally cause me harm when I’ve unintentionally hurt you.
Reassure me of your love when my mind tries to tell me that it’s not there.
And if that love fades, don’t try to cling to it for my sake. Release me to the next who will love me properly.
In writing out this list in my journal, I realized I wrote a version already, which means I’m pretty consistent with what I’m asking for.
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All these words, Ashleigh. So full of truth, goodness and profound gentleness. I can see this poem as one for loving myself well in addition to how I wish another to love me. So beautiful.
Thank you for sharing this, all of the parts resonate. Esp this line: Consider me, not above all else, but I’d like to feel like a priority.
Whew 😅