I am writing for a magazine called Inspire (www.inspiresa.co.za) - this is my latest article, which I am now able to blog as the magazine has been published and is "out there" on our world wide web.

Selfhood begins with a walking away, and love is proved in the letting go…

At school my favourite subject was English.  In this subject, I had a teacher extraordinaire, whom I completely and utterly worshipped, and who had a command of the English language I had never seen before and seldom seen since.

I have many vivid memories of her, and even more vivid memories of her reading to us at times.  There were of course many set works and projects, and as pupils, we all waded through them when we needed to, however, what I remember most is that this teacher truly believed that the most important thing in life, was love, and she used to repeat ad nauseum two sayings I suspect I shall never forget.  One was a quote by Shakespeare that “the course of true love never did run smooth”, and the other, I remember her telling us was, “love is proved in the letting go”.

I recall her reading the poem to us by Cecil Day-Lewis, the last two lines being:-

How selfhood begins with a walking away,
And love is proved in the letting go.

My by-then-icon had tears streaming down her cheeks as she read this to us, and I looked at her in bewilderment wondering how on earth such a seemingly simple sentence could bring tears to anyone’s eyes?  I was sixteen then, naïve and unbroken.  Now, at the mid-life-crisis-age of forty, I too could shed a few tears over those lines, and I am now, a little less unbroken.

As a woman, and particularly as a woman with many close female friends, I am all too familiar at this age and stage of life, that love can for many of us be as allusive as that promised pot of gold at the end of that promised rainbow.  My friends and I now, whether we like it or not, all have a history of sorts, we have all loved, we have all lost, we have all stayed for longer than we should have, we have all too, at times, realised that the only way to protect ourselves and maintain or find our selfhood, is in fact to walk away, and let go.

Of course this grand plan of self-preservation sounds easy beyond the speaking of it, and it fails to mention that the path followed to get to that point of letting go, is in actual fact, the true test.

We tend to head into oncoming love-traffic with great ease, and get caught up in every single green light of emotion as easily as one, two and three.  What I believe the danger is, however, is that through these intoxicating and indeed hedonistic feelings, we often lose touch with ourselves.  We lose who we are, who we were, who we want to be, and we often compromise ourselves in order to fit into another’s brand new seemingly squeaky clean and exciting life.  Suddenly it is not what we as individuals want, but what we as a couple want, and sometimes this is not necessarily a good idea.

A great girlfriend of mine said to me at least a decade ago, that in relationships, one needs to be “the girl he fell in love with”.  I think of that saying often and I have to say, it can become a challenge.  If we are lucky enough to find love, or have it find us, we must remember to be that person we always were, and to remain true to ourselves.  The man who may (or may not) fall in love with us, will do so for a multitude of reasons, and we as women, need to keep these reasons intact. 

What life does show us so often though, is that love starts off as something wonderful, yet can over time change to something not so wonderful.  It is at the not so wonderful stage that a sense of self needs to prevail.  Love is a positive emotion and should remain as such – however, sometimes relationships dwindle, resentment creeps in, anger reveals itself, irritation emerges, and suddenly, we are in the middle of the fiery love forest, and that happy girl he fell in love with… is nowhere to be seen.

My intent is not to dwell on the negative that can at times befall us, my intent is, however, to dwell on the positivity of being a strong woman, of staying centered at all costs, of not being afraid to “stand up and be counted”, and for being honest.  I am not talking here about being honest with others – I am talking here of being honest with ourselves.  By this I mean knowing when it is that one needs to stay and try and carry on, and when it is that one needs to accept that the green light has turned to amber, and should now in fact, turn to red.

I am no longer that cute, flat-chested sixteen year old staring at my emotion-laden teacher in curious wonder, but I am still that person fixated with all things English, and beyond that, fixated with all things love.  And so it is with truth in my soul and hope in my heart, that I believe, that if in doubt, I will remain authentic to myself.  I will remember my teacher, I will remember her tears, I will remember her voice, and above all, I will remember when it is that I need to walk away, and when it is that I need to let go.