N8tivegirl

Opening your heart without losing yourself

Becoming Free to Love Again

Opening your heart without losing yourself

There is a special kind of ache that comes from loving deeply and losing what you thought would last.

Whether it’s the loss of a loved one

or the quiet death of a romance,

the grief feels the same.

You want to move forward.

You need to move on.

But instead, you find yourself standing still—

holding pieces of a heart you gave away fully.

When something ends after you’ve invested your time, your faith, your future,

you’re left asking:

How do I begin again without losing myself this time?

My great-grandmother Annie used to say,

“Pray and ask the Lord to fix it so they can’t hurt you no more.”

And sometimes, when God answers that prayer,

the answer doesn’t look like restoration—

it looks like release.

Because what you eventually realize is this:

some people look better going than they ever did coming.

There are times when we pour so much of ourselves into another person

that we abandon ourselves in the process.

We confuse love with sacrifice

and devotion with disappearance.

Without realizing it,

we make a person an idol—

placing them where only God belongs.

And the God we serve is a jealous God.

Not jealous in insecurity,

but jealous in protection.

He will not compete for your heart.

And when something begins to replace Him,

He lovingly—but firmly—removes it.

The relationship ends.

The focus shifts.

And in the loss, we finally see what we forgot:

We lost who we were.

Becoming free to love again doesn’t mean closing your heart.

It means opening it wisely.

You learn to love without shrinking.

To attach without abandoning yourself.

To give affection without forfeiting identity.

This time, love doesn’t cost you your peace.

It honors it.