The Ocean Within
Sometimes, I still see that little girl inside me who looked at everything with curiosity, always lost in her own thoughts. Even though she was born i...
Sometimes, I still see that little girl inside me who looked at everything with curiosity, always lost in her own thoughts. Even though she was born into a well-to-do family, she was always searching for something. Despite being surrounded by people, she always felt a profound sense of loneliness.Parents, siblings, uncles, friends - there were many people in her life. Since she always achieved top grades in school, she was a favorite among her teachers. Yet, she constantly felt that no one would truly love or understand her. She always wished for someone who could feel the depth of the ocean of emotions surging within her soul.As she grew older, the need for someone to understand her feelings became more prominent, and her desire for love grew stronger. Her happiness began to depend more on others making her happy than on her own internal life. As the years passed, the void of loneliness in her mind grew even larger. Among the new friends and acquaintances she met, she was always searching for that one person who would love her just the way she wanted.Then one day, by a stroke of fate, a boy stood before her. She felt that this boy would finally understand her and her emotional world. Because she was looking at him through the lens of her own desires, she felt his every action was exactly what she had wished for. She believed she had found her "right person" - someone in whose life she would be the priority. She decided to marry him and moved far away from home. This was the emotional world of that little girl until marriage. I was now trying to build a life with a man of my own choice.Within just a few days of marriage, however, I began to feel that loneliness again. My husband's love didn't seem to reach me. On paper, my life seemed to be going perfectly well. I couldn't understand why, even though my husband was a good person, my loneliness would not leave me. I shared my feelings with him and tried to establish a dialogue, but the emptiness remained.Suddenly, I realized I was pregnant. It felt strange; I thought, "My own emotional world is still so confused, how will I take care of another soul?". After the birth of my child, I realized that I was no longer just on the side of receiving love, but on the side of giving it. I wanted to give my child so much love. A conflict began in my mind: on one side was my own hunger for love, and on the other was my desire as a mother to fulfill my child's hunger for love. In the struggle between these opposing emotions, my emotional state suffered. My love for my child was as vast as the sky, yet a deep void remained from my own unmet needs.As days passed, I realized that my baby loved me unconditionally. That thought comforted me. I felt that, finally, there was someone in whose life I was the priority. Someone loved me completely. But this was merely a temporary balm for the wounds in my heart. The loneliness still peeked through occasionally, and my head would spin with intrusive thoughts. I was suffering immensely, wondering why my mind could not find peace when everything in life seemed "fine".Then one day, I sat down and reviewed my entire life, starting from childhood. I realized that for all these years, I had expected love and happiness to come from others. I had been searching for happiness outside of myself and, most importantly, I had neglected my own soul. My happiness, my joy, and my love were within me all along, but I had ignored them. The day I realized this, my search ended. I understood that I am complete within myself. I do not need anyone else's validation to feel whole.The little girl who was once lost, searching for an "ocean of emotions" in others, finally found that ocean within herself. I started loving myself, attending to my own needs, and giving myself the priority I once expected from others. My loneliness didn't vanish because the world changed; it vanished because I changed the way I looked at myself. Now, I am not just a mother or a wife hungry for love; I am a woman who is a source of love for herself and everyone around her.
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