Sometimes goodbye slips past us without a single word, it hangs weighing in the balance of our deepest regrets in the back of our minds. Perhaps we loved them in one way or another as either a friend, family, or really believing that they were “the one.” Maybe we had been lost in finding words, strength, courage, the means or the opportunity to say what we wanted to.

 We tell ourselves that there’s always tomorrow, and perhaps that day can change everything that we have no power to fix. Imagine saying nothing, letting years pass, living in silence that brings only internal turmoil, doubt, pain, conflict and friction between someone you hold in high regard. 

In the article “Teenagers’ ability to describe negative emotions protects against depression” published by the University of Rochester states,

“Those who score low on negative emotion differentiation tend to describe their feelings in more general terms such as ‘bad’ or ‘upset’. As a result, they are less able to benefit from useful lessons encoded in their negative emotions, including the ability to develop coping strategies that could help them regulate how they feel.” 

A flip switched in my mind due to all of these experiences that made me decide to follow my heart, which I recommend you do as well. Most recently, my close call was having a car go from 80 to zero miles per hour in front of me with no warning. I felt the adrenaline pound within my stomach as I slammed on the breaks. Having that sick feeling shudder throughout my body, that burning and alarming knowledge that if I did not react quickly enough, I was going to die.

 I’ve had other near death experiences, such as a seizure at age 19, a boating accident at 12, nearly being suffocated and trampled in a mosh pit at 16, and I nearly drowned once around age 14. I take nothing for granted.

After I met that person who changed my world I found he stayed in my thoughts even in the moments I thought I was breathing my last breath. At that moment, it’s a flickering voice of consciousness as if it were a lighthouse trying to remind your soul of the pathway home. Your last streams of thought say sweetly in both hope and despair that, you are the one memory that I will remember in this world and in the next. 

In my experience, my last thoughts were like this but more in a rush of feeling — barely a thing of comprehension until I discovered the words over time and they were this. I know it’s hard to love someone who is in the wind, but every time I closed my eyes then open them after the dust has settled, you were there and it was enough to bring me to my knees. 

I said what I could to him which was a simple ‘I love you’ and then ran away, leaving it in the air. At least I freed myself by saying something. So why censor what you feel? When life is so short? 

Popular songs have rotated around these feelings that we should learn from like Katy Perry’s “The One That Got Away,” Adele’s “Someone like You” or Calum Scott’s cover of “Dancing on my Own.” There is a reason these songs are popular, it is because we all feel these emotions.

When you listen to lyrics that comprehend emotion better than most articulation in casual speech, its surreal. Especially in Calum Scott’s rendition of “Dancing on my Own.” I can feel that pain of knowing someone else is the lucky one holding the one you love.

“I’m right over here, why can’t you see me? And I’m giving it my all, but I’m not the guy you’re taking home. I’m just dancing on my own.”(almost).