If you had just one wish, what would you wish for?
I guess the most obvious wish would be to ask for a different life. Is it not? Or would you ask for money, love or something else? I don’t think money or love makes us happy, but then, what does make us happy? What changes would I make in my life if I could change anything?
I would never wish to have been born without autism spectrum disorder. In fact, if I am ever born again, I hope I get to be born with autism spectrum disorder once more. It’s a part of who I am and how I see and interact with the world, and honestly, I think it makes me a better person.
I’m not saying that everyone with autism is better than others, I just feel like my autism spectrum disorder makes me a better person than I would have been without it.
Sure, it complicates… well, everything, really.
It’s not just the awkwardness or humiliation that comes with not understanding social cues and social interaction, it is all the things that happen as a result of my inability to read situations and people others can.
It’s the constant fear of being used without knowing – or knowingly being used and being unable to stop it. Every time I interact with others, I have to deal with that. I have to hope they don’t lie or use me, because I can’t tell and even – in the few cases where I can – I still can’t stop myself from wanting to believe in the best in people and ignore the gnawing feeling in the pit of my stomach. Some part of me simply refuses not to believe in people, no matter how many times I get hurt.
So, maybe I should wish away my desire to believe in others even against my better judgement? I don’t think I can, because life would be a lot more depressing if I didn’t believe in others.
Of course, all this means I’ve ended up secluding myself once in a while, because interacting with others has rarely brought me anything but pain. Friendships are difficult. I don’t know how other people do it. Relationships are even more difficult, as you might remember, I recently ended my last relationship.
I thought being in a relationship with someone I was in love with would make me happy, but it only made me sad. I thought being alone would make me sad, but it only made me happy. What a messed-up world it must be for this to be true, but truer words have rarely been spoken.
It wasn’t easy to leave simply because I’m happy now, it was one of the most difficult things I have ever done. I don’t regret choosing what was best for me, however, and I never will.
Looking back, it was my naïve idea of love that ruined it, I think. I thought that as long as there is love, everything will be fine. Beatles might have given me a fairy tale image of love, because I’ve learned it is certainly not enough.
Acceptance is something we do for our own sake because someone else doesn’t deserve to have that kind of power over us and so that we can be free of past mistakes and regrets to live happily in the now. I have always believed it was okay to forgive everything others do and even after everything that has happened, I still do. I had misunderstood something though. I thought forgiving and accepting was basically the same thing, when in reality, nothing could be further from the truth.
We should always forgive others for our own sake, because when others hurt us, why should we give them the power to continue to do so? They should not continue to affect how we live our lives.
Accepting, well, that different. We should never accept what we cannot live with. It’s pretty simple, isn’t it?
When I was with my ex I was always accepting his bad behaviour because I always forgave him anything he did. The problem is, I don’t think he wanted me to accept his behaviour – unfortunately, I am not the kind of person who will force people to change. In my opinion, true and lasting change can only come from within.
Every time he hurt me, I forgave him. But, since I continued to do so, I inadvertently accepted and allowed his increasingly bad behavioural patterns. I have still forgiven him everything, but I cannot be in a relationship with someone who has hurt me as much and often as he did. When I left, I knew that if I didn’t leave at that moment, I would never be able to get free and I would live in the pain until the end.
For a long time, months actually, we discussed the challenges in our relationship and my unhappiness with how things were, but it wasn’t until the end that he even recognized my feelings. By then, it was too late. I didn’t know it was too late, but it was.
I was far too heartbroken and tired. I tried talking with him many times since leaving him, but every time it was like he didn’t understand that I don’t think we are good for each other. Every time I told him I didn’t regret leaving and that I only wanted to be friends with him and nothing else, he acted like it was the first time I told him and every single time it broke my heart a little bit more.
I don’t know why I couldn’t express myself in a way that he could understand or maybe accept, but if I had a wish, maybe it ought to be that I could be able to communicate better. Or maybe I would wish that he would find someone who can give him exactly what he needs and treat him better than I was ever able to.
I don’t know. Even if that was my one wish, it wouldn’t change my future. I might still make similar mistakes in the future and others might still get hurt.
Any wish I made for him, well, it would also be wrong. We can’t decide what other people need or feel or anything. It’s not right for us to determine someone’s fate for them – they walk their own path.
That’s how it has to be.
I do wish that he may find happiness one day, but with someone who isn’t me. There are many reasons we were not going to be able to make each other happy – or that might not be right, because now I’m speaking for him again. I don’t know his heart; I can only ever know mine. It only changes it a little – there are many reasons I would never be happy with him.
One of those reasons is that I am no longer in love with him, and even though I wanted to fall in love with him again when I was in the relationship, now that I am not, I no longer feel like that. I want to fall in love again one day, but I want it to be light and free – not the heavy, intense relationship I had.
I know myself better than ever before. I no longer accept continued bad behaviour, but I do forgive it.
How about even further back? Could I change something even further back with one wish?
My past is one with deep traumas at much too young an age, trauma that has haunted me all my life – defined me at the most important moments of my existence.
I used to wish it had all never happened to me, but then I realised I am not my hurt. I can’t wish it away though, because it would erase my personality as well. I am who I am because of all the pain I have carried. I don’t need to wish for a way to deal with it either, because I believe myself strong enough to find my own way. I’ll tell you more about that in a post soon.
What would I wish then? If I cannot make the wish for someone else, nor use it to take away all the bad things that happened in my life, could I make a wish for the future?
What do I even want in the future?
Happiness.
I simply want to be happy, but I have at long last learned one very important lesson; I have no idea what will make me happy.
It kinda sucks, doesn’t it?
I wish I knew so that I could carve out my own path, but all the things I ever thought would make me happy almost never did and the things that I thought would bring me nothing but suffering rarely have.
When I just go with the flow and enjoy the moment, well, that’s actually when I find myself most happy.
When I walk to the train station and watch the sunlight through the trees, when flowers look almost luminescent in the twilight or when I hear the rustling of wind through leaves. When I truly see nature, sometimes, it’s raw beauty simply overwhelms me and I feel that I can understand all those humans who came before me and believed in a divine entity, because how else can one describe this often ignored world around us, except with words like divine?
I would not wish to always remember to notice the beauty that surrounds us, because I am afraid that I would then take it for granted and not appreciate it as much.
I would not wish to know what makes me happy either, because figuring out what makes me happy is… well, isn’t that what life is all about? I enjoy that part, so for me, it’s a big part of what life is all about. If I already knew, I think I might be a little bored. This search, figuring out who I am and finding what makes me happy has made me happier than I have been in a very long time. Accepting that I am really bad at it, well, that has been tough and it’s something I am still working on.
In the end, maybe it’s really just that there is no shortcut.
Whatever wish I make it seems like a bad wish. I can’t make a wish about my past, I can’t make a wish for someone else and making a wish for my future, when I have no idea what I want or even who I really am, well that seems plain silly. Whatever I would wish, I would probably just end up regretting it, because I never want what I think I want.
I could wish for money, success or some other cliché… But somehow, I doubt any of that would make me happy – because I think it would make me happy! And I definitely can’t trust my own power of judgement these days.
It’s lunch time, now, while writing this. Perhaps I could wish for a delicious sandwich? That way I wouldn’t have to make lunch…
But I do enjoy cooking…
What would you do with one wish?
