Reclaiming One's Self

It was all very simple. Sometime between the hours of late last night and early this morning, I made the decision that from now on, I would no longer invest so much of myself into anyone else. I'm the only one who will look after me, and no one is worth giving that up for. And now that I look back, I have not thought of myself much for the past few months; I have been second, third, or fourth in the grand equation of things, and rather than being the mathematician, I have let myself be a variable to which I held no particular attachment. 

What scares me is how easily I allowed myself to forget about what I wanted and deserved, and how willingly--in fact, gladly--I put aside my desires and values just so somebody else could feel more at ease. I had witnessed so many relationships where a friend had lost herself to "the unit" or "the man", and yet until now I was blinded to the fact that this too could easily become my fate. I didn't spend the last 25 years building myself up just to fall at my first glimpse of love, nor did I think it would be possible that I, so used to being alone, could so quickly get accustomed to spending most of my time thinking about or talking to one person--a person that one year ago did not exist, and is now so interwoven in all aspects of my life that I don't want to imagine it otherwise. 

I am conflicted, but my next steps are easy. Things must change. I need to put myself back in focus again and do the things I love. It starts today with yoga and blogging. Tomorrow, a happy mystery.