The Door Is Not Locked From Your Side

The sun is setting, and for the first time today, the noise stops. Now you have to feel the weight of the armor you've been wearing to stay in a place that is slowly breaking you.

You tell yourself you are being strong. But strength is not the same as suffering in silence.

There is a voice inside you that has been whispering 'leave' for months, maybe years. It is the same voice that told the father in the story to let his son go, even though it meant watching him walk away into the dark.

The father did not stop him. Because love does not chain.

Love does not hold on so tight that it crushes the life out of the one it claims to cherish. You are afraid that if you let go, you will be alone.

But you are already alone — just with someone else in the room. The light inside you is not asking you to destroy the relationship.

It is asking you to stop destroying yourself to preserve it. The door is not locked from your side.

You have just forgotten you can turn the handle.