Thoughts on life and love.

Life. Love.
Two words. Eight letters. A thousand meanings.
We were born. We were kids. Teenagers. Young adults. We went to kindergarten and then to school and, then, college. We keep fighting to stand on our feet, get prepared for the void, this uncertain promise that's called "the future". For what reason? Are we sure that the choices, this confusing tangle of choices, regrets, tears, smiles that brought us to this very moment are correct? Have we achieved the wanted feeling of happiness?
But let's not be confused.
Let's start from the beginning. Kids. 8 or 10 years old. For some of us these were the happiest and purest years of our lives. For some other of us, the nightmare began these years. Abuse, verbal and/or physical. Bullying. Abundance. This feeling that no one notices you, you're an invisible person among invisible people. You try to talk, to shout, to scream but no air comes out of your lungs. Your parents are there and, at the same time, they're not. They think you're happy. But little do they know about happiness. It doesn't matter that they're older and in many ways wiser than you. Happiness isn't a lifetime lesson.
Happiness, like love, can't be learnt neither in 1 month, nor in 80 years. Happiness is abstract, like an idea which slowly flourishes in your mind. Happiness is the most delicate flower in the world's most beautiful valley.
I'll return to the idea of happiness. Where was I? Oh yes, at childhood.
There you were. You survived. You found a way, or many ways, to escape into a world that didn't cause you pain. It doesn't matter if it was a fairy tale, an imaginary friend, a pile of books, a collection of poems or a messed up doodling. What matters is that you succeeded. You made it to the teenage years.
14, 16, 18 years old. The Chaos. The mess. So many emotions bursting up all at once and you don't know which one of them to firstly follow. You fall in love. You fall out of love. You want to die. You don't want to die. You cut your arms, your tighs, your belly, your fingers. You regret it. You cut them again. A vicious circle. You find friendship. For the first time in your life you feel like it doesn't matter that your parents don't seem to care about you, because you've found something holier than them, something deeper. Friends.
Friends. What could I really say about them? They can lift you up to seventh heaven and they can tear you to million of pieces. They can make you believe that you're Mother Teresa or a Mafia member. With them you can be anyone and no one simultaneously. You can do everything. Powerful feeling, isn't it? You smoke, you do drugs, you have sex with strangers.
Or you're a good teen. You read, take good grades, dream of scholarships and golden college years. You're loyal to your first love and sex before marriage isn't an option.
I don't blame you. I think I was a good girl. I didn't get drunk, my grades were good, my parents knew all of my friends.
From time to time, a thought crosses my mind. That I didn't make the most out of my teenage years. (I'm currently 20 years old.) I didn't cry much. I didn't laugh much. I didn't act crazily enough.
I didn't climb a mountain, do bungee jumping, kiss a total stranger, sleep for 2 days, go out naked, run away for a week, buy 50 books at once.
I don't know. It may sound strange or weird, but I feel old and young. Like I've lived my whole life, like there's nothing else to see. But I also feel young. Weak. Vulnerable. I need a shelter, a protection, a hand to put my own to, a shoulder to lie on. I need to find my soulmate, the person who will love me for who I really am, not for who I think I am.
Oh yes, some words about beauty. Beauty is something subjective. It isn't something good or bad, positive or negative. It is beyond us, inside and outside of us. Beauty isn't just straight or curly hair, skinny legs or flat belly. Beauty isn't mere make-up or long nails. Beauty is the smile you crave to see in the face of the person you love. It's the way you want to kiss him/her, not because it's the right thing to do, but because it's the o n l y thing you can do to show your love. Beauty is the tears you hide only for your second half. It's the promise that you'll love or won't love again, either because you're astonishingly happy, or because you're unrepairably broken. But, either way, it's you. You're beautiful. Not worthless. Not dumb. Fat? Skinny? Tall? Short?
Ignore them. They're just labels. Nothing more. Nothing less. Labels that describe the size and pattern of the vessel. You are the vessel. Your heart, mind and soul, are the flowers. Who cares about the vessel? It's the flowers that produce the enchanting smell. It's the flowers that grow and flourish and light up the whole room with their beauty. The vessel is nothing but a cold structure.
Young adulthood. (...)

My arm hurts though. And it's late. I'm not finished. Please read it and comment.
Positively or negatively. Through positive comments we boost our strength, through negative ones we learn.
Thank you. :-)