Chasing love where it can't be found

I'm single. Very single. Very, very single. Painfully single.

That sounds a little desperate...maybe I should clarify. I'm single because, well, I choose to be.

Kinda.

I quit dating, completely, several months ago. This was directly after about 5 months of intense, non-stop, obsessive dating. (NOTE: by dating I mean actual dating. Going out on real dates. Pre-planned meetings. Not slamming shots at bars and going home with random skeezy fellas. That's a whole other discussion folks.) I was meeting guy after guy. Having coffee, drinks, taking walks, chit-chatting over pasta, laughing, simply enjoying the company of someone new. I was having a blast! But it quickly came to a point where I was getting a little overwhelmed. I felt like I was losing myself in the process of gaining attention from these men. Almost like I was leaving bits and pieces of me all over the place. Giving all of me away, laugh by laugh, kiss by kiss, to people who didn't genuinely treasure a piece of Ali Schmidt (no, not that piece...geesh). Until I stopped having any sort of significance. Until I had nothing left of me to give. I started hating it. I started hating me because of it. I needed to re-evaluate. I needed to gather up all those lost pieces of me and try to put them back in some sensible order. That's when I began to see that I never had all the pieces and the ones I did have hadn't been in any sensible order to begin with! And so the revelation came pouring into my heart. Although that stint of dating didn't provide me with relational success, it did provide me with the realization that I sucked at love. Bad. My heart needed some fixin', and with the quickness.

So, I decided to have a chat with the Lord. With His guidance I began to dig deep inside of myself. I started pulling up junk that I purposely buried and junk that I didn't even know existed. It certainly hasn't been an easy process. I've had breakdowns, meltdowns and total freak outs...yea, yea, I've always had those...but this time they had a point.

So now here I am, with a bucketful of fresh insight into my own heart. A brand new outlook on life and love. Ready to jump in with both feet and eyes wide open! Yet I remain unattached. And for the most part, I've made my peace with that. There are times when I get pouty and weepy...but I remind myself that my time is coming. After all, I'd much rather be single then in ANY of my past crappy relationships. Indeed.

SIDE NOTE:
Kiss Quick by Matt Nathanson does a phenomenal job at summing up this portion of my life. I swear he writes songs specifically for me.