In my life I have been in love twice. Both times I became so obsessed with the girl that when they eventually broke my heart, it hurt for months, maybe even years afterward. It’s a present sort of pain, the kind that persists without peaks or valleys.

There’s a man out there, a comedian or a profit.  It’s hard to tell the difference these days. This man tells a story during his act. He talks about a girl who broke his heart and hurt him so badly that he could not love again for a long time. Yet, when pressed to think about it, he says that if he were to see her on the street and see her begging for food or shelter, he would stop and he would help her. Because he loves her.  Not loved. Loves. That’s the important message of his story. He never stopped caring for her, even after he felt that she stopped caring for him.

I have noticed that concept is a foreign one in today’s society.  Too many times I have seen two people fall in love, then break-up and never talk to each other again.  One day they are completely in love, the next day they couldn’t care less if the other person got hit by a bus.

I’m not sure how this line of thinking came along, but I would be lying if I said I never became persuaded to a similar line of thinking. After college I left the town that I had lived in for over five-years.  On my way out of town I decided that if I were to keep friends I should make sure they were meaningful ones.  I ended up cutting a lot of people out of my life, in real vindictive ways, too.  Years later, I realized that the only thing that I gained from doing that was loneliness. Seems simple enough when you think about it.  Guy cuts people out of his life, guy realizes he lost friends.

Well, honestly, I didn’t think about it at the time.  I was so focused on leaving, starting my new life, getting new loves and new friends, that I didn’t realize what I was giving up until it was gone.  Cue every song on the radio ever.

It took an episode of Doctor Who to offer me an epiphany.  Now, I have had strikingly few epiphanies in this life (I’m still young, so don’t worry, there will most likely be more), but this one is by far the biggest.

The episode in question showed a companion of The Doctor betray his trust and then expect vengeance to be her reward.  Instead of vengeance, he offers her kindness. He says: “You think I care for you so little that betraying me would make a difference?”

This blew my mind.  For the first time I had seen an instance of a character finding someone who had wounded them, who put significant effort into wounding them, and the character responds with not only kindness, but acceptance.  He accepts this companion for who she is, even the part of her that betrayed him.

‘Betrayed’ here is such a huge word.  When the girlfriend I had in college told me she wanted to break-up I felt betrayed.  When the girlfriend I had some years after that told me she wasn’t really feeling the relationship, I felt betrayed.  It’s a huge concept. Betrayal. It’s something you can’t do to just anyone on the street.  It requires the gaining of someone’s trust, then turning that trust against them completely.

The difference was my response to these girls. I say girls here because in my mind they are both a bit immature.  Not in a way that I’m trying to lash out at them through the internet, but in a way that I understand that they have some growing up to do.  I’m fine referring to myself as ‘boy’ in the same connotation.

The way I responded to girl number one was the way I had been trained by popular belief of friends, social media, and basic advice off the internet. Remember, this break-up was tough and I searched long and hard for a balm to my emotional burn.  As a result of my exhaustive searching, I told her that she wouldn’t hear from me again and now I have no idea where she is in life and I feel about as good as one can after cutting someone who once meant a great deal to them out of their life.

Girl number two I treated a little differently. Please understand, these relationships were several years apart, as I’ve said, and I feel as though there were a few life lessons learned in between.  Particularly from a certain Doctor.

When girl number two broke-up with me, I told her I understood and I want her to be happy.  And I didn’t hear anything. For months. Then I sent her an e-mail.  Told her I missed talking to her and I recognize how easy it is to cut important people from your life, told her that I didn’t want to make the mistake of pushing her away from me, despite the horrid feelings that come after someone says you’re not good enough for them to love.  I told her that despite everything, she could find me if she needed me.

And I felt better.  At least, better than I did after the way I handled girl number one. I feel as though I can uphold that comedian-profit man’s lesson.  And maybe I won’t have to wait until she’s lost everything in life to prove to her that I can still be there.  Maybe I can prove to myself that I am allowed to care for people who have hurt me, and the only response to pain isn’t more pain.

I know that some religions preach this about friends or family, but for me starting a family, meeting that right person, and falling madly in love has always been at the top of my list.  So when the pain hit so close to home, so did the lesson. And I realize now that if I care about someone, it shouldn’t matter if they betray me, I can still feel the way I do about them. I can offer them food and shelter and anything else. 

Have you ever heard of the Trickle Down Theory?  In case you haven’t, it’s a theory that came about in Hoover’s day to help deal with the Great Depression.  What it attempted to provide was relief for the poor by giving more money to the rich.  In theory, the rich would then spend more money, and the money would trickle down the economic system of America to the point where more money would be flowing from the pockets of the rich and into the pockets of the poor. It didn’t work.  The rich kept the extra money and the poor got poorer and The Great Depression went on.

Anyway, this idea I’m talking about is like that. Only it seems to work a little bit better.  Because finding a partner, getting married, having a family and what not is so high up in my list of To Do’s, everything under that on the list gets a bit of the lessons benefits.  For example, I learn that betrayal is just a word and I don’t have to take it to heart when a loved one breaks said heart, now I’m not only placing more understanding throughout my romantic relationships, but my relationships with my family, my friendships, work colleagues, people I meet from the bar, people I talk to on the street and so on.

Sure, I may have a damaged heart at the moment, but I’m not letting that get in the way of being the good person that I want to be. I can hurt and still help people heal, and so can you, reader.