Choosing Connection
There's a particular kind of heartbreak that comes with loving people through our differences - not the small ones, like do you drink coffee or tea, do you push up the sun or stare at the moon, but the deep, values-level differences that make you wonder if you're even living in the same world anymore.
I've been thinking about this word "soft" lately. How it gets weaponized sometimes, used to dismiss or diminish. But what if softness is actually one of the most courageous things we can choose? What if it's the bravest response to a world that seems determined to harden us?
Years ago, I thought being right or “in the know” was a really important thing. I thought if I could just present the facts clearly enough, love fiercely enough, I could bridge any gap. The fire in my belly felt righteous, justified, necessary.
But fire burns. And after a while, all that burning left me exhausted and further from the people I wanted to love up close. I unfollowed, I told others I needed time from them after elections. And I kept coming back to this "Do not abandon" - this quiet voice that keeps calling me back to love even when love feels impossible. A voice that said do not leave friendships or bigger or other humans because it is hard, sticky and uncomfortable.
Softness, I'm learning, isn't about becoming passive or abandoning your values. It's about choosing connection over conquest. It's about remembering that the person across from you - even when they're saying things that make your heart race with frustration - is still human. Still carrying their own stories, their own fears, their own reasons for seeing the world as they do.
This doesn't mean we don't have boundaries. It doesn't mean we accept harm or stay silent when speaking up matters. But it means we can disagree without demonizing. We can hold our ground while still holding space for complexity.
Some days, choosing softness feels like the most unnatural thing in the world. Our culture rewards the quick comeback, the devastating argument, the moral high ground claimed with righteous anger. But I'm starting to believe that softness might be our secret weapon - not for winning arguments, but for winning back connection.
What if, instead of asking "How can I make them see?" we asked "How can I see them more clearly?" What if, instead of armor, we chose curiosity?
I don't have this figured out. There are still conversations that leave me frustrated, still moments when I choose being right over being kind.
Maybe that's what love looks like in hard times. Not the easy love of agreement, but the choice to keep showing up, keep breathing, keep believing that somewhere beneath all our differences, we're still connected by something deeper than our opinions. And if have relationships that are so very different right now, while it is common for us to think we are correct - they are thinking the same thing.
No one can hug heart to heart without inquiring about what's on the inside of these hearts. I'm still learning this myself, still choosing softness one conversation at a time.
Thank you for being here, for caring about the hard things, for refusing to abandon love.
And is there any place you are being called to choose curiosity over armor right now?
