Do you still carry the weight of words left unsaid? Picking at the scabs of conversations that once was?
I know I do.
It’s strange isn’t it? How moments that felt like snowflakes anchor themselves in your mind, replaying itself as if there is something to salvage, something new to discover.
We are forced to move on even if we don’t like it. It’s a harsh reality but its a necessity for growth. There's an ache in my heart knowing that what has passed cannot be changed and that those moments only exist in memories that are both faint and vivid, warping each time you look back, like watercolours and oil or a polaroid in the sun.
“You obsess over your identity in relation to others while your soul rots inside you.”
Regret is a stubborn thing. It doesn’t just linger, it grows. You find yourself dissecting every pause, every stumble, every stutter, and every word that you find stuck in your throat. You’ll wonder if they noticed. If they cared. If they also replayed the scene in their minds with a script you’ll never read, directed in a way you couldn't control.
And as regret roots itself deeper, I find myself thinking of the things that I didn't get to say. Not because they were profound, but because they were true. The apologies I swallowed. The confessions I buried deep. The kindness I withheld out of fear. I wonder if those words had found air, they could’ve filled this space in my heart instead of widening it.
And then there are the words that I wish I could take back. The recklessly sharp and careless things that cut deeper than I intended. They’re the awful ones that visit me when time sits still, when shame curls up beside me like that one bully as a child. How unfair, I make the wound yet I suffer the scars. I replay those moments too, hoping that maybe, just maybe, I’ll find a way to forgive myself.
There are some things that hold onto that we can't just let go. A keepsake that's been worn with time and a memory that I refuse to discard. We cling to these broken pieces because they feel like treasures, and because letting go would be losing our identity and a part of ourselves.
It's an obtuse kind of self punishment, this autopsy of dead conversations. Digging through them as if trying to find out if the why will erase the what. But time doesn’t bargain. It just is. Immutable, and always a small bit out of reach.
The hardest pill to swallow is that everything happens for a reason. The lessons we take forward matters so much more than the moments we leave behind. And yet, we continue to carry this weight. Not because we have to but maybe because we don't know how to put it down. And maybe that's the tragedy of all this. We’re so busy holding onto the words of yesterday that we forget to speak today.
So what happens if we let them go? The regrets and the unsaid. What if we stopped picking at the scabs and let the wounds heal? Would we finally find peace, or would the silence feel more heavier than the words ever did?
I don't know. And I don’t think I ever will. But maybe the point isn't to find any answers. Maybe it's to just keep speaking, to keep trying, to turn the weight of what was left unsaid into the bravery to say something now. We carry these things not as burdens, but as reminders. They guide and teach us where not to step again, and maybe that’s where all of this ends. To move forward, the same way time always has.
This gives me the air of a horrible person pretending to care/feel regretful about what they have done. Awfully written too.