I have been apologizing for being hard to love for so long, I stop realizing I was doing it. “I’m sorry I’m so needy.” “I’m sorry for being annoying.” “You can say no, if it’s too much, I understand.” I’ve said these things, to my family, to my friends, even to my boyfriend. Any every time, they are met with the same response, usually a laugh and a reassuring smile and statement reprimanding me for feeling the need to apologize for my own presence, my proclamations of affection, or my willingness to want more time with the people I care for. I don’t know when I started making these apologies so often, but it’s taken until recently for me to realize how ridiculous it is that I am making them at all.

I am not hard to love.

But I have been conditioned to believe I am. For years, I have taken to heart hateful statements and descriptors aimed at parts of my personality, my enthusiasm, my zest for life. I have believed the negative comments made by people who have claimed to love me, those comments meant to be lighthearted but have fallen flat. “You’re annoying.” “No one can be that happy all of the time.” “Calm down.” These statements meant to dilute me, to dial down my bright personality, and to fit me more neatly into whatever role I was meant to play in life never seemed to work, even if I tried my best to appease my critics. I became convinced that my overzealous nature was synonymous with seeming crazy. “Boys don’t like it if you’re too eager.” “He’s going to think you’re crazy/needy/desperate.” These tips, sometimes pitched by even the most well-meaning of friends, further emphasized this thought. I was too much. Too much in every aspect and I would likely scare away any person interested in getting closer to me. To earn to affection I so desired from others, I had to become a dimmed down version of the person I am, so not to blind them with the light I felt bursting from every part of me. I find it funny that we don’t expect the sun to shine less brightly, and we are so rarely pleased by clouds blocking out the light from the stars. I don’t understand then, why we are often intimidated by the intensity of other people, then again not everyone takes the time to appreciate the sky.

You are not hard to love.

The right person. The right friends. The people who are drawn to you and appreciate you, and accept you for all that you are and all that you’re not will not think that you are hard to love. You will not need to apologize to them for being who you are. You may occasionally be hard to like and so will they. But you will never be hard to love. You are not hard to love. Say it. Believe it. And you do not need to put up with any person in your life who makes you believe that you are. To the right person, loving you will be as easy as breathing. It will come naturally without any effort require. I am not hard to love and neither are you. And it’s about time we stopped apologizing for it.