I. The question.

What does it mean if someone chooses you, even though he is heartbroken in doing so?

The first thing that comes to mind is love. Love is the only real thing that’s powerful enough to make people do things they don’t want to do. We’ve seen people do bad things for the people they love. We’ve seen people make sacrifices for the people they love. We have done some things for the people we love. It is the only thing that can make someone choose others over himself.

But it’s not as bittersweet, as romantic, or as heartwarming as you may think. Guilt can also make people do things they don’t want to — the only other emotion that’s almost as powerful as love. Almost.

Guilt is an emotion so strong, so powerful that sometimes it’s easy to compare it with love. It consumes us, taunts us, scares us into doing things we think only love can make us do. It blinds us into thinking and doing things we’d normally do out of love alone. It is another thing that’s powerful enough to make us do things we don’t want to do. Just like faith, having guilt in your system, even if it is as small as a mustard seed, can make us do things beyond our understanding. If having faith as small as a mustard seed can move mountains, guilt as small as a mustard seed can sweep away even the biggest of mountains. The only difference is love is real, whereas guilt is an illusion.

Do not doubt love. Love will always be the stronger between the two because only love can dispel guilt. Guilt, or any other emotion, can never destroy or change love. 

II. Living with the choice.

Whatever reason/s he may have for choosing you, it is something that you have to live with. You will have to wake up everyday thinking that there might be someone out there more deserving of him, more suitable for him, more compatible with him, better and right for him. It is a burden you will carry, you will have to carry for the rest of your life. It will be a never-ending cycle of knowing and living with the thought that he shouldn’t have chosen you.

But only if you let it be.

He made the call. He decided. He knew what he was getting into. You can tell him to go away, to choose the other, to go back, to not choose you, but in the end, it was, is and will always be his decision. Choosing you might have broken his heart for reasons you may never find out, but it doesn’t mean that you have to make things worse for him. Yes, we can never mend a broken heart and make it new again, but we can stitch it back together and make it feel better. The worse thing you can do is to make him feel that he made a bad decision by making it into a burden and carrying it forever. He’s heartbroken. Don’t add fuel to the fire by showing him that you too, are heartbroken because of his decision.

Put the pieces of his heart back together, and appreciate him. Make him feel that he did make the right decision, and that things will definitely be better. He chose you. Make his choice a worthy choice.

III. Would and why.

People do things because of varying reasons, because of varying times. They have different needs, different understandings, and different patterns of thinking, which change over time. I don’t know if I would ever be caught in a situation like this, but I do know that when I do, it will only be because of one of two things: love or guilt.


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