It was back in 2016 that I gave up on the idea of love. The books and movies I read convinced me “pyaar ek baar hi hota hai” and that the violins singing in the background was confirmation of this being IT. My poor young love did not last and broken-hearted, I turned to my parents and promised to marry whoever they thought was fit for me. Now, my parents are wonderful, and I love them, and they love me but this decision taken in a moment of weakness was not wise.
I come from a middle class, Rajasthani family that had started asking me to get married the very day I turned 23! My heartbreak, though, embarrassed me and made me question everything I knew about myself and the world. With a broken heart, I retired from dating and gave up control of my love life to my parents. What my parents thought of life and my ambitions for it were completely different, so rather understandably, the men they tried to introduce me to were just… not looking for the same things as me.
Long story short, I did find love. We connected on the internet through a series of serendipities and bonded over our shared love of immersive conversations and impromptu adventures. What makes us work is that he is always pushing me to be my best self, be it my fitness goals or my career aspirations, something I was always too scared to expect out of that scary word “love”.
I guess to us love is a leap of faith. For me, it was ignoring a cousin who asked me to suck it up, and “stop believing in such fairytales”. It was walking into a hotel lobby to look at a smile I’d see thousands of times on the screen of a phone for the first time in reality. Today it is the love we share, 3 years strong, the biggest adventure of our lives. Our love is in the cities we have hopped to see everything beautiful that India has to offer.
If I could go back in time I’d tell that 23 years old not to give up, that love as quirky and funny and filled with acceptance as I’d always dreamed is a few years away. For everybody else who’s beginning to drown out the voice of what she wants in love, I point you to OkCupid’s stories in their latest campaign ‘Love Is’. The message is simple, don’t give up because what you are seeking is out there, your kind of love is out there. And today, I believe in it wholeheartedly.
This is a sponsored story for Ok Cupid.
Featured Image: Unsplash
