I've been "too much" as long as I can remember. Even back when I was in kindergarden, I remember every time an adult would admonish me for being "too loud" or "too wild" or "too emotional." It seemed this "too" label would follow me even into my adult life where being "too" anything was deemed uncool or crazy. Girls who felt too much and loved too hard were the crazy ones. Anyone who voiced their opinion just a little too loudly or dared to share feelings in the name of being honest ran the risk of being "one of those girls." Girls who were taught that their "muchness" made them unlovable as boy after boy who they themselves were too young to understand showed them the door.

I came to each new relationship wearing my "muchness" on my sleeve. I warned every boy who loved me after the first that I was broken. My heart was ripped from my chest during a time where I was my lowest. I was broken down to the raw material of the person I wanted to some day be. Shattered pieces I sat painstakingly gluing back together on the floor of a college apartment as friends and family cut themselves on the glass of my broken soul, helping me to make sense out of what once was whole. I promised myself then and there I would stop fearing my muchness. After all, I lived and loved beautifully, recklessly, with every fiber of my being singing the praises of the person I loved. How could that be so wrong?

It turned out being left was the best thing that could ever happen to me. As I rebuilt, I learned to own this person I was destined to be. I achieved great goals and remade myself in the image of a person I could be proud of. I worked myself back into a place where I could finally go out into the world wearing my own skin like a badge of honor in the war I'd won for my mental and physical health. I had truly learned what it was like to grow, as painful as that growth period was; I felt like I was finally coming into my first spring; sprouting the new leaves of a healed soul, flowering for the first time.

And winter came again, as it always does. Resisting the urge to shrivel up and die, I came back each season, a perennial force that seemed unable to be shaken. I started to love my muchness. The abundance of happiness and warm and love for all people and creatures that radiated from me like a true light. I know that others loved it too. They basked in the warm sunshine. But like the sun, I tended to let people get too close, where it was possible to scorch or burn. I never meant to, like the sun, I'm sure, never intends to let it's light shine too bright and blind it's revelers.

But recently, when the latest burn victim decided to step swiftly into the shade, I started to question again my shine. How can someone who loves so hard end up burning those she loves? When all I've ever wanted is to give love and be loved in return, why did it seem like I was always destined to be the one left standing in the cold?

The conclusion I've come to is that yes, I am too much. I'm too happy, I'm too strong, I'm too loving, and I'm too broken. But not too much for the person meant to love me. I cannot be too much for that person. The person meant to love me will see my "muchness" as just enough. They will be overwhelmingly happy with all the love I have to give and will glow when I illuminate them with my light. The only people blinded by the light I have to give are the ones who choose the shade instead of reaching for sunglasses. I can't settle for life in the shade. I'd never be happy there. Instead I will wait for the one who doesn't mind a getting a tan. Who craves the fact that I have an endless amount of adoration to give to them; that I'd do anything to make them smile. I will wait for the person who can give me back that same love and attention I shower those I love with. I will wait for someone who isn't afraid to show emotion, to talk about how they feel, or to simply look at me and say, "You are as radiate as the sun." Because I am. And I deserve to hear it. I will always be my sunny self, and know now that settling for clouds can never do.