"The opposite of fear is love"

That is what was written on the paper of my fortune cookie and as I looked at it all sorts of things went through my mind. What does this mean? Is there truth behind it all?

What stood out the most about this fortune was the fact that perhaps after all these years of being single and broken up with the love of my life, was that there was fear within me to give someone new a chance. It's been 6 years since the love of my life and I broke up...err...should I say that he broke up with me. And in those 6 years, I've tried to find myself again, remake myself, redo my physical exterior...thinking that it would make the pain go away. It helped for a bit...but I don't think it really healed me completely. Don't get me wrong, I've finally let go and I've moved on with my life...but I never let anyone else back into my life the way he was in mine.

Anyone who showed interest in me....I shook it off and I created a wall around myself to prevent people from entering. I wasn't going to let anyone too close to just have them hurt me and leave me in the end. And when I thought I was remotely interested in someone, I didn't persue it because I was so afraid of rejection. Why is it that when I was much younger, I didn't care too much about getting rejected? I'd tell a guy that I was interested and if they didn't feel the same way...oh well was my reaction. But as I get older, I don't want to even take a chance at expressing my interest in that person. My ego doesn't think I could handle the words "I'm not interested in you".

For example, I have this friend and we're cool and he's great to hang out with. We would hang out all the time. And I remember telling a friend about him...and all I got from her was "Oh, I don't know if he'd be interested in you" or something like that. It wasn't even the guy telling me that he wasn't interested...but another friend of mine...and that hurt me. Imagine if the guy was telling that to me to my face. So, all I can do is admire from afar...and feel my heart break whenever I'm around him knowing that we could never be together.

But what if like the fortune cookie says that the opposite of fear is love? Behind all my silly fears could love be waiting for me? And what if I just took that chance and put away my fears....would I find him standing there...loving me? Or would I find myself all alone?