Everybody’s taking ‘stuff’ back that somebody didn’t want. The car parks in the shopping centres are full of folks with bags filled with ‘refunds’. Easy isn’t it to take back things that you decide you have no use for. Swipe the ‘card you paid with it for’ and the money is back in your account.

Funny how you can’t do that with love though.

Give it away and just you try asking for a refund. Want to put back that piece of your heart that you laid wide open to someone else? Forget it. Giving your love does not come with guarantees for you to take it back if the other person doesn’t feel it ‘fits’ them. No refunds, no credit notes – no, nothing. You are turned away at the Love Counter and ‘buyer beware’ - the value of your investment has definitely gone down!

Even if you only have a little fling, a ‘one nighter’ perhaps, a moment where you invest in connection, if only briefly. What about that tiny piece of your self that you gave away? (And you can argue with me, but intimacy of the frivolous kind is still full of hidden emotions that I promise you will surface at some point whether you are a guy or a gal). Sorry same rule applies. No refunds. Give it away, get to keep your memories (some good, some bad), and your learning. And perhaps that’s the key.

Every time you give a little piece of your love; any time you part with a little piece of yourself, and whenever you invest physically or mentally in another, you will learn and learn and learn some more about what you really want, what serves you and what causes you pain from the niggling discomfort, to the gigantic gut wrenchers and the whole gamut in between.

So, if this Christmas you gave you heart and it either got rejected or you realized you had given it, just that bit too easily and now want a refund, know this.

Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to keep your heart open and at the same time protect it by selecting with care whom you open it too. Does this sound like a mission with a mixed message?

Its not really. Simply stay on the side of your values, know your own agenda, don’t blame anyone else for rejecting your love because reciprocal love is not guaranteed and if you have fallen hook line and sinker for someone who is anxious to set sail for open seas, or you have put your iron in a fire that burned you (albeit just round the edges), learn from your behaviour and actions, be more conscious of whom you love, how you love them and what love means to you and then when you give your heart away, maybe, just maybe, no refunds will be even be required.

Love Francine