this is how i know that this is a TF experience..

You know that this is a TF because, the pain you feel is like no other yet you can't figure out the polarity of that pain sometimes... because they love you for who you are and ALL you are. And to realize that you want to be yourself is scary..

They say the amount of pain is proportionate with the desire you have for that thing.. well when i feel a 'lack' of something i always know what i really feel, and how i really want the object of that is making me feel a 'lacked of'..

With TF it's nothing but pain... i try to understand how TF makes me feel that i want him so much, but i can't....

And i realized something... it's because i want to be me, but i'm yet to understand how to be me, cause this is my life, and i gotta live it while finding who i am...however there's this person that just 'knew' who i am, and how he find me adorable, and amazing on spots that i didn't even know exist... and that's terrifying cause i can't replace that feeling with my own, since i don't even know that those spots exist...

so on and on...TF journey really something else...

I'm going to apologize because I'm certain I've misunderstood you, but...

Are you saying that you are defining this connection by the intensity of the pain, or that you are defining this connection on the basis of the connection (or that person) having given you access to yourself you wouldn't otherwise have?

What's scary to me personally is that I've never felt that anyone understood me better than myself. This leads to some trust issues and I have trouble letting people in, but on the other hand I always know where I stand. Along the way there have been people who have helped me define who I am better than I could have done on my own, but it was all still my own doing.

I think TF connections show us ourselves for the very first time in a lot of cases, because so many of us go through life simply reacting to everything rather than understanding and controlling our own motives. So when we meet them and see us, and our own power, we end up clinging to this person to have more of what we should have had in ourselves already. That makes sense to me. It also explains the runner/chaser dynamic pretty aptly. It seems that maybe the chaser is someone who desperately needs to have their sense of self validated by the other, and the runner is someone who can't bear to see themselves as they are. That's tough.

I think the greatest gift here is introspection. Whenever I feel bummed and alone and isolated, I remember that statement:

"Wherever you go, there you are."