The acclaimed aviator and adventurer wrote Letter to a Hostage for his friend Léon Werth while waiting in Portugal for a passage to the United States, having just escaped the terrors of war-torn France. Saint-Exupéry's observations on the aimless existence of his fellow exiles in Lisbon filled with parties, gambling and spies leads him to examine the nature of existence itself.
"Then the miracle happened. Oh! a very discreet miracle. I had no cigarette. As one of my guards was smoking, I asked him, by gesture, showing the vestige of a smile, if he would give me one. The man first stretched himself, slowly passed his hand across his brow, raised his eyes, no longer to my tie but to my face, and, to my great astonishment, he also attempted a smile. It was like the dawning of the day.
This miracle did not conclude the tragedy, it removed it altogether, as light does shadow. There had been no tragedy. This miracle altered nothing visible. The feeble oil lamp, the table scattered with papers, the men propped against the wall, the colors, the smell, everything remained unchanged. Yet everything was transformed in its very substance. That smile saved me. It was a sign just as final, as obvious in its future consequences, as unchangeable as the rising of the sun. It marked the beginning of a new era. Nothing had changed, everything was changed. The table scattered with papers became alive. The oil lamp became alive. The walls were alive.The boredom dripping from every lifeless thing in that cellar grew lighter as if by magic. It seemed that an invisible stream of blood had started flowing again, connecting all things in the same body, and restoring to them their significance. The men had not moved either, but, though a minute earlier they had seemed to be farther away from me than an antediluvian species, now they grew into contemporary life. I had an extraordinary feeling of presence. That is it: of presence. And I was aware of a connection. The boy who had smiled at me, and who, until a few minutes before, had been nothing but a function, a tool, a kind of monstrous insect, appeared now rather awkward, almost shy, of a wonderful shyness — that terrorist! He was no less a brute than any other. But the revelation of the man in him shed such a light upon his vulnerable side! We men assume haughty airs, but within the depth of our hearts, we know hesitation, doubt, grief.
Nothing had yet been said. Yet everything was resolved."
Think back to geometry class: You can't make a straight line unless you can connect two points. When all you've got is a starting place but no destination, you're left with just a dot. How can you plot the trajectory of your life that way? The only direction you're headed in is "Not here!"
Being in love and have a history of being abused?
"Soul mates aren`t the ones who make you happiest, no. 
