Tagged as: Life, Relationships, Seen-Around
Jan
27
Search for anything of substance, and you will find that it is quite easy to start believing that there is only one option that will satisfy. And even though it is near impossible to tell whether you have exhausted all possibilities in the world, you know that you will immediately recognize that Perfect One.
The Perfect One is the ideal that you have in your mind of whatever it is that you are looking for. It is going to be recognized and apparent. You are sure of this. Far be it from me to doubt that you could possibly know this for sure.
For example when you are dating, you are looking for the Perfect Boyfriend/Girlfriend. If you are a little better at seeing the bigger picture, you are looking for the Perfect Husband/Wife. But through the good and bad dates, you are evaluating the other person by holding them up against your ideal. Once the other person does not match, you are going to move on. Don’t pay attention to the fact that the person would make a very good match for you despite being slightly too short. Much more tragically than missing a good match in search of a perfect match, though, is being married to someone who you eventually believe to not be the perfect match. When that happens, you might find that you have found the Perfect One in another person. At the very least in this situation you are going to imagine the possibilities of a different life, and at the worst it can lead you to pursue your fantasies. This will obviously hurt many people around in addition to making you a liar (since you could not keep your vows).
Another instance when people look for the Perfect One is when they are house hunting. When you are searching for a house, people often advise you that you will “just know” once you walk into a house. That is rubbish. It is just another way of saying that you should be looking for the Perfect House. Forget the fact that you are looking at houses that would work out just fine. And forget the fact that any house will have its problems. Forget the fact that it’s just a building that will not last!
The horrible thing about this mindset is not that you should have standards. When someone fails to meet your standards for a mate or if a house is completely broken, you should move on. That just makes sense. However, the horrible thing about this mindset is that it will fool you into doing things that do not make any sense at all. You will fall in love with the Perfect One with your heart but not with your head. And then when (not if) reality comes in the form of imperfections, you will be horribly disappointed. And it will hurt.
Can this be fixed? Yes it can! Today you can realize that there is no perfect one, whatever it is that you are looking for. Realize that settling can be just a negative take on this and realize that settling is not always so bad. Settle on something that is acceptable (this seems obvious but don’t settle on something that is unacceptable). If you do not settle, then at least start to believe that the Perfect One will never be found. Move forward with the knowledge that you will NOT find the Perfect One. And if the results match up to your expectations, you are much less likely to get into trouble.
Tagged as: Life, Relationships, Seen-Around
Dec
22
Growing up, I heard the children’s rhyme:
Sticks and stones will break my bones, but words will never hurt me
It was assumed that this saying would protect us from other people’s mean words. And when you’re a young child, it is easy to trick yourself into believing it.
But then you get older and you realize the truth. Words are, in fact, more powerful than physical pain. Physical pain definitely has its place. Broken bones, strained joints, diseases, and so on are all painful and uncomfortable (to say the least) to go through. But all of that pales in comparison to the effect that words and emotional trauma can have.
While it’s rather debatable what can hurt a person more, it is pretty easy to see how emotional trauma can scar people for life. The life of a child who has verbally abusive parents can be negatively impacted for good even with counseling. While I do not want to undermine the damage that physical pain can have, the emotional pain is the one that I have seen with my own eyes because it happens all of the time. One can toil for great lengths of time over something, and sometimes it seems like it takes only a single word to make all of that labor futile. Words get at us even through our armor and shields. They needle their way through kinks and prick us to death. And the worst part of all is that it is the words of those closest to us that hurt the most. Well maybe even worse than that is the fact that we are all so horrible in regards to how we use our words.
The tongue: so mighty and so horrible. No one can tame it, but we must try, eh?
Tagged as: Rant, Relationships
Jun
11
They’re pretty much married already. What’s the difference?
-former co-worker about an unmarried couple living together
What is the difference, really? That is, I have an idea of what the difference is. To me there is a difference between marriage and just living together. In fact there is a difference between marriage and any other state that one can be in (e.g., single, friends, partners)!
But to the rest of the world, it seems like marriage is only an extra special promise to be faithful. And legal rights and benefits. Really, that’s all it is to a large part of the world? “I do. I definitely promise not to be unfaithful to you. You have my word.”
It seems like people wouldn’t try so hard to fight for it if that’s what it is to them.
Tagged as: Life, Relationships, Seen-Around
Jul
23
An easy way to differentiate between people that are young and old are how they deal with relationships. Even more important than their years (after all age is just a number) is the maturity with which they handle things.
So what do people do? They play games. What are games? They are things like:
When we play these games, it’s all smoke and mirrors. And if the goal of relationships is marriage, then how is that helpful in accomplishing that goal? It’s not.
Guys need to ask the girl out, straight up. (I had my fun being sarcastic about it On Asking A Girl Out by saying what you should not be doing.) But you need to make it crystal clear to her what you want and what you’re doing. Otherwise you’re just beating around the bush and wasting everyone’s time.
Girls need to act purposefully. You want him? Go with it if he asks you out. You don’t? Tell him the truth, brutal as it might be. Don’t sugarcoat things because that helps nobody.
These things don’t just apply to the chase, do they? I’m not even really sure why they would apply more specifically to guy/girl relationships. All I know is that I see it there more often. However, these thoughts and their ramifications could be generalized to cover any type of relationship with anyone.
Tagged as: Life, Relationships, Seen-Around
Jul
10
Discrimination isn’t great. That much is obvious to most people.
Isn’t it strange, then, that it seems like most people will indeed discriminate against others if they are in the majority? That is, people that might be discriminated against for whatever reason in one location will discriminate others when they’re somewhere else.
What is within man that we do such things? Is it egocentricity? Original sin?
