May 13, 2014

Pace Yourself: A Race to Relationships

After reading some misleading articles and listings on the “Do’s & Don’ts in Relationships” or on “How To: Keep Your Relationship From Failing” from so-called experts who have probably never had a successful relationship due to some of the ridiculous notions they hawk, it has sparked up a few sub-thoughts of why some of these “rationales” are missing the more basic and pivotal picture.

You’re all so concerned to know why most relationships throughout Generation-Y are a total bust? Well, coming from someone who has been screwed over and in turn, screwed up time and time again in all kinds of relationships, it seems I’d be of the least suitable to answer that for you.

Though, after an almost sickening degree of mistakes and screw-ups, you do inevitably learn a thing or two.

So, I’m going to enlighten you anyway.

When you come upon someone who pulls at your heartstrings, there seems to be a rather heightened urgency to just skip the prologue and dive right into a relationship.

Whether the exclusive acquaintance is with your barista, friend with benefits, the cutie at the bookstore who happened to grab the same book as you so it was immediately concluded that he/she is in fact your soul mate, or some mixture of all these, we seem to naively disregard that no matter the degree or discretion of your intimacy, all of these are essentially only a dimension of a relationship.

However, the status quo now-a-days is if you talk to each other on a daily basis, physically see each other more than just on occasion, and don’t completely hate each others guts by the third week, you’re already basically reeling in a full-blown relationship — whether that’s what you had intended or not.

Except we seem to have the dynamics of a relationship all backwards. The rather precarious yet vital time to actually getting to know the person we grow oh-so fond of, oh-so-quickly has essentially become a foreign concept.

Strictly chatting via social accounts and relentlessly exchanging poop/heart emojis to each other hardly counts as a reliable way to deeply familiarize with your special someone.

We romanticize and idealize the abstractions of a relationship, before we’ve even barely scraped the surface of who our desired person really is.

The vast majority of people don’t even bother to get to know basic information about each other anymore, such as: favorite color, family background, food allergies, hobbies, or middle name (if one at all).

In this day and age, credibility primarily lies no further than what meets the eye:

Bra size? C. 
Ass? Mind-boggling. 
Hair color? Brown.. 
Eyes? Green.. wait.. no. Blue.. I think. 

No worries, you got her bra size. She sounds lovely.

This may all sound very elementary, but it is still no less valuable. The foundation of any developing connection lies within the margins of meeting and thoroughly grasping the basic essentials of one another, prior to solidifying any substantive relationship.

Who knows, if you had known your girl was a passive-aggressive-bitch from planet Schizophrenia before you got acquainted with each other’s private parts, you might have saved yourself some trouble. Or, if you had perhaps waited a couple of months to find out that the guy you are seeing is as sensitive as a new-born infant, you may have thought twice before calling him your “man.”

Let the strengths — and more importantly, flaws — really manifest themselves before you even consider being each other’s babes. You may recognize that some of the shortcomings can be easily overlooked, to which you continue on to the amends of love. Or, they’re simply far too much to bear with.

If you do end up realizing the disclosed attributes aren’t in your best interest, you have at least allowed yourself a gateway to be proactive and opt yourself out of the virtual duo without so much but a punch in the gut — as opposed to going out on a whim without any proper knowledge of your supposed lover, and then down the short road of what may sometimes feels like an everlasting heartbreak on one or both ends.

Take things at your own pace, even if it takes a while. If you’re not ready, accept that it is okay and everything shall progress as it need be.

So, just chill. It’s a relationship, not a rat race.


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