Happiness is a Journey

In the course of this life, I have struggled with getting to know my essential self. It’s a part of the struggle of being a sentient being with a moral compass, to struggle to find your way all while dealing with feelings of desire, greed, jealousy, love, anger, egotism…the list goes endlessly onward. I didn’t understand the importance of getting to know myself until after my marriage failed. I suppose you could say it was the spark that ignited my pursuit of finding my core. I was tired of feeling angry and having my feelings be whipped around at the whim of someone else’s. I am a 21st century female, capable of voting, acquiring gainful employment and still rockin’ it out in the kictchen (my choice!), so why was I still letting my partner influence so much of who I was and how I felt? I’ll share what I’ve discovered in the next few paragraphs, with the hope that it will provide you with some clarity, or maybe kick-start your own journey into being happy to settle in with your own thoughts and find the love you’ve been looking for waiting patiently for you to take notice.

Exactly what is Love? I’ve come to discover that love is the sincere wish for others to be happy, and to be free from suffering. Love is realistically recognizing others' kindness as well as their faults. Love is being aware of another person’s feelings but not being swept away by them. There are no ulterior motives to full-fill our own wants or desires, there is no pull to make someone just a little “better”, we love simply because that person exists, exactly as they are. Attachment is a close cousin of love and often exaggerates others' good qualities and makes us crave to be with them. When we're with them, we're happy, but when we're separated from them we find ourselves un-happy and tempermental. Attachment is linked with expectations of what others should be or do. Is love, as we have come to understand it in our culture, really love or a form of attachment…or in some cases a form of addiction to sexual gratification and the good feelings associated with being in an intimate, physical relationship?

Generally we are attracted to people either because they have qualities we value or because they make us feel good/wanted. If we observe our own thought processes mindfully, and carefully - we'll notice that we look for specific qualities in others.

Some of these qualities we find attractive, others are values that we have inherited from the society we live in or from our familial circles. Someone who has grown up in a family with little financial stability will often have the emphasis placed on finding a partner who has the ability to provide that stability. American society has created this attraction to others who are tall, lithe, bronzed Gods and Godesses’…

We examine someone's looks, body, education, spiritualism, hygiene, employment, and social status. This is how most of us decide on whether or not the person holds any true value to us. Subconsciously, we think “Will this person make me better.” In addition, we judge people as worthwhile according to how they relate to us. If they help us, praise us, make us feel secure, listen to what we have to say, care for us when we are sick or depressed, we consider them good people, and it is this type of people we are most likely to be more attracted to. But this is very biased, for we judge them only in terms of how they relate to "us", placing ourselves at the center of all existence, as if we are truly the most important person in the world. How does this person treat the people around you? How do they treat strangers? How do they act in traffic? Around children? We overlook that people are capable of being one way in the presence of one group and another elsewhere.

After we've judged certain people to be good for us, whenever we see them it appears to us as if goodness is coming from them. We expect to have that feeling of “goodness” radiate into us because we are with them, but if we are more aware, we recognize that we have projected this goodness onto them. How many times have you fallen in love with the expectation you have for a person rather than the person themselves?

The desire to be with people who make us feel good causes us to become dependent on getting that feeling from them. Your feelings cease to be your own and your emotions and reactions to life are linked directly to the source of your good feelings. Furthermore, we form fixed concepts of what our relationships with those people will be and thus have expectations of them. When they do not live up to our expectations of them, we're very disappointed, or may become angry! How dare they challenge the idea we have created for them!? Don’t they don’t they are responsible for not one person, but two? We want them to change so that they will they will match what we think they are. But our projections and expectations come from our own minds, not from our partner.

Our problems arise not because others aren't who we thought they were, but because we mistakenly thought they were something they aren't. What we call love is most often attachment.

We then cling to tightly to that person, thinking our happiness depends on that person.

Love, on the other hand, is an open and very calm, relaxed attitude. We want someone to be happy, and free from suffering simply because they exist. While attachment is uncontrolled and much too sentimental, Love is direct and powerful. Attachment obscures our judgment and we become impatient, angry, and impartial, helping only our dear ones and harming those who we don't like. Love builds up others, and clarifies our minds, and we access a situation by thinking of the greatest good for everyone. Attachment is based on selfishness, while Love is founded upon cherishing others, even those who do not look very appealing to the eyes. Love looks beyond all the superficial appearances, and dwells on the fact that they are just like us: they want inner peace, happiness, and want to avoid suffering. If we see unattractive, dirty, ignorant people, we feel repulsed because our selfish minds want to know attractive, intellectual, clean, and talented people. Love, on the other hand, never evaluates others by these superficial standards and looks much deeper into the person. Love recognizes that regardless of the others' appearances, their experience is the same as ours: they seek inner peace, to be happy, to be free from sufferings, and to do their best to avoid problems.

When we're attached, we're not mentally and emotionally free. We overly depend on and cling to another person to fulfill our mental and especially our emotional needs. We fear losing the person, feeling we'd be incomplete without him.

This does not mean that we should suppress our emotional needs or become aloof, alone and totally independent, because that too does not solve the problem. We must simply realize our unrealistic needs, and slowly seek to eliminate them. Some emotional needs may be so strong that they can't be dissolved immediately. If we try to suppress them or pretend they do not exist, we become anxious, insecure, falling into a depression. In this case, we can do our best to fulfill our needs while simultaneously working gradually to subdue them.

The core problem is we seek to be loved, rather than to love. We yearn to be understood by others rather than to understand them. If a person can learn to subdue their own attachments, we can most definitely have successful friendships and personal relationships with others. These relationships will be richer because of the freedom and respect - the relationships will be based on. We'll care about the happiness and the misery of all human beings equally, simply because everyone is the same in wanting and needing inner peace, happiness, and not wanting to suffer. However, our lifestyles and interests may be more compatible with those of some people more so than with others and that is alright. In any case, our relationships will be based on mutual Love, mutual interests, and the wish to help each other in life.

Being Human

Sometimes the most difficult thing in the world, is to just be present in what it is that you're doing. Multi-tasking has become not only a social norm but an expectation. If you aren't checking your email, while you're paying your phone bill all during your trip to the grocery, then you're a slacker.

I call bullshit.

It's makes us sloppy and disconnected. We miss things that matter for things that we'll forget next week. Our memories are being clotted with alpha numeric passwords and deadlines and we're overlooking the changing of the seasons, the laughter filled nights with friends, the plethora of experiences that helped create our "offline profile."

Earlier today, I was at the grocery store during my lunch to pick up some tea (it's kind of a crisis when I run out of decaf tea during a busy morning working from home). While in the line at the store, a young mother (I'll call her Cyber Momma for the sake of this blog) and her absolutely adorable kiddo starting checking out in front of me. Seriously, this kid was Shirley Temple cute and was putting on a full scale production from that buggy. We're talking singing, dancing and jazz hands emphasized with the leafy green lettuce she was holding. It was a hoot and something that I'm pretty sure would have been committed to Cyber Momma's memory had she not been staring at her phone the entire time she was scanning items. I watched the enthusiasm fade from that little girl and she sat down and asked for her IPad, which her mother pulled out of her gargantuan bag and stuffed in her tiny, previously marvelous, hands. In that moment I wondered how many other memories she had sacrificed in order to be "connected." I thought of how fast life would turn that adorable little kid, filled with vitality and enthusiasm, into another user staring at a screen.

Yes, I had a philosophical moment in a Kroger checkout.

When you're present, "moments" can happen anywhere and with anyone. I looked around and I would dare say about 70% of the people in my line of vision were on their cell phones in some capacity. I've been in that number many times, sacrificing making eye contact with someone who might reject me and instead checking a Facebook status update. To be human is to be exposed and raw and the influx of technology at our disposal is making that feeling optional. We face a conundrum because as human beings, we crave social interaction. We need to be around others, even if only sporadically but we're terrified of it. We've been taught to tear one another apart for appearance, financial and political status, and even geographical location (Oh, the teasing about Kentucky Fried Chicken and being barefoot, will it never end!?) So, we plug in, upload a perfect version of ourselves, and connect on the most superficial of levels.

Technology is a necessity in the professional world, I'll give you that. However, who says we have to make it a focus in our personal life? If you're reading this thinking "This is isn't about me" then I have a challenge for you. Turn off your phone from 6p.m. until it's time to get up in the morning for one week. Your computer is not to be used either (unless you're only streaming music, that is forgivable.) No excuses about how someone could call you in the event of an emergency. You not being available for a night, when you should be connecting with your friends and family, creating something, going for a walk, looking up at the sky, maintaining your home, will be okay. Now, pay attention to the urge to pick it up. Process why it is that you feel a sense of loss for not having it in your hand. Why does it make your anxious? Why do you care if that little device is on or off? You have formed an attachment to a machine, my dears. You have developed a relationship with an inanimate object.

Ultimately, remember that you have warm and beating heart that longs to be used. It can withstand being put at risk when you seek out relationships with others. Stop making easy choices. Unplug and be human.

Dog Is My Co-Pilot

I remember a time when the sentiment "My life is going to the dogs" was something bad. It meant that there was no control, that chaos was following your every venture, that, essentially, your life sucked and there wasn't a thing you could do about it. As a dog owner, I wish my life was going to the dogs. My dogs are spoiled, happy, well-fed prima-donnas who live in a perpetual state of contentment and who live for jerky and belly rubs. Buddy, the youngest in my pack, is curled up at my feet, dreaming doggy dreams of birds chased in golden fields of light and joy. However, I'm currently procrastinating on doing paperwork for my job, that is more and more feeling like a responsibility I don't care to shoulder any longer. Dogs don't care about making the world a better place (and still manage to do so daily for those whose life they touch), they don't stress over deadlines, about gaining weight, about making a car payment or replicating their grandmothers recipe for apple pie. Dogs just live. I don't know if it's just that I'm gradually losing my faith in humanity, or if I spend entirely too much time hanging out with my buds of the canine persuasion, but I find myself trying to emulate their way of life. NO....I am not sniffing butts or chewing on the cloven hooves of other animals (at least not today)but I am trying to let go of the expectations I place on myself and the life I live. I work hard, but I don't beat myself up too much if I take a break to nap in the sun or find something yummy to snack on. I show affection freely and feel good about the affection I get in return from the people I care about. I avoid others who bring me down with their yipping and snapping...usually cat people. Living like a dog is pretty great. I'm not sure when we humans decided we were the superior species, but I think it might be time to take another look. We bind ourselves to jobs we tolerate and sometimes hate to buy things we don't need for reasons we can't explain. We would rather communicate with each other via internet than meet and make physical contact in the form of hugs (and belly rubs!) We are self-conscious of appearing too enthusiastic when we do something we love (like hearing our favorite song and dancing even when no one else is.) Dogs don't think like that. So, in my life's journey I'm happy to have Dog as my co-pilot. Even if it does mean frequent stops at the park for bathroom breaks and Frisbee. Actually, especially if means that. Someone (or something) needs to remind my feet that the dirt is soft, that the wind can carry a world of smells and that water tastes sweeter after a long day of playing and smiling.

Sentimental Fools

Friendship IXX by Khalil Gibran


And a youth said, "Speak to us of Friendship."

Your friend is your needs answered.

He is your field which you sow with love and reap with thanksgiving.

And he is your board and your fireside.

For you come to him with your hunger, and you seek him for peace.

When your friend speaks his mind you fear not the "nay" in your own mind, nor do you withhold the "ay."

And when he is silent your heart ceases not to listen to his heart;

For without words, in friendship, all thoughts, all desires, all expectations are born and shared, with joy that is unacclaimed.

When you part from your friend, you grieve not;

For that which you love most in him may be clearer in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the plain.

And let there be no purpose in friendship save the deepening of the spirit.

For love that seeks aught but the disclosure of its own mystery is not love but a net cast forth: and only the unprofitable is caught.

And let your best be for your friend.

If he must know the ebb of your tide, let him know its flood also.

For what is your friend that you should seek him with hours to kill?

Seek him always with hours to live.

For it is his to fill your need, but not your emptiness.

And in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures.

For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed.

I found this beautiful and wanted to share it. I am thankful for the many friendships, strong and true, that I have earned in my lifetime.

The Raptors?

SO
Here I am on yet another "eve of destruction" (remember Y2K anyone?) with one more on the way according to John Cusack, and I can't help but chortle about the willingness of so many cults (and this is most assuredly a cult) to die (or be raptured whatever the heck that implies). I suppose I would be too if my religion bound me so tightly that I really wasn't living at all. Sacrifice is at the root of all religion and I can get on board with that. I've never received anything in this life that I haven't worked for, so of course I would carry that same mentality into working towards my afterlife. You can't make something from nothing (unless you are a Creationist, in which case we were all finger snapped into existence!) and in most instances in order to excel in one area, you have to give, or sacrifice another. We are finite in our ability to focus. Well. Except for Stephen Hawking, and really, what else is he going to do besides focus? (BAZINGA!)
What I take issue with is all the finger pointing and condemnation that always surfaces with every end of the world scenario. With todays rapture, brought to you by the "prophet", Harold Camping, he states that anyone can go to heaven regardless of religion only to go back and say "as long as you believe in the ENTIRE Bible and the teachings of Jesus Christ." Basically negating his previous statement and replacing it with if you aren't Christian, your ass is going to hell. Period. This loving God that I've heard so much about in the last 29 years, is going to have an exclusive VIP party and give the middle finger to the majority of the planet? I'm sorry, but that's a jerk move and the God that I believe in, the one that has it's (because this being transcends gender!) hand in every religion, whose primary purpose is to inspire love and hope is shaking it's head.
I have an excerpt from a favorite book of mine that I just had to share that I think blends nicely with where I'm going with this blog post.

"Religious rituals often develop out mystical experimentation. Some brave scout goes looking for a new path to the divine, has a transcendent experience and returns home a prophet. He or she brings back to the community tales of heaven and maps of how to get there. Then others repeat the words, the works, the prayers, or the acts of this prophet, in order to cross over, too. Sometimes this is successful--sometimes the same familiar combination of syllables and devotional practices repeated generation after generation might carry many people to the other side. Sometimes it doesn't work, though. Inevitably even the most original new ideas will eventually harden into dogma or stop working for everybody...Be very careful not to get too obessessed with the repetition of religious ritual just for it's own sake. ESPECIALLY in this divided world, where the Taliban and the Christain Coalition continue to fight out their international trademark war over who owns the rights to the word God, it may be useful to remember that it is not the tying of the cat to the pole that has ever brought anyone into transcendence, but only the constant desire of an individual seek to experience the eternal compassion of the divine. Flexibility is just as essential for divinity as it is for discipline.

Basically, it's about the search for God and the desire to be more like this being that should motivate us, not the honor of saying "I told you so" to any other religious sect. God doesn't want us to hate one another, or exclude each other from partaking of divine love. The end game for this being is love. It's not about how many feet you wash on Sunday, or how many wafers you eat, or how many snakes you handle, or how many visions you receive, it's about the the quest to be more like God. It's about kindness and love.

I think, on this the eve of my third imminent judgement, I will just continue to be myself who strives to be kind everyday, who loves with an open heart and mind that meditates and feels closer to God than I have at any other point in my life who has no agenda to try and spread any idea except one of love and tolerance.

" The Yogic scriptures say that God responds to the sacred prayers and efforts of human beings in anyway whatsoever that mortals choose to worship-just so long as those prayers are sincere. As one line from the Upanishads suggests " People follow different paths, straight or crooked, according to their temperament, depending on which they consider best, or most appropriate-and all reach You (God), just as rivers enter the ocean.

Another Sunday Night

Where is my mind? Another late night (or at least it seems late on my new up with the chickens asses at dinner time sleep schedule) and sleep is elusive.
Empathy and I have a love hate relationship.
On the dark days, I feel too much, I feel it all the pain, the disappointment, the confusion of my dear ones. With my heart, large and strong, I take it because I love them all, more than I love my own peace of mind. I am the martyr once more. Take me, cold and dark night, and spare those that have taken up residency in the warm folds of my heart. I go willingly, and with a mind clear and ready to accept the worst that they have to offer.
These lips will never betray the heartsick thoughts you have whispered sacredly into my ears.
I meditate, deep and true, to heal the wounds I have willingly allowed to be inflicted on my own psyche. I am the shaman of my heart, and I will heal it with all of the love and kindness being offered up by others who slip into the stream of semi consciousness that is the meditative mind. I am surrounded by light and feel love pour into me, rebuilding me so that I might once again pass what I find onto you.

Not all days are dark...there are days that all of those that I cherish shine and lift me up. Today, however, was not that day. The sky and the hearts who live under it were a mirror. I held out a light for those who wandered, and watched it flicker but never sputter, beckoning for them to come forward and share their burdens.
I will man the coals of loves light, keeping them warm and bright so that they might offer up their protection for any that may wander close. Come close, aching heart, for my flames were meant to warm you, mind, body, and soul. I am familiar with your path. Give me purpose. Touch my heart, the war torn mess that it is and marvel at its tenacity. It beats still, steady and strong in spite of scars from wounds that should have been fatal. Draw from it a hope that the days will not always be dark, that light is waiting to burst through and that someone loved you enough to listen.

Linda Blair, You Had It Right!

There are times that I wish I could possess people.
I'm not talking Linda Blair, exorcist, spitting pea soup and jamming my who-ha with a crucifix kind of possession but something a little more subtle.
I wish I could possess my friends and loved one's when I think they're acting like asses, when they vote republican or they admit to watching shows like The Bachelor.
Better yet, I wish I could possess them when I feel like they are being taken advantage of. I wish I could take over their bodies and senses and defend them against threats like cheating lovers with lips dripping with sweet and enticing promises. I wish I could say for them the things that their hearts and their fears of being alone and damn near thirty prevent them from saying.
If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.

I spent the better part of the day lending a sympathetic ear to the lamentations (said in true Conan the Barbarian fashion) of a friend of mine who I just know could be happy if she could let go of her sinking ship ex-boyfriend that she keeps hoping will somehow change after 34 years of being an ass. She cried. She stomped her feet. She tugged her hair all because she hoped for the best in another human being and was sorely disappointed.
A vivacious, beautiful, opinionated sass-mouth of a woman becomes a ooey, gooey, invertebrate at the sight of a man who has stolen her time, her money, the majority of her 20's, and her ability to trust with her whole heart. The heart is a cruel, twisted mistress.
She seemed equally dumbfounded at her inability to tell him to fuck off and die (one of her favorite expressions during equally stressful situations). It was while I listened to her relive all of the negatives of 5 years with Mr. I Suck, that I had the notion of wishing I could possess her, drive to his house and not only curse him out, but say all of the things she was afraid to say for fear of burning bridges with a schlomo since she was nearing thirty, and by Kentucky standards, an old maid. I wanted to see his face when he realized she wasn't going to keep waiting around and that he couldn't keep using her as the old stand by. I wanted to use her hand to smack him in the face, literally and figuratively, with all of the resentment, anger and hurt that she's been carrying around for the last year.
While she continued venting, I was a bad friend and drifted off in my own thoughts a bit thinking about all of the other friends I would like to help out through Critty possession. My bestie who has lingered around a lying, slick talking jerk-off who won't even give her the satisfaction of being his "girlfriend" after 2 years of his demanding, egotistical, self absorbed buffoonery even though it obviously hurts her to keep herself open without any promise of a future commitment. Another friend who is scared to talk to men period, needs someone to take over who isn't petrified of social interaction. Come on lady, you have boobies, use their power!
Fear.
Fear.
Fear.
I'm scared of clowns, spiders, heights and the thought of someone grabbing my foot from underneath my car at night and had always kind of berated myself for it. Looking at the lives of others, however, I take pride in my ability to communicate effectively with others, including my romantic partner. I don't let fear of someone getting mad at me keep me from saying what is on my mind. I think this comes from my willingness to be myself. I have no facade to maintain, no painted face to keep from cracking, no lie to keep weaving to hold someone close. If you love me, it's really me you love and not some idea that I've invented to draw you in. It isn't until now that I realize how amazing a feat is just to be your unfiltered, unprocessed, chemically un-altered self.

I will keep lending an ear, hoping that my honest opinion remains good enough for those around me. Hell, maybe it'll rub off.




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Now playing: Helen Stellar - Io
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Now playing: Sia - I'm In Here (Piano/Vocal Version)
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Hurricane Soul and Tsunami Thoughts

“Sometimes what we call love is just a settling of old scores, or a seeking of forbidden pain, or a circuitous path to the kingdom of cruelty, or she may simply have confused lack of capital with heroism while searching for rescue without knowing from what.”- Anne Roiphe


It's Saturday and I'm posting! I've been online quite a bit in the last few days thanks to the previously mentioned back injury Whats on ye olde mind tap? Besides wishing I could trade in my current back for one less riddled with pain, just that far too many of my friends are deeply unhappy with the romantic aspects of their lives. Those friends that I have that are single are either celibate completely and refusing to date or dating assholes whose self absorbed antics traumatize everyone involved.
Attraction. It's a necessity when your looking for someone to share your time with. When I was younger, like others my age, I was attracted by things that simply pleased my eyes. It didn't take long for me to realize that although my eyes might be pleased by the physical features my heart was often left empty and without love. This was when I discovered lust. Deciphering the two can be a trick since as humans we're instinctive and more often than most will admit, primal. There were two sides to this relationship thing. Interesting.
When I was seventeen I met the man I am now married to, Dan. He was the first person I had met that not only did I find physcially stimulating, but intellectually and emotionally as well. I was overcome with this feeling of "togetherness", and felt for the first time that the world truly is a small place if in all of it, I could find someone who "fit" (please supress giggles your juveniles!) me so well. Of course life happened and we took separate paths for quite sometime (about 4 years), often merging briefly during his military leave, but keeping our distance until the military part of his life was behind him. I did a whole lotta' lustin' in that time and discovered that it's really not the sort of lifestyle that makes me happy. This was when I discovered that I was, indeed, a relationship person. When The Hubs came to me after our separation I was surprised. It had been over a year since we had talked. I had just ended a really terrible relationship with a Cajun douche bag and was back to my "primal ways". I was living with the besties at the time in a townhouse that doubled as "Party City" during the brief year we lived there. I'm veering off subject again. When nostalgia takes over, my blogging seems to become quite sporadic. I had always thought about Daniel, but didn't see how we could be "us" again after all the curve balls life had thrown at us. He just showed up at my doorstep during one "girls night" and said "I'm out of the military for good now (after serving 8 long years in the U.S. Navy) I think it's time we were us again." Very Jerry McGuire. And we were.

Over the course of the past 28 years I have met a multitude of people: roommates/dorm mates, co-workers, people you party with, people you pray with, people you shop with, people that I hold close still and people that I'm happy are gone from my life. In those years, I have gained a thorough understanding of what it is that I find attractive in other people. Through the process of trial and error, all of us find what characteristics in other people that we find exciting, soothing, annoying, irresistible, intriguing...etc. Based on that knowledge we connect with those people that believe will add value to our time.
This is where I get frustrated. This is where I shout to the heavens and say "whyyyyyyyyyy is this STILL a problem!?"

Why is it, that people MY age, are so utterly hell bent on CONSISTENTLY choosing people who they a.) Share no common interests with besides the obvious need for food/water/shelter b.) People who closely resembles those who have gone before and not worked out. I'm all for giving everyone " a chance" and not making decisions based on the views of others, but you can't deny the truth in the old saying "where there's smoke there's fire".

I'm not singling anyone out here. I know of a couple of people that are probably thinking "that bitch, I just KNOW she's talking about me", but in truth this is just a very general assessment. The fact that I can think of at least 6 people that this applies to in my social circle, speaks volumes.

As a society, is there SUCH a stigma on being alone that we would compromise ourselves just to be a part of a couple? I know I'm not single and in truth, I haven't been single for an extended amount of time since I was 17 years old, but those times that I was I never felt like I just HAD to be with someone even if I knew that person was bad for me. I've made BAD decisions, but it was never because I was simply scared of being alone.

BE HAPPY! That is the best advice I could give to any of my friends who find themselves ready to reprimand me for this blog because they just KNOW it's about them. Maybe in the movies being a sad sack is considered sexy but in the real world, where we all have problems on our own, it's very rare that a person is going to be drawn to you if your continuously sulking. I'm not saying fake it. Seriously go out and do the things that you enjoy and pretty soon, you'll be happy, with or without someone to hold your hand while you do it.

STOP WAITING! Live your damned life already. Time will not go backwards if when your 50 you realize "hey I should gone on and *insert wish here* instead of holding off until Mr. or Mrs. Right could join.

BE YOURSELF! Even in the beginning. Gals, don't try and pretend like you don't need food even when your out for dinner, and guys if you curse like a sailor, let it be known up front. The purpose of that date is to decide if the person your out with is compatible with YOU not the person you think they would be interested in. The only smart thing I've ever heard Dr. Phil (who I'm quite sure is the Antichrist with a Georgia accent) say is that the reason most marriages are failing these days is because we create these alter ego's in the beginning of relationships that over time become too much to maintain because they are just facades. As you grow comfortable with someone, all those little things that you lied about add up. If you don't like Chinese food, just say "Hey, I think it's gross" instead of picking at your spring rolls and smiling like a cheshire cat because you think it will make you more attractive in the eyes of a potential life partner. It's gonna' look mighty weird down the road, should things work out with that person, if one day you snap and say "I fucking hate Chinese food, can't we just eat something else". NO ONE likes being lied to, even if it's something seemingly insignificant like that. It creates doubt, doubt creates distrust, which leads to fighting, clinginess and just a breakdown of the structure of the relationship.


If your with someone just too keep from "ending up alone", well, I'm of the opinion that you have no right to bitch about how unhappy you are (unless you've been ball gagged and stuck in someone's closet, gotta' have a disclaimer). It's so cliche, but the truth is life is short and the one we're living at this moment will never be repeated, so make it count! Sure, in any relationship your going to have days when you'd rather chew your own leg off than talk one more time about bills, family gatherings, crazy kids (including those of the four legged variety) etc, but at the end of the day you KNOW the only way to make things better is to curl up next to that person and sleep until a better day rolls along a few hours down the line.

Stick to your guns about those "standards" that you have that pertain to motivation and passion, but be a little more flexible when it comes to physical appearance (not EVERYONE can be Angelina Jolie/Brad Pitt) or monetary value. Those are precarious things, like building a home on a sand dune. Over time those things can change. I absolutely agree that you have to be attracted to a person sexually if you plan a future with them, but that doesn't always come from eye candy. Sometimes people become attractive because of those things they do to make us feel our best. If someone can make you smile after you've had the day from hell, that's a start. If someone can turn you on simply by looking at you a certain way, that's a damn good start.

I've had a lot on my mind obviously.
I derive happiness by witnessing the happiness of the people I care about (being an empath sometimes sucks balls). Embrace this life, Debbie and Donnie Downers and take it for everything it's worth. Love yourself and when that happens everything else will fall into place. Remember, confidence is the sexiest thing you can wear.

I ♥ Geeks

...and nerds, dorks and the various other labels associated with people with big, firm, filled to the brim brains. No gook, goo and black stuff for them, they have mathematics to mull over and video games to code!
I married a self proclaimed nerd 3 years ago and have never looked back. He plays Dungeons and Dragons, loves video games and enjoys working mathematics equations (which makes me quiver in terror and delight all at once!) He taught yours truly how to play Magic The Gathering (which I've become quite good at) and we've spent many nights/days just reading in the same room together. My only qualm with him is that he loathes the outdoors, which I love, but I suppose it comes with the territory. You don't get very good internet connection when your hiking and tanning is expressly forbidden when you take the nerd oath (or so he says.) So I'm content to have some things that I do just for me (like being outdoors) and I leave him to his D20's.
Did I mention he played the tuba in band?
*feels all twitterpated*



Here's my nerdy love while gaming...and something has obviously gone amiss.


Now to share a lil something funny since I'm over my middle finger, mediocre Monday blues.

"Once upon a midnight dreary, while i porn surfed, weak and weary,
over many a strange and spurious site of 'hot xxx galore'.
While i clicked my fav'rite bookmark, suddenly there came a warning, and my heart was filled with mourning, mourning for my dear amour,
" 'Tis not possible!", i muttered, "give me back my free hardcore!"
quoth the server, 404."