Greetings again blogosphere. I had originally planned to have this post continue with the introduction of myself to you my devoted non-existent readership. Instead, after talking with a couple of my friends I decided to delve into my first relationship related posting. As far as blogs go it may be weird for a guy to cover this kind of material. Relationships and feelings aren't something we willingly talk about most of the time. I'm not most guys. Though being able to talk about things like this, whether in my own relationships or others is also part of my reasoning behind the anonymity.
In talking with them, a couple of issues came to light. Though the root of them both was the same. It boiled down to the difficulty we all have when it comes to the point in a relationship where you have to decide whether this is the person you want, or whether it's time to move on with someone else. As my father liked to put it "Fish or Cut Bait." We all hate these moments in our lives. Especially in relationships. After all this is someone we cared enough about to invest time in, and we don't like hurting them to end it. However, it's also not worth having to sacrifice our own happiness in the process in order to stay with them. Now the reason we get to this point in a relationship are infinite. It could be anything from a major fight, to just not wanting the same things from the future. When these moments occur the first thing we have to do is usually the toughest. Which is talk about it and be honest with how we feel. Once the lines of communication are open it doesn't necessarily get easier, but it does at least allow for progress to be made. If you are unable to talk about it, well then there's your answer anyway.
Even when we know what the answer should be, we often times get stuck in our own hang ups. Fear is usually at the root of that problem It's a powerful motivator, sometimes for the better, sometimes not. We all carry around different sets of baggage from relationship to relationship. When it comes to our hang ups, as "G.I Joe" once said, knowing is half the battle. To often we try to ignore them and pretend they don't exist as long as we possibly can. But a lot of the time fear is what it boils down to. Fear of being alone, fear of the unknown, fear of not living up to others expectations of us, or even to our own.
Like with any problem in life, it's how we approach it and deal with it that define who we are and what will happen as we move forward. There's a Marine Corps solution "adapt and overcome". Though that's usually easier said than done. It seems to me that the first step is the same in most cases. Forgive yourself for what happens. We're our own toughest critics and harder on ourselves than others ever could be. We don't need to hold on as tightly to the past as we tend to do. The future may be scary, but it's a lot easier to deal with when you're not carrying the weight of the past with you. Granted like everything else it will probably be easier said than done.
That's when the wisdom of The Beatles comes in handy. "I get by with a little help from my friends." We'll just forget the next part of that and focus on this specific section. Since for legal reasons I wouldn't advise taking the other part of advice that song has. We all have our support systems. Friends are the family you choose so like with your nose, pick good ones.
With that I'll leave you with this platitude. A man walks down the street and falls into a hole. The walls are so steep he can't get out. A Doctor passes by and he shouts "Hey Doc, can you help me out?" The Doctor writes out a prescription and tosses it down the hole, then moves on. A priest walks by and he shouts to him "Father I'm stuck down here, can you help me out?" The priest writes out a prayer and throws it down the hole, then moves on. Finally a friend walks by he says "Hey Joe, it's me, can you help me out?" The friend quickly jumps in the hole along with him. The man says to him "What are you doing? Are you stupid? Now we're both stuck down here." The friend says "Yeah, but I've been down here before and I know the way out." Here's to the friends that have jumped in the hole with us.
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