Thinking about Relationships

Few people listen.
Most assert the primacy of their own opinions. Few are willing to accept a pluralistic framework for the understanding of the world and of others. For most, it's either My Way or The Highway.
Very few are curious about other points of view or willing to see them as complentary to their own.
This is why relationships can sometimes be so problematic. Especially if you're dealing with an obnoxious and stubborn partner. A curious listener, man or woman, puts himself at a disadvantage; an invitation to be run over, or so it seems.

Still, I am a listener. And I sometimes wish she was. Maybe that's why her relationships with others seem to fail, most of the time. I'm not judging, just observing.

Anyway, I got to thinking about relationships the other day. Where do I even start?
You have those relationships that open you up to something new and exotic, those that are old and familiar, those that bring up lots of questions, those that bring you somewhere unexpected, those that bring you far from where you started, and maybe even those that bring you back.
But you know, I think the most exciting, challenging and significant relationship of all is the one you have with "yourself". Where you show that side of you you never thought you could ever share. And if you can find someone to love the you that you love, don't you think that's fabulous?
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In your life meet people, maybe even have brief relationships with them. Some, you never think about again. Some, you wonder what happened to them. There are some that you wonder if THEY ever think about you. And they are of course, some whom you wish you never had to think about again. But you DO.
Do you ever get that?

Have you ever thought about how you used to be, how you're still that you or how you're miles opposite to that person that you were?
It's interesting how our attitudes towards relationships sublime as we grow older.

When you're young, your whole life is about the pursuit of fun. Then, you grow up and learn to be cautious. You could break a bone or a heart. You look before you leap and sometimes you don't leap at all because there's not always someone there to catch you. And in life, there's no safety net. When did it stop being fun and start being scary?
So if there's no net to catch us, does this mean we stop leaping? Whatever happened to landing on our own two feet?

You know, I'm beginning to think that the relationships we have with the world is largely determined by the relationships we have with ourselves. Maybe we should work on ourselves first before beginning one with another human being.

When we're incomplete, we're always searching for somebody to complete us. When, after a few years or a few months of a relationship, we find that we're still unfulfilled, we blame our partners and take up with somebody more promising. This can go on and on--series polygamy--until we admit that while a partner can add sweet dimensions to our lives, we, each of us, are responsible for our own fulfillment. Nobody else can provide it for us, and to believe otherwise is to delude ourselves dangerously and to program for eventual failure every relationship we enter.
Don't you think that's true? I believe it is. I think it's one of the many steps we have to undertake to ensure a rich and fulfilling relationship.

I think I need to believe that it works; love, couplehood, partnerships and of course marriages. The whole idea that when people come together, that they stay together. It doesn't matter if few of those happens, the fact that it does. I have to take that with me to bed, even if I have to go to bed alone.
Sure, I can always argue with myself and say if people can fall in love, what's the guarantee that we won't fall out of love?
I know, I know. It's whole big risk, there are no assurances and guarantees. But still. I think about it sometimes, I choose to believe it.
And yesterday, I saw proof with my own eyes, in church. A couple was celebrating their 60th wedding anniversary. They were so cute! And you could see the love they had for each other, still in their eyes.

Have you ever bought a lottery ticket? I buy them sometimes, I mean not that I think I would ever win, but I'd like to hold it in my hand and think : What if?
It's the same with love, I guess.

Seeing that it works, is maybe enough for me; though it brings a certain aching comfort to me.

The world is no longer a romantic place... some of it's people still are however, and therein lies the promise. Don't let the world win.