The Last Five Years
So I’ve grown up. Mostly figuratively in this scenario. I was an adult before as well; I can’t deprive my former self of that. Though I can admit to how much I had yet to experience after those posts.
I’m looking back at what I’ve written and all I can think is how much I modeled myself after Ted Mosby, but more so than that, how much my writing had predicted that character’s trajectory in the later seasons. A bit of a fun thought experiment I guess. I was living what was being written by people in Hollywood. Maybe not truly, but what’s true is differs from person to person.
I should start this post by saying that I am happy. I should follow up that statement by saying the these past five years I have scarcely been happy. This isn’t said out of some ‘coming of age’ intent or some ‘key to happiness’ secret because I don’t think I know altogether that much more than I did in my last post. I can only say that I had some life experiences, that I learned from them, but it’d be fair to argue that I’d forgotten or let go of things I had once known then.
Since this blog isn’t meant to be explicitly about me, but rather about my peri-spiritual journey to find the love of my life - my soulmate- I’ll attempt to keep to remain true to this theme. What’s wrong with buying into a fun little thought experiment? With letting one’s imagination rule out for a while?
So. Hey Sweetie.
I don’t know that I feel you in my heart still. That’s a lot to claim, and more to proclaim from the heights of this internet mountain peak we call Tumblr. What I feel confident in saying is that I know a little more about you than I once did. I’ve grown in my view of love. I’ve come to see it as a companionship more so than what I could only ever before characterize by calling “that feeling.”
I recognize infatuation’s role in its development, but no longer expect that head over heels sentiment to persist indefinitely.
More so than just this, I’ve come to see all the ways I chased poor relationships. I believed so heartily that love was about finding this one person that meets and exceeds your expectations, that you need only point to or at and amaze the world with. That one person that blew your standards out of the water.
In the past I rejected the ones that were, in truth, the exact type of person that I belonged with. The exact type of person that I know now that I will end up with. I’ll spare the actual names, but I can say that I’ve dated exactly three girls that put me first. Well, not truly. They put themselves first- as they should- but it was never in their nature to turn a cold shoulder to my emotions, to neglect my needs, to falter between whether or not I was “good enough.”
I’ve been with too many girls that had dated me with exactly that approach. And they may end up happily with someone that can tolerate that, or that wants that too, or whathaveyou. I know now that I cannot.
The girls that will win my heart over now, in my ripe twenty five years of age, are the ones that see me as someone they want to enable to succeed, as someone they can bolster emotionally, as someone they will help, and someone they can share their existence with. And they will expect me to return this in kind.
This is what I consider a loving relationship now. And this is the kind of goodness that I foresee carrying me forward with this ‘girl of my dreams.’ It won’t be a relationship littered with doubt or toxicity because it’ll be built between two people that genuinely see their other as another similarly minded human being that they believe in.
These are just some thoughts from the treasure cove I like to call my mind. I doubt I’ll post again, but for all of my followers that enjoy the slow play I hope this both fulfills that and creates in you an anticipation for the Next Five Years.