These are the cookie crumbs for my depreciating mind.

Tag: hate

Sense of Adventure

It’s funny I was just talking about a “sense of adventure” with a friend. We determined that I do indeed have one(golf clap), but I consider my time very important these days and find myself less inclined to be adventurous with random people. I would rather people I really enjoy the company of be the ones I give my spare time to and then opt to be stranded on an island with. I could leave a situation but I would prefer to not have to worry about leaving, but camping out for awhile. While this contradicts the word “adventure”, it makes the actual adventure itself so much more fun, rather than just the preconceived notion.

I suffer from some sort of social anxiety, which is ironic since I am literally a social butterfly by nature. I graduated as a theatre major because I could see nothing else for my in my life than interacting with others and putting myself out there for all to see. I was making myself “google-able” before it even existed. It is my default to be expressive and outloud. I thrive the more people are around me and the more people I can put on a show for.

But along the way, my brain changed, my comfort changed, my chemistry changed. I developed the need to know if there was a bathroom where I was going, not because I need to use it but because it signifies the comforts I have in my own home. It represents the “safety-blanket” of a space I have made my own. And at first it was debilitating. I felt like I would never be able to be myself again and I was a broken fragment of myself, but over time I learned it, I adapted to it, and I conquered some of it. It will be a constant struggle but I am OK with it as long as I am learning and evolving with it.

I wasn’t always like this, shit I was always the first one out the door and last one in. I would jump before you could even suggest it. I used to consider my time wasted if I wasn’t out and about even if that meant me not enjoying my evening. One day it clicked that happiness isn’t about being out all the time but doing what feels good at the time you want it. Watch a movie instead of driving around a parking lot or going to the bar or vice versa. But forcing it to happen was my downfall back when. It is that “holiday” pressure. Let’s get blasted because it is New Years, always ended up in the toilet. Not my idea of how to start the New Year. I would rather just go anyday I feel like it. tangeeennttt…

So dating can often be a scary thing… First dates are not scary to me whatsoever, however. I know I can hold my own, I know I will be myself, I know if they don’t accept me for me, then it wasn’t meant to be.(mind you I am still learning how to self preserve) Sure I will be upset if they are a beautiful person and I don’t understand why they don’t like me back, but I can’t control that, I can’t be in everyone’s head(as much as I try by expressions and tonality). I am one of those people who would choose insanity, while being able to hear every thought of every person than to be naive and sane.

But ultimately I make sure I am the best version of myself that I can be, that includes telling people about my shitty day or good day when asked. I don’t have the mind space to have different personalities for people or situations. Sure I know what is socially acceptable behavior or not, but I choose to be the same “version” of myself to the best of my ability in every case.

On some of these dates I have been on I feel like I need to be more careful who I get stuck with and when. Because I think a lot of my anxiety is not about being in control but lack of control. I under estimate my own ability to leave a situation that doesn’t make me happy. I am slowly learning to navigate that. Instead of going to a happy place, I am facing it more head on and learning when I am going because I just don’t want to be somewhere or if I am trying to escape myself. I often feel like I will disappoint someone if I say no. Learning to balance my yes’s and no’s is still a struggle.

I am learning how to tell someone I would like to get to know them before doing some crazy adventure. Seems to be an online dating thing where your first message has to “amaze them” or your first date has to be “an adventure”.. if I met you in person it would be different because I could get a feel for you, but online, I want to at least meet you before the crazy fun begins! I blame this on the idea that online dating overloads you with so many options you are looking for someone to “best” the other person.

Define Compromise

So there is the definition, yet somehow I feel as though most people use this word in a completely broken way when it comes to relationships.

“Acceptable to Both”

“Each side making concessions”

“Mutual concession”

But, what do I hear more often than the above?

YOU need to…

YOU have to….

YOU are going to have to compromise so they are comfortable/happy/ready.

This doesn’t sound like compromise. It could be, if the other person was also getting the above and each of you decide to come to a decision together so you both are comfortable. But we most often hear “You need to compromise” from friends and family, because that is who we turn to to ask when we feel the need for help and we can’t understand what is going on with our significant other. The problem is, our family and friends are not seeing the entire picture. This knee jerk reaction to say “well compromise” comes from a place of good intent, but can often be ill informed and cause an instant feeling of guilt or insecurity in your own relationship. The minute you ask your friends and family what to do in a half baked picture, the minute you muddy the water with socially acceptable “make you feel better” chatter. It is the SIGNIFICANT other that needs to be having this conversation with you, due to compromise being such a personal and intimate need for two people who share life together.. If you are ever in a situation where there is a balance of power shift where you feel as though you have to compromise on who YOU are, it is no longer a compromise at all but you submitting to a bad situation or one that needs work. When you compromise with a loved one obviously you have to be humble and give a bit, but it is mutual. You don’t leave it feeling as though it isn’t better for the whole. You don’t feel as though it is hindering you from being you because it is allowing you to love stronger, harder, and with more understanding.

There is negative compromise and positive. At the end of the day you need to be ready to accept when it is negative and either stand your ground to keep who YOU are intact, or you must be able to come to the hard conclusion that the “MUTUAL” compromises needed to make the relationship work are not actually mutual from your end of the spectrum. I am saying “you” a lot because it is a selfish side of being that needs to be kept intact. That sense of self can often be lost for many people in and through other people’s needs and wants. So you feel like you are “compromising” so they are happy, but slowly you are breaking down all your own joy, creating a shell of who you could, can, and want to be. And eventually you get beaten puppy syndrome, brought on by your own inability to know when it was no longer a compromise but a, for lack of a better term, deal breaker.

Dating is scary, I get it. Especially in the beginning and even scarier as time goes on and more is invested. But we as a specifies need to get over our shit when it comes to the idea that a relationship may or may not be working. I know I have been stuck in many in the past because I was too prideful, comfortable, naive, to just tell the other person I was no longer happy and why. So me thinking I am giving it my all is actually bringing down two people, my significant other and myself.

Dating gets tiring, I get it. Loud and clear. The fatigue that sets in from telling your “intro story” over and over, getting excited because they said something in return that made you think it would be beautiful together, or just dealing with the many incompatible people. Dating sucks, so why are we wasting time trying to “negatively compromise” instead of just moving on and trying the next person. Instead of juggling 50 at a time, shoot like an arrow, 1 at a time, your all, until you find it. No complication, confusion, and your intro story can be much different. Why? Because what if we all approached dating like talking, telling our day, including ups and downs, day by day to person by person. Living in that moment and not worrying about living vicariously through their Facebook history.

So don’t compromise on yourself, on who you are, and on how you date. But when you do meet that person who is right for you, remember this…

Compromise is a beautiful thing we done by the actual definition, but do it by the socially accepted viewpoint and it has a tendency to break you down. Compromise should not be a synonym for settling.

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