Thursday, September 13, 2007

untitled


Have you ever wondered why there is no cookie-cutter answer for relationships. Yesterday, someone talks to me and says "I used to have the same problem. You did the right thing." Then today, another says, "I used to have the same problem. Maybe you should rethink this." I don't mind people's opinions. In fact, I appreciate them. I know I don't know squat about relationships, despite all the advice I generously offered to roommates and friends in my relationship-experience-less 23 years, and I know that I could be doing something completely stupid. But I just find it curious. What does it really come down to? What does it really depend on in the end? There is no equation. You simply just make a choice.

It reminds me of something I read in Lewis's preface to The Great Divorce. He said that life isn't linear like a river, taking simple turns and reaching obstacles only to eventually reach a common destination with all other rivers. But, it is like a tree - complex in its growth from the common to the distinct. The roots, up to branches, which expand even more to the leaves, to the veins in the leaves. The thing that differs from using this example with relationships and Lewis's use of this analogy is that his has to do with good and evil/right and wrong; mine has to do with something somehow beyond that - human relationships. How come there is no right and wrong sometimes? It just becomes, "It didn't fit" or "we made it fit." And when to live with that and when not to...?

Or maybe it is actually the unspoken, but innerly believed and relieved feeling of: "Thank goodness there's no right and wrong in this."

I'd appreciate your comments.

3 comments:

jes said...

Just so you know, people don't know crap about what you are going through in a relationship. Everyone's different. How interesting that people believe their experiences somehow apply to your infinite feelings and the dynamic aspects of a relationship. Best advice I can give about relationships: don't let people persuade you that what they think is good for you, is really good for you.

ps...still waiting for your comments.... Love.

cath said...

What I wonder is why there are so many of us expecting cookie-cutter answers for things. Who is behind this myth that life makes sense? Because we all seem to think it should, and that the mysteries are the exceptions to the rule.... Is this part of our nature, does it come from a legitimate source, or is it just an expression of our own desires? Maybe we recognize the ambiguity of life deep within us and yet we try to enact a different reality where there is a right and wrong because its the reality we prefer. Black and white is so much easier than gray.

PS still unclear when you use grey and when you use gray.
"i before e except after c, and when sounding like hay as in neighbor and weigh, and on holidays and birthdays and anytime in may, and you'll always be wrong whatever you say!" -brian reagan

jeff said...

This reminds of the dilemma of social science--there are some who try in earnest to make a positivistic study out human interaction. However, it simply is foolish to ignore the prejudices and ethical evaluations that are different enough in every person so as to destroy any possibility of approaching the objectivity obtained in physical science. Also, if you could account for these prejudices it would be insanely difficult to isolate variables in order to study these human interactions systematically.

I believe there is no system or method which could be followed and then result in an extensive, or successful, relationship consistently. The only solution, in my eyes, is to keep at this seemingly random process until the circumstances between you and someone else align. The most influential action one can have over finding success in relationships, then, is to not give up after many apparent failures.