Youthful Life: X

“Everyone longs to be loved. And the greatest thing we can do is to let people know that they are loved and capable of loving.” Mr. Rogers I am a certified loverboy. I am a romantic. I am believer in the all powerful nature of love. Never have I ever been in love. When I started writing this blog I was 17 years-old, and now I am 30. What a life that has been lived and one with so much left to experience. There is so much discourse about how love, relationships, dating, etc. have changed as generations take the helm of those experiences and the introduction of technology both in dating apps, and social media has radically changed our access to people and information about them. Is it supposed to be easier? Has social media and the endless barrage of swipes, taps, likes, messages, etc. changed our love lives for the better or has it made us gutted connections leaving vapid exchanges in their place? To be this age and to not had that seemingly major human experience can be anxiety-induci...

“A friend is the hope of the heart.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson Pandemic life has radically altered or maybe made more efficient communication. Now more than ever we are made to be consistent in how we communicate lest we further our disconnection. There's something grave about getting disconnected now. Is it easier or does it feel more permanent? Somehow it just seems like the thing to do. In times past, letting go of connections friendly or otherwise seemed like a massive deal, and now it's common. We're just not that invested in one another, or the effort we're putting in to stay connected is unbalanced. That's okay. That's the reality. That's useful.  “Talking” these days is like a subscription. It starts to run out and either we have to renew by sending a text or let it lapse and never hear from one another ever again. The goal is a lifetime subscription with automatic renewal.  Instead of renewing subscriptions we don't use in others we can just let ...

"My alone feels so good, I’ll only have you if you’re sweeter than my solitude” Warsan Shire Find someone, meet someone, be with someone - we live in a society that deems us incomplete lest we have someone else. I don't subscribe to that ideology. I believe in wholeness. I believe in additions not completions. I believe in co-creation not achievement. Togetherness is not the opposite of singledom. People are often "together" but distanced and isolated nonetheless. The more I move through life I have come to realize that what people want, need, and desire in others varies - drastically. For some, the quest for their one true love, their perfect match, soul mate, if you will occupies them. It seems effortless.  For others, it's people that may not "fit" together but put in the effort to make it work. For others still it's a sort of crowd-sourcing, so that their "someone" is not their everything - it's sharing different kinds of...

“Life is just a slide. Back and forth between loving and leaving, remembering and forgetting, holding on and letting go."  Nicole Lyons I dislike the notio n of always being expected to be accessible. I don't believe people should always have access to us as a people. It feels intrusive, demanding, and invasive. We get to grant and more importantly, revoke access to us as we please. That's our prerogative. Both in a proximal sense, and digitally through social media, we get to decide who gets to be near us, contact us, and engage with us. All too often we shy away from rescinding access once it has been given. I am of the camp that we can, and should be constantly reevaluating who we allow into our lives. Much like Marie Kondo's tidying up method, if people do not bring us joy, contribute to our peace, or more practically add to our lives beneficially, then what is the purpose in keeping them around. That is not to say that everyone should serve a purpose, bu...

"Have no fear of perfection - you'll never reach it." Salvador Dali I am a recovering perfectionis t. I have spent so much of my life striving to be perfect, and by perfect I mean absent of mistakes, put together, and without flaws. I used to make mistakes and beat myself up about them when in the grand scheme of things they weren't significant to begin with. More and more I have strove to unlearn that yearn for perfection, given myself more grace, and been patient with me. I'm slowly but surely embracing being messy, silly, and less staged. I'm trying to be less calculated, less fearful, and less in my own head. I'm doing by best to be more accessible, relatable, and realistic. It's been a challenge to say the least but one that I'm becoming more okay with. I know that I am not perfect, and that idealizing the world, the people around me, and myself can warp your perception. I'm working to speak to others with more kindness, empathy, and ...

"It's not that I dislike many people. It's just that I don't like many people." Bryant Gumbel No one likes to be dislike d. It's sewn into our DNA that we just have a general disposition and a need to be liked. We want people to want us. We want them to like us, get excited when we're around, love us. We spend so much of our time devoted to getting people to like us. We shouldn't have to convince, beg, or plead with people for them to like us. We don't owe anyone ourselves. We don't have to give the entirety of who we are, or pretend to be someone else in a futile search for the approval of others. If we have to persuade someone to accept, tolerate, value us then maybe those people truly are undeserving of all that we are. And, and, and, we ourselves do not have to like anyone if we don't want to. "Like" should an enthused, jovial, and benign feeling we have for another person whether friendly or romantic. We get to reserve t...

" The greatest gift that you can give to others is the gift of unconditional love and acceptance." Brian Tracy I believe in love . I believe love has purpose and power in all of our lives. Love is a driving force throughout the world. There is nothing more inhumane that being deprived of love. We need love to survive, and to thrive. Without love and without hope life has no purpose, no light, no peace. And yet, love has escaped me for so long. What I know is that I am surrounded by love, and what a gift it is to love and to be loved in return. I am wrapped in, adorned, drenched, and covered in love. I have others that love me, and the more I recognize it the more I am grateful for it. I, however, don't think I love enough, and love people enough. I don't demonstrate love. I don't live out my love. I don't embody love. I love, but not in it its entirety. I am still figuring out what me loving others - not just the way they love, but in my own way, means f...

"Words are singularly the most powerful force available to humanity. We can choose to use this force constructively with words of encouragement, or destructively using words of despair. Words have energy and power with the ability to help, to heal, to hinder, to hurt, to harm, to humiliate and to humble." Yehuda Berg I've been ghosted one too many times , and once is too many to begin with. Indirect communication defeats the purpose of communication inherently. Messages are misconstrued, signals are crossed, and conclusions are few and far between. I think people truly believe that their line of indirect communication laced with missed responses, multimedia scavenger hunts, and passivity is being kind to others. It's not. It's avoidance. Whether intentional or not, it communicates a lack of care, a level of disregard, and implicit disrespect. Indirect communication does the exact opposite of what people who employ its ambiguous means set out for it - hurtin...

"I learned a lot about falling in love when I fell out of love. I learned a lot about being a friend when I was alone." Unknown  Forging connections with new people is a challenge the older I get. Maybe it's because I'm stuck in my ways or I'm just cynical and closed off. Whatever it is, it makes my efforts to connect with others few and far between. When I do connect with people, I struggle to overcome my default behavior of comparing them to all the others who have come before them. I think I want familiarity but in reality, it just shows up as trying to replace one past or far away friend with someone who just isn't them. Whether it be in like, love, or friendship it's been a challenge to unlearn that woefully limiting behavior of comparing the new people in my life to those my people of the past. What I miss out on is the opportunity to get to know someone who they actually are, not who I imagine or want them to be. I want so badly for someone to...

“Rejection is inevitable. The goal is to minimize it.” Keith Grafman Language is a constantly evolving sociopolitical construct. It changes with the locale, culture, and context in which it is used. Words take on new meaning. The world of relationships and romance has been revolutionized itself with the onset of digital mediums through which to communicate. With it though has been borne a potentially toxic culture of miscommunication, micro-communication, and no communication at all. No one really knows how people will utilize inventions, and oftentimes users dictate the uses of products more than creators do. People are both predictable and simultaneously an unsolvable enigma of the most epic proportions. They exist both in the centerfold and the marginalia. They are creatures of habit and wildcards played to disrupt the flow of things. People can be cruel regardless of intent just as easily as they can be kind. Time for a vocabulary lesson, this time on breadcrumbing, windows...