Showing posts with label #thoughtcatalog. Show all posts
Showing posts with label #thoughtcatalog. Show all posts

Thursday, June 27

LET IT BE

Another good one from Thought Catalog.

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Let it Be: A Life Lesson from My Dad

Several weeks ago, my dad presented me with a birthday card. Attached to the back of the card was an additional piece of paper posing three questions — questions that he and I are both still working on answering together, in what he likes to refer to as our “marathon” years of life. He at 62, me at 26.
Here they are.

When to lead and when to follow?

I tend to think of this question more in regard to, when do you throw yourself out into the line of fire and risk everything, and when do you sit quietly and watch things unfold as they may? I can’t say I have an answer as far as where to draw the line here, but what I can say is that if standing up and igniting or fanning a flame equates with freedom, I’ve stayed seated far too many times.

When to hold on and when to let go?

By nature, I am a tight holder. I was born with a stubborn mind and an even more stubborn heart and it’s something I wrestle with. That said, I think the act of letting go is a vital part of putting to rest agonizing over things that are outside of your control and finding some serenity. If that means letting go of the people in your life who want to be let go, even if only for a time, so be it. If it means letting go of comfort to enter into the unknown, so be it. Things have a way of coming back around again, which may be the reason this question becomes perhaps the most impossible of them all to even begin to answer.

What is meant to be and what is our free will?

I personally believe everything happens for a reason, despite all the moments I’ve lost sight of this. Sure doors close, but I also firmly believe that sometimes life beckons that you kick doors down to get where you want to be—a test of your might, if you will. I don’t think we are predestined; however, I do think we are predisposed based on environment, fears and insecurities to make certain choices for ourselves. Still, these choices remain our own, and can be driven by our beliefs, our passions, our might and ultimately our will, if we let them. Might I suggest what is meant to be and our free will go hand and hand.

All in all, these questions and explorations are ones that I consider to be some of the most monumental that we will continue to seek answers to, as long as we live. Perhaps the beauty is in the fact that this is part of the lifelong process called living and learning, together.

Following the series of lingering life questions on the paper, came this note from my dad (and the Beatles), speaking words of wisdom.

“If we wait long enough the answers will reveal themselves. Let it be.”

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Saying that this was a 'good' read is an understatement bordering on crime. For you guys working out these exact questions, like me, I hope you enjoyed that ! :)

Wednesday, August 1

thoughtcatalog.com/2012/you-dont-like-me/

All I can say is, HOLY FUCK ! 

Well done by January Nelson from Thought Catalog. This blog always has a way of making shit make sense.

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You Don’t Like Me

Jul. 31, 2012
It must be so hard being you. It’s always trying to be decisive, to say what you know deep down is right even at the risk of coming off less-than-perfect, to cut a cord when you’re not entirely sure what you want.

We’re together. Or we’re not. Or maybe we’ll get together. Or maybe we’re somewhere in between. I like you. I think about you constantly. I want to know everything about you. I want to be around you.

Though you haven’t said anything directly, it seems obvious that you’re not as on board. You’re vague. You’re flakey. I could forget about it. I could be delusional. I could hear what I want to hear and ignore my gut. You tell me you’re in it, but you seem really out of it. Maybe you think I don’t realize. Maybe you think you’re fooling me. I hate to go all Greg Behrendt on you but I know: if you were into me, you would act like you were into me.

So what’s going on here is: You don’t like me.

Okay, whoa. Whoa. Don’t get defensive. Don’t shush me. Don’t start countering my point. You do like me. You do. You like me a lot. You just…have some issues, some things to work out, some dilemmas Nelly-And-Kelly-style. You’re just an aloof person. You’re just bad at showing love. You just feel awkward about intimacy. You’re just not always present. You don’t mean to be that way. That’s just what you’re like. You can’t help it. It says nothing about me.

Your distance is palpable. It’s disappointing and expected. It’s this weird elephant in the room that is our relationship, whatever it is. I can sit here all day and make excuses for you. I could say things like: “He had a really hard family life so he just doesn’t do affection.” “He hates answering text messages during the daylight hours.” “He’s just grumpy around people with faces and hair so he doesn’t want to meet any of my friends.” “He’s really busy with his skateboarding business right now.”

No. Nope. Uh uh. If you like someone, you find a way. If you like someone, they invade your thoughts and actions involuntarily. If you like someone, you’re on fire. If you like someone, you make room for them in your brain and in your life — no matter what else is going on. (Or even better, you don’t have to make room. You just feel like they fit.)

So let me help you out, dude, because you want to say anything about our situation but the most basic truth.

You don’t like me. You. Do Not. Like. Me.

Sure, I’m fun. I’m easy to be around. I seem great. I like you. But I don’t make you crazy. I don’t make you sweat. I don’t make you interested. You don’t think about me when you’re in bed at night. You don’t need to see me, to touch me, to talk to me. You don’t wonder what I’m up to or what I’ll do in the future. You like me fine, but you don’t like me.

You’re a nice person so you don’t want to say it so bluntly; Either you think it’s mean or you’re noncommittally trying to keep me around for rainy day boredom. You’re full of excuses and you never take action, but you’re not an outright d-ck.

You just don’t like me. Doesn’t that feel better?

I’m taking the burden off your shoulders. I’m alleviating your tension, your obligation, your pain. (I mean, never mind my own, right?)

No more growing anxiety wondering if you should wait 24 hours to call me back. No more coming up with elaborate excuses for why you can’t meet me and my friends at the bar. No more pushing yourself to feel about me the way I feel about you. Let me just wipe those stressors right out of your life. Must have been such a difficult time for you.

I hope I could eliminate your guilt. I know it must have been hard, all this time, bandying back and forth between wanting to keep me or not hurt me and facing up to your non-feelings. No more looking at your phone and sighing instead of answering flirty texts. No more leaving me in your bed while you go do work on your computer. No more talking about “slowing down.” I’m not a dope. I get it.

You’re free. More importantly, I’m free.

You don’t like me — so today, I set us both free 
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I love it ! Good stuff :)