fillosophy

In any successful relationship, there’s a natural balance between two people. This balance, though not literal, could be represented by a balance scale - where in each person stands on their respective side, and then articles of that relationship can be weighed in. For example; take “Joe” he’s a stalker. Put him on a scale with who he’s stalking, we’ll call her “Jane” (Joe:Jane), and relationship items would look like this:

Thoughtfulness (100:0)
Emotional Attachment (100:0)
Attentiveness (100:0)
Appreciation (100:0)

Since Joe, here, is acting on impulses, regardless of reaction from Jane, he simply takes on every other aspect of his “relations” with Jane; and compensates (within his brain) for her lack of input. This is an extreme case, and not quite a relationship; considering stalkers are one sided psychopaths that don’t need any input from others to established … feelings, if you can even call’m that. But apply this to a successful relationship. Joe’s awesome and into Jane, Jane loves Joe with everything.

Thoughtfulness (50:50)
Emotional Attachment (45:55)
Attentiveness (55:45)
Appreciation (50:50)

Since Jane’s more emotional about things and Joe is given more opportunities to be attentive to her emotional states; including her attachment to him - he gets to the slightly more attentive one. Most males are more attentive (brain) than emotional (heart) anyhow; its no surprise that women are emotional, driven by hormonal shifts and have been even given a bad wrap, more often than not, for being illogical and irrationally controlled by them at least a week a month. In actuality, some women are controlled by their emotions and do act irrationally. God forbid if you ever have to handle one of these…

So; with that in mind you can imagine why relationships will fail. if the input isn’t 100% combined, then compensation will begin one way or the other. Example: Joe’s less attentive toward Jane for some reason; perhaps his attentiveness has been redirected to the new secretary at work. First off, if this happens, there’s another problem - being satisfied in his current relationship; or at least feeling as though he’s getting back what he’s putting into his relationship. There are two reason’s people start to stray from their responsibilities in a relationship; either the fault of themselves, or their mate.

Regardless, Joe’s attentive score within his relationship is now (35); and Jane recognizes this and tries to compensate by being inquisitive about what he’s doing and she starts to pay attention to his actions and actually overshoots the attention to his actions. Jane (75).
What you have now is (35:75); for you math inept, that’s 110, and chances are Jane’s not going to ease off if Joe’s pushing away, after all her emotional attachment rating is probably fluctuating as a result as well as Joe’s is becoming more distant, as is Thoughtfulness and Appreciation is definitely slipping:

Thoughtfulness (40:60)
Emotional Attachment (35:65)
Attentiveness (35:75)
Appreciation (35:65)

No matter how it’s scaled; there are a number of problems that are occurring. Once you have anything that measures outside of the 60/40 range you’re in trouble. And if you have something that’s over balanced, it will smooth itself out and cause more troubles. “Attentiveness (25:75)” for example; meaning Joe’s thinking about Secretary AS much as Jane now, and its only a matter of time before the domino effect gets into full swing, and:

Thoughtfulness (25:75)
Emotional Attachment (20:80)
Attentiveness (20:80)
Appreciation (20:80)

At this point you have someone that’s more that likely being cheated on; and though this is a specific case, there are many things that can cause this balance shift - “faithfulness” is the easiest subject to attack, since most people can relate to it. Most people, regardless of sex, will do one of two things in this situation; get angry and seek results, if they’re in over their heads on the output they’re giving without receiving any feedback - or they’ll simply make excuses for themselves and continue to compensate and over-compensate, pushing their “significant other” farther away, while allowing them to get away with whatever it is they’re doing to distance themselves from the person they supposedly are with.

Some people do both; they get pissed off and know what’s going on, but are strong enough and intelligent enough to ease the relationship back into balance using things such as forgiveness, guilt, judgment, and flat out punishment. Depending on how much these things are used will determine where the balance ends up; if it doesn’t completely break down entirely.

Anyhow, Joe and Jane, they started out with the best intentions toward each other, but what might have happened? All infidelity comes from a single point in any relationship, and it usually is present from the very beginning; Jane wasn’t what Joe really wanted or pictured himself with; Joe’s lower ranking in emotional attachment from the start was a result of him not really wanting to fully commit, and thus was more attentive to Jane - to see when and where he could make his break and start to look elsewhere… there’s countless things that could do this; but for my example we’ll go with the latter.

Actually, instead of turning this into a “how cheaters become cheaters” blog, here’s a few tips on how to make adjustments properly and a huge tip that will help everyone in a struggling relationship…

Huge Tip: If your relationship is on the rocks, its going to take communication and time… separately. If you don’t give the other person time to be their own person, you’re going to lose; and even more so, if the time has come to talk things out and all you can do is be upset and fly off the handle? You’re only going to push them away again… if you do that it’s probably what you want anyhow. Since you’re too frustrated with “what they’ve done to you” to actually want to repair anything, you just want them to know how you feel at that point - and that’s simply selfish. Regardless of what you think; selfish acts of emotional expression, no matter how good they feel at the time, cause irreparable emotional scars on yourself more than them. From a guy’s point of view; if someone’s getting heated over a situation or coming out of left field with something… you’re now a psycho that I can definitely live without. (so to speak)

How to adjust the balance: The numbers in my example aren’t a literal; and neither are the measurements. I mean, if I could sit here and label all the items involved in the balance between two people… well… lets just say that’d take too much space and time to compile that list. But, not literal… there’s no set number of “what needs to be done”; the speed of the relationship doesn’t always have to be 60mph, it can be 10mph and still be at a (50:50) or close enough to it. Think of the ratios as a percentage of the whole. The “Whole” is whatever arbitrary number you want it to be; or whatever it is measured, if you can do that.

Try to work with each other to make adjustments in the “Whole”. If Joe slows things down, then Jane should as well. If Jane doesn’t understand why, then TIME and COMMUNICATION have to be factors, give it time - for when talk is ready.

How to not make adjustments: If Joe is taking the speed of things from 50mph to 20mph, Jane might want to over compensate for that by taking her speed from 50mph to 80mph and just drive into a brick wall with Joe. This is what I call the catastrophic relationship traffic accident.

Good news is, people survive even the ugliest of traffic accidents; real life & metaphorically in relationships. Its all about how you recover. Unfortunately, the brutally ugly reality of things is; sometimes one person survives and the other doesn’t… in terms of relationship; this is what happens when being cheated on is moved into the equation… loyalty and trust issues fuck everything up.

enrique
fillosophy.net : admin
www.n-re-k.com

It’s a fact, romance; actions and words that carry sincerity and truth about ones feelings for another - is a dead practice, shamefully. Consumed lives filled with reasoning and logic, science and media, have washed out the very thing that societies have lived and died by since the dawn of civilization; doubt, contempt, jealousy, misunderstanding and lies all contribute to the feeble attempts made by shallow men these days in hopes to woo someone they simply desire to sleep with; further defacing romance, and furthering ourselves from practicing the cause of it; true love.

Political partisanship, religious organizations, bureaucracies, the media and society in general; I’ve poked holes in and denounced major factors, if not the items themselves entirely, in the past, but never will I say that love doesn’t exist, nor will I ever deny those feelings and lie to myself about them. Only a pathetic excuse for a man would ever call what I’m saying fiction or weak, and it is in that, I sit here proudly in my own skin, embracing my own heart, that I can without a doubt claim that I have loved, wholeheartedly, and will again. In fact, it is the pathetic men, and the equally pathetic women, that force lies and doubts upon themselves, discouraging themselves from seeing what they are truly capable of; and it is they who destroy what a very few of us hold dear, and even more so when the purity of true love arises between two people.

Disgusting, reckless and horrific; just three of the words I can place as description of the things I’ve seen weak, spineless, poor excuses of people do toward those who are happy and in love with one another. I’ve seen men cheat on their wives in attempts to break up a relationship they observed as better than theirs; I’ve heard people passing off lies, deceit, and doubts to close friends and loved ones – simply to cause a problem, cause drama, cause arguments, between two people who could go months, years or even their lifetimes without ever striking up a single argument between themselves; I’ve seen backstabbing so-called friends tear down the bonds between two people with vigorous, deliberate, and vial intent – all to just simply be a shoulder to cry on so they feel better about their own fucked up lives…

What we’ve become; with all of our brilliance, intelligence, and knowledge – monsters. We’ve replaced everything that we should be holding close to our hearts with purchased desires, selfish goals, greed and envy. Strangely enough, I can’t think back in a time where “romance” was ever an American thing to do; considering we’ve been killing, thieving, and raging wars ever since our nation was “discovered”; or acquired, I should say.

There I go, bashing this wonderful nation; unfairly… We stole this dirt fair and square!

There’s some righteous justification for you. Regardless, have we ever known what romance is? If so, have we ever practiced it? Perhaps I was born in the wrong century, the wrong dimension, hell - the wrong species even still. I give my all to someone, once I’ve found them to be someone I truly want to be with – and have no problem expressing it, acting on it, and involving myself in it; and I’ve been lucky enough, to have found a few people in my day that can understand and appreciate what that means, exactly. The rarity of someone who can actually and honestly understand romantic gestures, appreciate true notions, and not just think you’re trying to get them into bed, is obscure to say the least. It’s mindboggling how fucked up society has become that when true actions driven by feelings are displayed; they are scrutinized, doubted, and analyzed. Rightfully so, I guess, considering all the shallow pukes that try to call themselves men that are out there, parading around like a pack of barbaric apes, drowning in beer and numbing themselves on football; and “you’re special baby” comes out of their gourds as though it was the scripted thing to say just to keep their “piece of ass’s” mouth either shut or filled with their manhood.

In the end, what is there… Valentine’s Day? [insert laughter here]

Actually, what’s left is a very select few who actually are capable of being rightfully expressive; and an even fewer who are able to accept it for what it is… Amazing we even still find time to procreate these days with all this shallow life catering we do for our selfish desires. It is in that; I leave the rant, before I start to attempt to correct this problem by giving tips and self help notes. Honestly though, how could I? If you need to be told what you should do to be romantic, you’re beyond hope. For it comes from the heart, not a blog, or a teacher. All it takes is respect and a pair of ears; if you listen to your significant other, she’s giving you everything you need to be romantic… it’s up to you to do something about it.

enrique
fillosophy.net : admin
www.n-re-k.com

So… what is a relationship?

Simply put, in the traditional sense, two people getting along with each other well enough to be with each other exclusively… but anyone who’s ever been in a relationship can tell you, its never that simple; and in fact, “Simply” shouldn’t have even been used to start this paragraph.

There’s all kinds of stuff that can happen to them once they start – they fade away, things get “bad”, people grow apart, someone “better” comes along, people change, sometimes for the worse… that’s life, either you can deal with it or get rid of it, that all depends on the situation you’re faced with, hooray for “particulars”.

I’ve been in a few relationships in my day, some good, some not so good. They start, they’re great – the coined phrase everyone’s using these days is “the honeymoon period”, which is nothing more than you simply not knowing the person yet, and filling in the gaps with what you think you see, and hoping for the best. Depending on how distorted you are when facing reality? You’ll either be very surprised, very disappointed, or somewhere in between when that period is over. Fact of the matter is, when the beginning phases of a relationship are nearing an end and the “real” shit starts to hit the fan? That’s when you’ll pretty much (deep down inside) make up your mind of how much longer that person is going to work out, or if they’re going to be around indefinitely. It’s the shallow truth in everyone, but heart and mind cover most of that up, patching up those flaws you secretly hate… for a while.

So what happens? You sit there, in your thoughts, drowning in your feelings for the person you’re with, noticing the things, behaviors and characteristics that you might not care for too much, and maybe start to take these details in to consideration: Time investment, tolerance, compromise, sacrifice and (my personal favorite) future plans and wants. And you leverage them together to form the “bonds” of the relationship.

I’m speaking generally, so if this doesn’t apply to you, congratulations, Mother Theresa, you’re the new found Messiah and you can live in your perfect relationship, with your perfect life, and kick rocks onto someone else’s philosophy. For those of you normal people, those “things” you find out as you come out of the honeymoon phase, ignore them or not… weirdly enough, they always tend to resurface later, generally after the two year mark – if you’re a long term, tolerant, patient, forgiving and humane person.

This is when the theory of “love lasts two years” comes from. Pessimistic? I’ve been called worse, but that term is fairly negative and even more so – incorrect. This is simply being realistic. It’s not like I’m not stating anything you probably haven’t thought or felt at least once in your life regardless. Deny it to yourself all you want, if you want to write to me and say “no I haven’t”; go lie to someone else.

Does love not exist? I’ll never say that, ever. I’m simply outlining issues of compatibility between two people.

True love does exist, happens all the time, its fantastic. Do some people get lucky and hit it off with someone their first go at it? Absolutely. There are 7 billion people on this planet, the chances of meeting someone you’re compatible with, with that many people to choose from, are pretty damn high, actually. What about the rest of us. Some people think that working things through because of the [time investment, tolerance, compromise, sacrifice and future plans and wants] involved, no matter what the situation is, it is ultimately worth it, because they “love” them. … This distorted view of what love is needs to vanish. Absolutely none of any of those points have anything to do with loving someone. Sure, time might be a factor, but is it part of love? Not at all…

………………

What Does LOVE Include?

Trust:Complete trust, earned trust, mutual trust. All factors of trust are important, and truly need to exist, and cannot be simply assumed, the need to just be there, not made to be there. If you’re a jealous person? Talk to someone about your confidence levels and ask yourself what your problem is, don’t take it out on your significant other, who is (if you’re truly in love) undeserving of it.

Honesty: This goes hand-in-hand with trust. How the hell are you going to put your trust in someone, if you can’t even trust your own actions enough to share them with your partner regardless of what they are?

Loyalty: First off, if you’re cheating – chances are you’re not with the right person to begin with. Love him/her all you want, you’re not satisfied in some way shape or form outside of simply sex. Being loyal to someone is as simple as not putting yourself in a situation where you can, in general. If you’re not satisfied and start to fill a “void” by looking around for a “side thing”? HA! You’ve already lost.

Passion: Sex is important; sure, humans are sexual animals, with a little thing called emotional reasoning mixed in, which makes exclusive companionship healthy, and also personally satisfying. But passion is so much more than simply “doing the deed” to get your rocks off; its enjoying the other person’s touch, the way they smell, how they look at you, dress for you, and treat you affectionately and caringly… Sound sappy? Bullshit, everyone wants to be held every once and while without being engaged in some kind of fuck session, think other wise? Then blame your mother for not holding you enough when you were an infant.

Humor: You can not be with someone if you can’t make them laugh. You can be the un-funniest anti-social person on earth and still find a way to make someone laugh. Doesn’t mean you have to learn to juggle and find ways to turn your eyelids inside out… it just means, if being you at times isn’t humorous to the person you’re with? You’re not only boring and bland to them, but, you’re also going to be replaced by a television every possible chance and there goes my next point.

Communication: The number one downfall to relationships outside of money (which I’ll go over) is lack of communication and too much misunderstanding, misinterpretation, and created/fabricated crap. Every communications book on this planet will have at least one paragraph if not a whole chapter dedicated to the two most important parts of communication. First and foremost, listening. If you don’t know how to listen? Learn or die alone. Pick up a communications book from a college, search google for answers, I don’t care, figure it out, and practice it… truly. This cutting someone off mid-sentence, refusal of listening to someone’s statements, and all of the drama that follows can be circumvented if you simply sit there and shut the fuck up. Secondly, weirdly enough – expressions. Facial and body language, if you’re upset? Slamming shit about and acting like an enraged gorilla will accomplish one thing – more drama. Want a solution? Talk one out. Too pissed off to talk? Take a damn shower, a walk or sit on the toilet and read the paper for a few minutes or so to calm down first, then give it a shot.

Finances: First, money doesn’t mean a god damn thing, but how it is managed and worked with in a relationship – like a serious one? Is actually extremely important. Don’t think so? Try dating someone who’s addicted to gambling so bad they pawn your car to play another hand of blackjack. The game of money in a relationship is all about financial fairness as well as you can make it with what the two of you make. So… money is needed for love? Hell no; but respect for one another’s needs is. Needs need to be met, on both sides of the fence, in all fairness, to reduce the other downfall of relationships… the number one downfall – stress caused by perceived financial unfairness, not strain, not “we don’t got it”, but fairness.

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All that spells out two things; respect and common-decency toward another person. It has nothing to do with how much time you’re with them, what you plan on doing, what you’re willing to “put up with cause he/she is good to you”, what you’ve given up to be with such person, etc. All those things are just that… things, and mean about as much to a truly meaningful relationship as what was on the Home & Garden channel last Tuesday night.

Chances are, if you’ve made it this far through my banter and have ever been in a relationship or are still in one, you’ve seen all these things, and know they all exist at some point or another when with someone. How do you keep it going once you got it? Once you’ve found who you want to be with? Don’t get caught up in the shallow ends of the situation. If there are with someone who has things you are unwilling to deal with? Communicate and discuss them to that person, or start doing an injustice to your relationship, and watch it deteriorate. Living with hidden opinions and sacrifices as a result of those opinions will not only eat you up on the inside, it will make your bond weak and your relationship fragile. It will also cause unnecessary stress on the one thing that’s most important to everyone, your heart.

enrique
fillosophy.net : admin
www.n-re-k.com