Remember that post from back in November of '11? The one where I mulled over my identity, or signature? I've been thinking. Yes, always dangerous as it is for many people who take up the habit. I like to go back and read bit and pieces from my entries from time to time, just to get a feel for where the blog is at, where it's been, and where it may be going. After landing on that article again and thinking about how things had changed in the last three months, I first thought that I had dropped that "quest" completely. That was, until I thought about it from a different point of view.
While I wouldn't say that I have spent any great amount of time thinking about that question, I have subtly altered how I analyze and examine the things I do, what I say and how I respond, and how I react to the world around me. This has actually started some great progress towards solidifying the more abstract parts of what make me up. For example, in a situation where I am faced with making a choice over whether I find someone worth my time and effort or no, I have really been weighing in the pros and cons. It takes me a bit longer to make up my mind, but I am finding that I spend time with more people who have something valuable to teach me, directly or indirectly.
I also am noticing more of a shift in focus onto the things that I want to do. Rather than approach life with a "meh" attitude, I have been actually pursuing those things that I am passionate about but have put on the bottom shelf because they weren't "the thing to do" or "I'd like to do that someday". I realize that I do a lot of talking about these things thinking that are a big part of who I am. But how can that be when I haven't engaged in these activities in months or years? One cannot call themselves a painter if they don't pick up a brush and canvas on a regular basis. You can't call yourself a mechanic because you fiddled with your car's engine five years ago.
I talk a lot. Mercury does have quite a bit of influence in my life. And I have the best intentions of carrying through with the ideas that I talk about. Half the time I am successful at following through. The other half of the time I either forget about them or set them aside long enough that they lose whatever oomph they had. And then occasionally touch on them again and get excited only to repeat the same pattern. I have a lot of theories on why I do this, fear of failure being the winning one. I talk, but I see a trend forming lately that may just fix the part where I splat five thousand feet before the starting line.
I think the key is to attack this one thing at a time. I've been talking for years about going to the gym. Tying it into getting in shape for a holiday, beach time, vacation or other event always gets me excited about it, but once that holiday gets close I lose all motivation. What I had to ask myself was why am I not doing this for me? Aren't I the most important person here to be making promises to? Shouldn't I care about the constant trend of disappointing myself? As the one perceiving and translating every thing in the world around me into time and life, how I treat myself is directly affecting how I treat others and my interaction with every other part of my life. So I decided to join a gym. And I made it all about me. I don't go for the company, because company won't always be there and they may let you down. I don't go for the attention, although I definitely love when I get cruised or "accidentally bumped" in the ass. I go for me. To spend time with me. And to enjoy the fact that I feel better because I did something good for, you guessed it, me. One thing at a time.
That example out of the way, you can see how this selfishness would apply to picking up my love for art and making things, being socially active again, and top on my mind today, finding a boyfriend. And this is the part I'm working out in my head right now. My apologies in advance since this will probably be disjointed.
So much of the process of finding a boyfriend is focused on what we want in someone and then seems to turn into what we can contribute. If we are living honestly with ourselves and being true to who we are, what we contribute will be what attracts other people to us. So why are we hung up on this? I'm not convinced it's a good thing to focus on when finding that special someone. Focus on doing what you love and finding someone who is what you want, not what the culture says you should want. I find it out of place to focus on settling for someone because they fit some of the bill and you can always find a way to sacrifice some part of yourself to make up for the rest. Fuck that, I say. Get out there, find what you want and go for it. If they like who you are they will go for it. If not, take what things you can learn from the relationship and aggressively move on.
I think a lot of this probably falls into the idea that the right person will come along if you just focus on being yourself and living your life. Many of the people I have been, or currently am, interested in generally fell right into my lap while I was busy living life. The times I've been so focused on nothing but finding someone and setting aside the things I enjoy have led to some of the most depressing times in my life. So, ultimately, I've probably not really stumbled onto some new take on life and relationships, I've just found a new way, for me, of looking at an old idea because of recent changes in patterns of thinking in my life. I like where this is going.
