(Or just don't date shallow people)
It's almost my 40th birthday...
To me, it seems like a long time to have lived. I've lived a long and very interesting life with a lot (read A LOT) of mistakes under my belt. With mistakes, one is to believe that wisdom is the proper fruit. Well... Sometimes it is. Sometimes we keep making the mistake until we learn painfully. We'll get to that.
About 15 years ago, I had counted roughly about 80 girlfriends I've had in my life. I had finalized a failed marriage now shattered into a brutal divorce and I was attempting to rebuild my life after horrifically "playing the field" with all the wrong women. That was the point I stopped counting the number of women I've dated. To be truthful, I couldn't honestly tell you now how many it's been.
I know this; I've spent the last fifteen years trying to find some way of reconnecting to someone, ANYONE, that I could possibly and hopefully spend the rest of my life with. Here's what I've learned.
Never be in a rush to be in a relationship:
Relationships are never something to be rushed into. At the age of 20, I had the belief that being married was the genuine ensured way of being happy the rest of my life. I believed that marriage was a blissful experience that lasted a lifetime. Who wouldn't want to rush into something feeling this way? Less than four months after meeting this person, we were engaged. Six months later, we were married. Three years later, we were divorced.
Statistically, First marriages have a 70% failure rate at three years. Second marriages have a 70% failure rate after a year. Third marriages have a 90% failure rate after a year. Marriage failure is a rough indication that a golden set of rings, a white dress, and a church steeple are not the keys to future happiness. Obviously there is some serious work that needs to happen.
Relationships take work:
Once you find yourself in a relationship, it takes work to make it grow and prosper. You can fall in lust with anyone, ANYONE. But love... Love takes genuine work. I can honestly say that what I felt for my initial marriage partner, and all the other hopeful partners I have met, was not in fact "Love". Initially, it was an infatuation with an idea in my head of who they were. Love emerged when that ugly truth of who they genuinely are revealed itself and I had to choose to work with them and be with them, or I had to choose to end it.
Love isn't warm squishy feelings. Love isn't heart throbs and pitter pats. Love is the ability to look and someone and say "From here on out, I put your priorities above my own." It takes both parties to look at each other and actively DECIDE to make that the statement of their relationship. And if one, or both, decide they no longer wish to work at it. It all comes falling apart.
If you have to look over your shoulder to have this relationship, IT'S NOT WORTH HAVING:
I would be remiss to tell you the truth on the matter, but I've written about it before. I've been a a cheater in the relationship. It hurt me, it hurt my partner, it hurt the person I cheated with, it hurt my child, it hurt my work reputation, it decimated everything about my life. It almost cost me my college funding, it cost me a lot of future potential. Cheating is wrong...
To have A relationship with one person, and see the possibility of someone else is one thing. To actively pursue that opens a door. You are always watching your back hoping no one who knows your other lady while your with the current one. You can only keep up the lie for just so long before you have to come clean and in the end... You break every one's hearts involved.
(Also good advice)
Quality of sex is never a sign of the quality of a relationship:
When I met the woman I was going to marry, it was shortly after I had lost my virginity to someone I knew in High School. I was a good Christian boy in High School; I lead the bible study and prayer group, the abstinence league, saving myself for marriage. I never played around much in High School. When I graduated, I had no one left to impress with my moral fortitude. So I surrendered to sleeping with a lonely High School friend. Not knowing what sex was supposed to feel like (and I still wonder if I really know what its supposed to feel like), when my new love and I started sleeping together, it seemed a magical wonderland of joys. I felt connected to her because the sex was amazing. So long as the sex was amazing, I felt we could survive anything.
She cheated on me with her boss...
Post my divorce, I spent years trying to find some new way to reconnect with someone who had that same sexual connection I had with her. I can say I've had some amazing experiences. But every time I drew close to someone who I felt was the most "connected to me", I found that those relationships were the first to fall apart. The last time was with a toxic and horrific ex that had kept taking back because I felt genuinely connected to her. She also felt genuinely connected to homeless drug dealers and pedophiles...
Just because the sex is great, doesn't mean the relationship will last.
Never take an ex back, they are an ex for a reason:
Inevitably and invariably, you will meet "That One". That one person who completely embodies everything you want and desire in a person. And then you realize just how horrible they really are. Maybe they cheat on you... Maybe they lie to you... Maybe they take advantage of you. Something horrific happens and the relationship ends. And then the predictable happens. You get the E-mail, the text, the call... I miss you...
I once read a meme (that I couldn't find to post) that read "I miss you, the sound your ex makes when what they tried to replace you with failed abysmally". It's apt... They can, most certainly, miss you with every fiber of their being. But that's the thing... They LEFT YOU. They threw you out to fill their holes with someone else. That someone else turned out to not be what they thought they were. Taking that person back is only going to prove to be a disaster. You fall right back into the same patterns that you had before and eventually it will destruct again.
I learned this the hard way. From 2010 to 2014, I kept taking back the same woman repeatedly. We'd date, be happy for a time, and she'd run off with a hotter skinnier (and usually homeless) dude who liked to deal drugs or fiddle kids on the side. I think at last count, we had gotten back together at least 14 times over the course of four years. Finally, being tired of being left for homeless dudes and knowing I was worth more than this, I ended it for good. Deleted her number, her email, her face book contact, everything.
(This about summed up the guys I got left for)
Someone has to break the pattern.
Learn to forgive wrong doings:
You will be wronged... As the above lesson may seem, I have held on to a lot of anger from prior wrong doings. I have learned, recently, that forgiveness for wrongs is an imperative for moving forward. Its a genuine guarantee that someone will hurt you. Maybe you'll get cheated on, left, taken advantage of, or abused. It WILL hurt.. It will scar you for life. But you have to forgive them for the wrongs you received. Because if you hold on to the anger, it will consume you and you'll never move on with your life.
If the kids don't like you, they never will. If the kids ONLY like you when you bring them presents, they will only love you for gifts and nothing else:
It currently is a fact of life that after the age of 30, you are more than likely going to meet a cubic ton of single moms out there with kids. Dating a single mom isn't a bad thing, in fact I encourage it. I advise a standing rule that if you have kids and are intent on dating anyone, there is a six month steady dating requirement before you bring the kids into the mix. I've found this to be success full being a dad myself. I expect that my future partner accept my child as much as I accept theirs.
However... Upon meeting the kids, if they instantly take a dislike to you and make it a point to make your life a living hell, and Mom "approves" of the behavior; RUN! Don't walk, run right out and run away. If the kids are always asking for presents when you come over, or expect presents when you come over, or Mom expects you to find presents for them; RUN!
Not all kids are brats. In my experience, I've met some VERY well behaved kids from single moms. They never expected gifts or demanded lavish affection. All they really wanted was someone to play games with and talk to and spend time with. I was willing to give that.
But if this happened... I was done...
Just a few bits of wisdom I'm sharing from the vaults of memory. If there is one major lesson I would leave, it is this. Pursue your happiness because life is too short.
Music in my head:
Lie to me by Razed in Black
"Come on and lie to me, say that you love me"
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