For all that we can all be cynical about today as a day to celebrate - it's all about the card companies/chocolate manufacturers/florists, ya da ya da - the fact of the matter is that this is still a day to celebrate. You may choose not to dive in to the over-hyped side of it and just not buy anything in order not to give those pesky financially-minded bastards any of your well-earned cash. But, honestly, I kind of think that it's a good thing that there is a day on which we celebrate romantic love. We can mark it how we choose. But don't shout about it if you went to M&S for an "Eat in for £20", at least not if Kathryn knows where you live.
I'm marking it, currently, by sitting on the sofa in my PJs. I don't have anything particularly pressing to be doing (except getting in the shower but it's okay, Lorraine's out and the cats don't seem too offended so I'm good for the minute) so I took a moment to read a Guardian guide to Love and Relationships that my Mum gave me as a response to my last post about how I'm struggling to be pro-active in terms of love and such-like. I'm a bit embarrassed to say how brilliant it is. It also means that I'm considering therapy a little bit. I do have real problems with being too afraid to do anything for fear of embarrassment. For all that I really like myself, there are things in my life that I just can't do because I'm too scared to do them. And these are the things, love, a career, planning ahead, that I'm really going to have to face up to before I'm too old and I wonder where my life went.
I've thought about therapy before. It's been mentioned as a way to get me to address certain things that I can't deal with by myself. I don't have a stigma about it and actually really respect people for going to therapy. The reason I've avoided it is because I'm scared (that word again) to lose myself. So much of who I am is defined by these little idiosyncrasies and patches of crazy that if I were to sort them out, I wouldn't be me any more. Again, this goes back to what I was talking about before, that I think people only like me because they think I'm interesting and unusual and that if they find out that I'm just a very normal and boring person hiding behind a twitching mass of imperfections nobody will like me any more.
I'm marking St Valentine's Day today by making some resolutions. I know that there are things about me that I kind of want to make better before diving headlong into a relationship. But that doesn't mean that I should wait endlessly for me to make my life better before I even start to look. So, my plan is to just be more open to possibilities. And maybe engage that guy I like in a conversation about something other than photocopying and post-its.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Saturday, February 06, 2010
Struggling
I've got my single head on again. I hate this. It's my frame of mind that weighs up single men that I meet and starts wondering whether they'll do, whether they're someone I could meet, have a connection with, be someone of potential interest. Despite logical head saying "you're not ready, it won't work", there's still a part of me that wants something. I think it's the part of me that really feels the loneliness. I set up a dating website profile again before Christmas. I deleted it after Christmas. I'm in constant war with myself.
It's difficult to explain. Part of it is being choosy, part of it is lack of confidence. I don't want just anyone. I don't think that anyone I would want would actually want me. My life has been full of crushes on people who were unattainable, not because they were actually unattainable but because I didn't feel I was good enough.
There's a man at work I actually quite like. He's cute, he's funny, he's interesting. I'm pretty sure he thinks I'm an idiot. And there's also this whole thing whereby I am only a version of myself at work. I tend to separate myself - work me, home me, family me. I am different with different people, in different places. I think I do it not because I am interesting but to maintain the myth that I'm interesting. Then if people think I'm weird, or boring, or don't like me as much as they like other people then I can think to myself, "oh, it's okay, they don't know the real me".
So I hide. Especially at work. And I think of myself like a female Clark Kent, hiding my superself behind my glasses. I think of my talent like validation. It's okay that I'm socially awkward because I can sing. It's okay that I build walls between myself and other people because I can act.
But it isn't okay. Not in the long-term. My personality ends up compartmentalised to the point where I don't know where I begin and end any more. The reason I'm boring on dates is because I shut off all of the bits that I think will alienate people but those are probably the best bits of me. The part that feels the need to run because the wind picks up, the part that laughs too hard and too loud, the part that mimics the way other people talk and move (does anyone else obsessively try to copy Cheryl Cole when the L'Oreal advert comes on? I just can't get "worth" right), the part that is annoyingly curious and wants to ask questions all the time, the part that obsesses over crap TV, the part that wants to sit quietly and listen, the part that wants to argue for the sake of it, the part that starts crying when passionate about something even if it's just a moment of perfect contentment.
Over Christmas I spent a lot of time with my parents who never expect me to be anything other than myself. They are used to the whirlwinds and eddies of my temper and tolerate my sudden passions and enthusiasms with amusement and collusion. It was so restful to not have any walls up at all and, as I double-checked with my Mum on Sunday, they like me despite, and because of, my faults. It made me realise how much of the time I am guarded and hold myself back, not just on dates but in real life as well.
I don't really have a conclusion, which infuriates me as I have been writing this, on and off, for several days and I would prefer to have some sort of shape for the sake of tidiness. I guess I need a tidier mental life in order for that to happen.
It's difficult to explain. Part of it is being choosy, part of it is lack of confidence. I don't want just anyone. I don't think that anyone I would want would actually want me. My life has been full of crushes on people who were unattainable, not because they were actually unattainable but because I didn't feel I was good enough.
There's a man at work I actually quite like. He's cute, he's funny, he's interesting. I'm pretty sure he thinks I'm an idiot. And there's also this whole thing whereby I am only a version of myself at work. I tend to separate myself - work me, home me, family me. I am different with different people, in different places. I think I do it not because I am interesting but to maintain the myth that I'm interesting. Then if people think I'm weird, or boring, or don't like me as much as they like other people then I can think to myself, "oh, it's okay, they don't know the real me".
So I hide. Especially at work. And I think of myself like a female Clark Kent, hiding my superself behind my glasses. I think of my talent like validation. It's okay that I'm socially awkward because I can sing. It's okay that I build walls between myself and other people because I can act.
But it isn't okay. Not in the long-term. My personality ends up compartmentalised to the point where I don't know where I begin and end any more. The reason I'm boring on dates is because I shut off all of the bits that I think will alienate people but those are probably the best bits of me. The part that feels the need to run because the wind picks up, the part that laughs too hard and too loud, the part that mimics the way other people talk and move (does anyone else obsessively try to copy Cheryl Cole when the L'Oreal advert comes on? I just can't get "worth" right), the part that is annoyingly curious and wants to ask questions all the time, the part that obsesses over crap TV, the part that wants to sit quietly and listen, the part that wants to argue for the sake of it, the part that starts crying when passionate about something even if it's just a moment of perfect contentment.
Over Christmas I spent a lot of time with my parents who never expect me to be anything other than myself. They are used to the whirlwinds and eddies of my temper and tolerate my sudden passions and enthusiasms with amusement and collusion. It was so restful to not have any walls up at all and, as I double-checked with my Mum on Sunday, they like me despite, and because of, my faults. It made me realise how much of the time I am guarded and hold myself back, not just on dates but in real life as well.
I don't really have a conclusion, which infuriates me as I have been writing this, on and off, for several days and I would prefer to have some sort of shape for the sake of tidiness. I guess I need a tidier mental life in order for that to happen.
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