An Open Letter

I feel pretty conflicted right now because I’ve been somewhat talking to this girl K For a little bit now and I am very confident that she is interested in at least a date if not more. I feel like there are logistical reasons why I can say that this is not maybe the relationship I’m looking for, she works opposite hours than I do and so I would only be able to spend time with her on the weekend. She also lives pretty far away from me. And additionally there are a couple things that aren’t necessarily red flags but maybe more yellow for me, she isn’t in therapy, and has said a couple things that kind of feel like they aren’t indicators of emotional majority but I also could be wrong. She also isn’t really chalant or expressive the same way that I am, and that’s not necessarily a dealbreaker but I do really like it when someone can match my energy. Otherwise I feel like I’m kind of constantly fighting this pull to match their energy. Also isn’t really convinced on if she wants to have kids or not, and she really wants to travel around a lot, meaning she isn’t necessarily ready to set roots.

But at the same time she is fun to talk to, and also is pretty well established with a job and her own friend group. We do have some similar interests like certain kind of games, and the gym. She also does give off a lot of that tomboyish energy that I like, where she is competitive for stupid things.

I keep thinking about this one reel that I saw, a woman was at a restaurant and the menu only had fries. She ordered the fries, and then notices another patron had a really nice plate of pasta. When she asked the patron how she got that it’s as simple as just asking for it. When she mentions that pasta is not on the menu, the other patron says that they’re simply is no menu and what you ask for you will get. It’s just a question about knowing what you can expect. An additionally when she orders the pasta she gets fries. She has to then wait and send the fries back. Then she gets her pasta right before she starts to eat it, it turns into fries. She has to again send it back until finally she gets the pasta that she wanted.

I feel like this is almost a test from the universe, seeing if I am willing to say no and wait a little bit more for someone that I truly fall in love with. The universe has been kind to me by making it explicitly hard logistically, but also by illustrating that it’s not going to be super clear answers of someone who says that they refuse to have kids, or that they live hundreds of miles away. Often these things happen in these gray in between. And I guess in journaling here I feel like the answer is clear to me. I guess now the question is how to make sure I’m not leading someone on even though we haven’t explicitly showed interest.

I guess when I think about it a little bit more, if I visualize the person that I want to spend my life with, it’s someone who looks at me and smiles in a slightly mischievous but very grateful way. I think I could really value someone that can help me stand up when I’m at my lowest. I don’t want my partner to be my therapist or anything like that but I absolutely want them to be someone that I feel safe going to. And I know that I grew up only eating fries but maybe I would like to hold out until I can find someone that would notice the little things that come from knowing me for long enough to tell that I’m struggling and maybe give me like a little pack of candies when I get home and a hug. And the thought of that makes me wanna breakdown crying. I want to be careful of saying that I’m not asking for too much because honestly to me that’s the world. I think that being loved can look like a dollar store pack of sour patch kids. And it’s a quiet reminder that you have a place in my mind. And even if that place gets dirty and neglected because you’re struggling, that’s a place that’s worth cleaning and tidying up for you. And instead of just shutting the door, letting a bit of sunlight in and letting me know that no matter what I am loved.

I’ve gone pretty far from the original point but I guess another kind of a litmus test for me is the fact that I’ve kind of spent my entire life learning that depression was something to be hidden. And this was also because of my fault. At least in the sense of I was doing something that wasn’t good for other people, before I was properly treated I was essentially making this massive concern someone else’s problem when they would give me some space, and I would like to acknowledge the fact that that is no longer the case. But it still is something I’ve had to unlearn and relearn again, taking up space and asking for help from friends and family. And I think that is something that’s really hard for me but incredibly important, and when I choose a future partner I want someone who recognizes that that’s both a weakness but also something great importance to me. And I think you’d be so incredibly sweet and loving if a partner that finds out about my struggles work conditions doesn’t shy away from them, but rather goes inside with curiosity and compassion, the same way I would hope I do.

If I’m being completely honest I hope that I find this person sued, because I really want to meet them and I would love to be able to start spending time with them, and I know that an important thing is controlling my hunger for it because that is what blinds me into taking fries instead of pasta. But I think it would be an incredibly beautiful dish of pasta and I would be lying if I said I didn’t look forward to it.

A little bit anxious if I’m being honest about the whole spark thing. On one hand is something that I have felt before and it has felt real. But also I feel like I’ve seen a lot of literature told through secondhand sources about how this park is actually just an anxiety response due to uncertainty. The part that I’m feeling is not necessarily associated with a healthy relationship. And so because of that I guess I’m kind of afraid because I feel like that spark has been a big reason why I enter into relationships in the first place. And I’m a little bit afraid because if I’m not supposed to use that as an indicator am I supposed to more or less just settle for someone who doesn’t excite me? And the problem is I don’t actually know the answer to that question. Because I feel like maybe yes. Maybe love is not meant to be exciting. And it goes completely against all of the narratives that I’ve seen through media because you never really see a slow burn or plotless love. It’s often painted by large grand gestures and this spark is captured within two or so hours in a movie. And I feel afraid because I don’t really know what to look for otherwise. And it feels like this is just another path of settling, which is something that I wanted to avoid because I think I owe it to a future partner and I owe it to myself to feel absolutely in love with them. But if I’m not supposed to necessarily feel a spark with them that does kind of widen the pool of my options that I consider because there are people that I just don’t really feel a connection or chemistry with and now the problem is maybe those people are the right partners to choose. And additionally when I think about how a partner is not supposed to match you in all of the ways, and they’re not supposed to necessarily share your interests, and attraction is a superficial thing and not necessarily something to base everything on, it feels like there’s an argument for almost anyone being a good candidate and that feels like I’ve stepped even farther from where I was originally with my goal of being more selective.

I’m gonna have to be quick because my phone is at 3%. After our salsa class, G And I talked for about two hours or so. We went through her hinge and looked at her matches on profile and stuff like that, and it was nice to see authentic male profiles because even though it wasn’t my kind of person that I would be interested in or I guess who I would consider as “my competition”, it was nice to see the kind of people that are on the apps and to recognize that I guess I would consider myself pretty confidently in that top 10% of men. I always think about that study that is quoted about how the top 90% of women give the top 10% of men and it’s not necessarily the men that are super tall and super incredibly wealthy and handsome, but it really is some of those other things that I have a strengths and that I’ve heard from several other women consistently saying and the science and literature everything backing up the fact that that is what matters. And I guess I just wanna say that I have a renewed sense of optimism.

Not really sure what happened but I got put on the waitlist for the Barcade event tomorrow that I was looking forward to. Oh well, I am kind of grateful that I get to take a little bit of a breather from all of the socialization, and I anyway need to catch up on attack on Titan in time for the movie. I feel like I’m starting to become more and more extroverted, I’m noticing that I’m less anxious with every new interaction and I’m also not necessarily drained afterwards. I don’t really feel that crash that sometimes comes with social experiences. I think that it’s actually really nice to have a kind of constant stream of events with people from a source that I do not need to create. Like I don’t need to worry about all the logistics of hosting or setting up an event, because I can just go to one of these events. I feel like there is a cup half full and cup half empty moment here, where I feel like I am very lively and constantly making everyone at my table laugh pretty frequently. And I think this has helped my self-confidence because I am more and more confident in the fact that I am a very interesting person that is charismatic and very good at conversation. I can talk to essentially anyone and have a good conversation, one where people look to join and want to interact more with me in the future. I think I’ve also gotten a lot more comfortable with soft social skills like ending conversations, introducing myself to people or joining and moving around different social groups. I’ve gone a lot more comfortable with eating with people, which is actually very nice. I used to be very anxious around it, because I wasn’t allowed to do this growing up and as a result I felt very anxious because it was very unfair. But I’ve had a good amount of experiences now both one on one and also in group setting, and I’ve been able to recognize that a lot of the concerns that I had while valid or rather things that only really exist when I try to solve some situation or make sure I fully understand it before jumping into it. I also want to recognize that it’s only taken me a few experiences to feel comfortable with this and I think that’s a testament to my growth and versatility.

I do think however there’s also the cup half empty perspective, where I’ve felt like I have met people varying from people I just don’t really mess with or don’t really enjoy interacting with too much, two people that are almost like sidekicks for a lack of better word. It’s felt like there are some friends that I’ve made that don’t really speak up in conversations or don’t really contribute too much, but are reliable people to laugh at jokes with, or to talk to at any point. And I do value these friends, and I think they serve an important niche in social groups, but I haven’t really felt like I’ve met people that are good at conversations or funny, like my gold standard of A. I get discouraged when I think about how I would like to find someone who reminds me of me and can make me laugh similarly, because I think it’s always going to be biased by the fact that I have spent my entire life with myself in a way that no one else can. And my perception of other people will always be different than a perception of self. But when I think about A, or A, they consistently can make me laugh without me providing something. I have a lot of friends that can make me laugh in the sense that I can make a joke or I can provide something or I can build on something they say, but I do have a few friends that are just genuinely very creative and funny. And I kind of wish I was able to meet more people like that, and it feels rare. And I think that’s the kind of pessimistic angle to view things, in the fact that I have met a dozen or so people in the last week and I haven’t really found anyone that has made me laugh consistently. This isn’t saying that I haven’t found great people and new friends, but there still is something to be desired.

I think I’m starting to feel comfortable being the person that I am. I feel like I’ve now had an avenue to meet essentially an unlimited stream of people through 222, and I feel like that has really given me a lot of confidence on depart like I felt like I couldn’t control and so I’m feeling like a complete lack of dread and I feel like that makes me feel more content as a person.

I went to an event by 222, which is essentially like time left if you know what that is. And I really felt like I was the life of the party for my group, I had people kind of hovering around me and if I went to a different group or made new friends I would eventually have my old group end up coming to me. I made a lot of new friends and people that are interested in doing several different things, and I very much consider it a success. I also want to kind of be a little bit intentional with reminding myself that I was good at being social and I was very well received by others. I also feel like I was very charismatic and entertaining with my stories, and I was consistently making people laugh. I remember that one reel that talked about how interesting people constantly have applicable stories and I kind of felt that way where I was able to just naturally have a lot of related stories that I felt like I was able to tell in a very entertaining manner and I was even complimented on my storytelling at one point. I just wanna take a little bit to be proud of myself for that and to acknowledge that as a strength of mind that I’ve worked hard for.

Additionally there was this one girl named A, who I was friendly to from the beginning but was pretty judgmental and honestly rude. When I would make friendly comments or conversations she would be pretty rude or would casually throw in put downs towards me, and this really does remind me of L. I essentially just stopped interacting with her, and she ended up kind of gravitating back towards me mostly because I was kind of at the heart of social interaction. But she still continued to be rude to me and so I just didn’t really go out of my way to interact with her too much. I invited some other people to a game night at some point in the future, mostly just checking for interest and I didn’t explicitly ask her because she wasn’t directly in that conversation and I wasn’t going to go super out of my way to invite her. When I finally dropped off everyone at their cars, I was talking with another person that I enjoyed meeting, and her. I was telling them a couple of different stories, and I eventually asked if she was interested in board games or specifically social deduction games and she said she was. She seemed friendly then. It kind of feels like there’s as weird manipulation thing almost of kind of being somewhat rude to them, and by that I mean not going out of my way to engage with them or to involve them with things which I do think is fair. But I feel like once that person gets that social feedback that their behavior of being rude gets them that response, they become a little bit more friendly.

I said the title kind of in reference to literally everything in life and maybe you can make an argument for this being overthinking. But for example with the whole fear about not getting married soon enough, I believe I saw something where the average age is 30, and if I wanna date someone for four years that’s two years to get into that relationship and of course if I wanted to really force it and hit this deadline I could absolutely do that but at the same time this whole arbitrary 30 years Mark isn’t for healthy relationships or for really amazing magical ones like the kind that you can get if you really wait and you do the work and the nice thing is I’ve done a lot of the work, and so the part that I need to do is wait and be patient. And so I guess I don’t really have too much to worry about I feel like in that sense, I can take my time if I want and my life isn’t a great spot so I’m in no rush. But even more generally I kind of just realize that I was both hungry and also didn’t have great sleep the last few nights and both of those things definitely negatively impact my mood, and so I just decided to not give too much weight towards any negative feelings today and I kind of just chilled and took it a little bit easy. And that’s all I really need to do.

I went to watch a horror movie with A, And she recommended unseen screen, Where the movie isn’t announced ahead of time and you see something that hasn’t yet been shown in theaters. We both assumed it was horror, and once we were watching the trailers she mentioned that now that she thinks about it she doesn’t actually know if it’s a horror movie. We ended up watching a two hour 40 minute political thriller/documentary about Russia in the 2000s. She fell asleep during the movie at one point which is really funny to me, and the movie was not necessarily good, but I realized that I actually really did enjoy it. I think one of the things I took away from it that I wanted to write down was how the main character essentially had his life fully rerouted an experience in his formative years.

In the movie it explains his backstory as someone who didn’t want to get into politics or anything like that and rather work odd jobs, and was part of the rebel/punk scene. He then meets a girl that is so incredibly unique and different from everything else that he falls in love with her. He gets into theater and the arts, and they are in a relationship and eventually one of his old friends who got into banking and made a lot of money essentially stole his girl from him. He continued to involve them in extravagant and lavish experiences, and the girl eventually ends up cheating with him. In a memorable scene, he talks with his father and tells him how after they had broken up he felt relieved, but at the same time theater could no longer satisfy him and he was essentially cursed with ambition. His father, who was a politician warned him against this. In the rest of the movie this person continues to climb in the chain until they are essentially a close advisor to Putin, and eventually it leads to his demise.

I thought about this because I realized that if I had had an experience like that during some of my formative years, I think that would’ve done an incredible amount of damage to me in the trajectory of my life. This person who was going down a completely different route fully pivoted their life into chasing power because that was who he lost his love to, which was his priority. And because of that he became disillusioned with the idea that power and wealth is what you should be chasing. And I think that he ultimately was not really happy or content the same way he was once he later had a child.

I think I see this story play out in several different flavors. I think about how there is the entire manosphere, where people are convinced that chasing wealth and monetary shows of that should be one’s objective in life. I think of people who hyper fixate on the gym, and think about how their social value is essentially tied to how muscular they are, or how physically strong they are. I also think about all of the people that play league too much and see their worth as tied to their rank. And I think all of these things are not inherently evil on their own and into some extent necessary in different ways. But at the same time these are not the sole optimization objectives or even necessarily that important I think. I think it is important to have financial security and some amount of success, I also think it is helpful to be in good shape. I also think it doesn’t hurt to be good at competitive things, but I do think that there is a hyper fixation or too much of a focus on some of these things that lead to neglecting other things that create a well formed individual. I think those important other aspects are sacrificed because they aren’t seen as important or of any value, at least compared to the main criteria. And I think that if I had had one of these experiences earlier on it would have absolutely derailed my life. I’m very fortunate to have both been successful in a lot of the endeavors that I’ve done, and I’ve also not had too many instances of direct competition especially in the romantic sense or in a way that matters to me too heavily. The closest thing I have that was maybe academics being compared to my sister, and maybe video games wanting to be the good friend in the group. Both of these things propelled me to be successful in these avenues, but at the same time I was able to let go and focus on other things because I think I did not have a strong loss associated with them. If I had lost the girl that I was interested in or in a relationship with to someone else that was for example a higher rank in league, I would probably have taken that as a strong source of feedback about how I value is tied to league and not sufficient. And the crazy thing is at least in the movie, the girl did leave for that reason. And I think especially in those early formative years is where you have autonomy, if this is what you see, and especially because stuff like social media will feed you more of these things, I can see it being something where you view the world as solely interested in that. And you see that as the entire market, pricing your value. But at the same time as an outsider I very much think that not a lot of my friends if any are that into extravagant wealth, and often or at least I would like to think it’s almost a negative thing. Someone being super showboaty and flaunting wealth would probably be seen as bad by my friends that are female. And so because of that perspective I’m able to separate my notion of value from wealth, but if I didn’t have other experiences I might’ve really fallen for that. I’m very grateful that I’ve managed to get to this point in my life where I’ve had a decent foundation of experiences where I am not horribly impressionable, and that I was able to get here without being poisoned by one of these predatory experiences. I’m very grateful for that, and I’m also very grateful for the movie for making me aware of that perspective.

I don’t know why today but I decided that even though it would probably hurt a little bit less if I waited more time I’m going to throw away the bag of stuff that I kept in the shed from our relationship. I went through everything because it was going to be the last time I was going to see them. And I decided that all of it should be thrown away. I feel guilty for growing away lemon, since I spent a lot of nights cuddling lemon and I feel like the parrot of that stuffed animal but at the same time it is just a stuffed animal and I don’t need to torture myself by humanizing it too much. I also decided to throw away the other presence and stuff that she gave me because I don’t want to carry those memories with me longer than I have to, and I don’t think that I’ll ever be able to separate those memories which is not a bad thing either. I just don’t want to be constantly reminded of them. I read the birthday card that she gave me. Twice. And then I threw it away without taking a picture. In the card she told me how much she loves me and how she loves to see the passion in my eyes and getting to hear about my perspective on the world and how many things I’ve been able to teach her. She told me that the only thing she wants is to be able to move in with me. I remember in one of the cards that I gave her, I wrote about how I’ve never been religious but I found heaven and it’s me laying awake in bed with her softly snoring on my chest, with me wanting to stay awake as long as possible to just save that memory. And it hurts because for some reason my brain wants to first say that it was wasted on her, something that beautiful, but it was not. I wrote those things because that’s how I felt and that’s what she gave me. And she also gave me a lot of horrible things I don’t want to romanticize the relationship, I remember going through the gratitude journal that she gave me and seeing the things that she wrote down and seeing the things that I wrote down, and it feels like I just had such a low bar or expectation, that I was trying to find ways to be grateful for the fact that she apologized for something after a lot of explanation for me, even though there was no behavior to back that up. And it sucks that I felt so unsafe and volatile in that relationship. And it hurts to see the times where she writes how much she loves me and how much she wants to spend her life with me and how I was able to teach her to apologize, but I couldn’t teach her how to actually change her behavior. And I think there’s just so much of a discrepancy between what would be healthy for me in a relationship and what she was able to offer, and that just caused so much friction and eventually the end. But it still hurts to throw away the framed photo of us that she gave me as one of her apologies near the end. She wanted to show me that she was committed and that she did care and that she didn’t want to change and that was her way of showing that she could put in effort. And it was so incredibly sweet of her. She framed the photo of us at the cat café that I took her to as a surprise. And it really hurts because I remember his feelings instead of had enough time to fade into the back, but with these small little things and these memories I remember how much I loved her. Like it’s such a beautiful feeling to care about someone so much and want to make them happy that you don’t even feel like it’s effort or work at all. It’s something that you want to do and it’s so incredibly rewarding. I have to kind of force myself to do these creative projects at different artsy things that I like and I’ve never once had to force myself to think about her or to try and execute these cute dates or things that would make her feel loved. Like wanting to write her cards, or to try to think about ways that I can help her or make her life easier. And it’s just that feeling of loving someone. And God it hurts to remember how I don’t have that anymore. It’s such a beautiful thing to be able to love someone like that and it’s so incredibly priceless to feel like that’s reciprocated. To think and to feel to believe that someone sees you and just wants to make you happy and just wants the best for you. And it hurts because I really did feel that and I don’t think that E is a bad person, and I don’t think that she was intentionally manipulative or aware of the bad things that she was doing, and I really do believe that she loved me. And I know that I loved her. And I know that both of us hurt in different ways and we both have to go through our own journeys and she is not alone in her path, even though it’s not one that I can relate to. And I know that vice versa is true. But it really does hurt to hold both of those truths together in a way that I don’t feel like I was able to earlier in the breakup. It hurts to understand that someone can love you and you can love them and they can have the best intentions, and at the same time they can still hurt and be toxic and do all of these things that are not OK. And I know that this vacuum and hole that I’m feeling from losing what was something incredibly beautiful is a necessary pain because it was beautiful in the same way that a drug is. It’s not sustainable and it’s something that can be damaging if you tie yourself to it so heavily. And there were absolutely things that I’m so grateful for and I am glad that I had this relationship, there was a lot of things that I had to learn and be aware of and thankfully because of that relationship I am more suited and positioned to hopefully find a partner where I do feel safe and consistently so. I don’t want to have every week or every other week another big problem or another potential dealbreaker pop-up. I don’t want her to yell at me when I try to voice that something hurts, or have to find out that she was hiding things like exes or talking to people that are showing interest in her. I don’t want to have this jealousy or conflict that isn’t communicated to me about my other friends, even with my attempts to be transparent. I don’t want to feel like there’s a different life that’s being hidden from me, and seeing the differences between her when she’s around me and her when she’s around other people. And I want to know that the big things that hurt me can be remedied, rather than them being disregarded or ignored or minimized.

But I do miss the good. And I know that overall it was a very clear sign that this was not a relationship for me and I am grateful in a sense, because there were enough explicit things and enough that pushed me hard enough to see that I was in the wrong for trying to make it work constantly. And this would have hurt me so much more if there were these different things that were incredibly valued to me in the relationship, or if it was just that zone of comfortable discomfort. I’m so grateful that it happened when it did and it didn’t last longer, and God forbid something like marriage or children. And I really do believe that there is some sort of divine planning in my life or some kind of a overseer that gives me these opportunities and experiences in ways that I truly need, even when I don’t think I do – all while protecting me as much as possible through it. And I will be OK. And I mean that in the sense of in the future I will have a life that will be so beautiful and it will be filled with the things that I am currently wishing for, like a loving wife that I feel safe with, hopefully children, and I really hope Hash for a long time. I will have someone who will love Hash just as much as me, if not more. And he will be so incredibly loved and safe. And I will find someone that matches me in the ways that matter, and someone that will be a great mother to future children. Someone that will be able to give them a childhood not just of love, but of stability. And that is so incredibly important to me. And it’s so important that it’s not worth a wide confidence interval for potential, but rather a narrow necessity.

I firmly and truly believe that my future will be everything that I want, either through divine planning, or through sheer effort and intentionality. I love you man, and I know that there’s a lot of pain and hurt that comes from living life, but I want to remind you that it is worth it.

Today I went to figure drawing and a salsa class by myself because my friends were not available this week, and I had a great time! I feel like I’ve been exposing myself to new people in several different ways and I’ve gotten so much more comfortable talking to strangers. I’m proud of myself.