Why we run from 'love'...

Remember when we were kids and heard all the adults talk about love, read about it in fairy tales, watched actors fall in ‘love’ in romantic movies? It seemed like a painfully simple yet beautiful concept. We thought it would be a natural, almost default occurrence in everyone’s life. We expected for love to come our way only to make things better. The inevitable happy ending!

And then we grew up! In the process, we got a taste for what love actually feels like. If love was indeed as simple as we would like for it to be, we all wouldn’t be running away from the mere mention of it. We wouldn’t choose ‘casual’, temporary, convenient relationships to fill the place that true love should have in our lives. But WHY? Why are we so afraid? Love doesn’t kill you! Or does it?

Love - the real thing - when it comes along, takes your breath away!

You think all the years of prepping yourself, almost like rehearsing for that big performance, would make you more capable of bearing the impact of ‘true love’. But no! All those dates in high-school, kissing all the wrong people, crying over them when it ended, still does not come close to what it feels like when you actually fall in love. And yes, you fall. Headlong into that abyss, willingly and eagerly, not realizing that there is not return from it.

And then your heart breaks, again! Classic, hey? Just cuz it was love, doesn’t mean it was going to last! I’m not saying no relationship lasts forever. But we all go through our share of heart breaks before finding the ‘forever’ - if at all! And that is if we have the courage to embrace love when it comes our way again, in the first place. So many ifs!

Nobody said heart breaks would be painless or easy. They hurt, so fucking bad! But it doesn't  stop there. And you thought it couldn't get worse?

While you were busy holding yourself together, physically clutching your arms across your chest because you felt like your body was being torn apart from the inside, while you were looking for something, anything to numb that unbearable pain ravaging your soul mercilessly, while you were looking for something to fill that huge, gaping, raw hole in the deepest part of your being, all the while that you were tending to your heartbreak – not only was it successfully resisting every move you made to recover, it was also changing you.

It changes you from within, your very essence. When the storm finally starts fading, leaving a breathless and shaken you in the wake, you do not even realize that the person you were before does not exist anymore. It only starts becoming evident when you get back on your feet and try living your life. Slowly you realize, you have become someone else – a stronger but damaged version of your older self.

Is it just the fear of a heart break though that makes us run in the opposite direction from even the possibility of love? Are we so afraid of the torturous pain that a broken heart causes? Maybe not.

To love is to open yourself up to another person, feel for them from the dead bottom of your heart, give them access to depths of your soul. When you love, you let yourself become vulnerable to someone. You are one person, living for two people, as one entity! Confusing? It always is!

The lines become blurred, you do not know where you as an individual end and where you as one half of this ‘couple entity’ start. You have two people’s dreams to fulfill. You start giving up on things that are important to you, to make place for this relationship. You let go of things or people you held dear to you. You want different things now, things that are in tune with what your significant other wants. Before you know it, you are putting him or her ahead of yourself. Subtly but surely, your principles and values are changing.

One fine day, when you look back, you do not even recognize yourself. You are happy (hopefully!) but nothing like the person you were before you fell in love. And worse – you don’t even know when you changed so completely! And THAT is what is scary!

Because we don’t think we are capable of this kind of love. When we think of epic love stories, we think ‘Romeo and Juliet’. What we do not realize is that love itself is epic! It is the most powerful, devastating, and complicated thing in the universe. It rules our lives.

It is overwhelming to realize we can love with as much abandon as the characters of a legendary love story! It is terrifying when we truly understand how much of ourselves we are willing to give up for love. How much of our life and world comes to revolve around another person.

And when someone like that fucks you over, how do you trust again? There is no short cut to recovery from such a betrayal. Of course, this might be one person (or a few people) who left you shattered and lost. But it isn’t really about the people. It is about love! A feeling so intense that it crowds your entire horizon.  An emotional web so intricate, beautiful and gossamer that you willingly get caught in it.

There is no reigning in love. There are no measurement scales. How much is too much? Any control is only an illusion when we are ruled by our hearts! And that’s why we say ‘fall’ in love. Cuz it is indeed a free fall, and there is no stopping mid-way or coming back. Once you’re in, you go all the way. And if you need to come up for air, however quickly you realize it, when you do come up you are breathless and broken! Isn’t that petrifying!

So it isn’t the other person we are unwilling to trust. It’s ourselves and the force of our own emotions that we are so afraid of! It’s a gamble too. You could be truly blessed to find love that turns out to be your fairy tale. Or you could be left broken hearted and damaged.

So for those of us who realize exactly how powerful and untameable love actually is, the prospect of getting sucked into it again is daunting. There are those who find the courage to swim into that whirlpool again. But then there are those who run away from even the suggestion of it. Some probably never will be brave enough to indulge in the sweet, sweet joy of loving someone will all their heart and soul!

What do we do then? We look for the kind of relationships that leave our hearts and sanity out of it. We pursue the infamous and much simpler lust, instead of searching for love. We build sky high walls around ourselves, with chain link fences outside and inside it, so no human capable of doing our fragile souls any damage will ever reach it. We keep our hearts and our emotions in a trunk, locked up, where they will remain safe. And we find solace and joy in uncomplicated, temporary, fulfilling affairs!

L'amour temporaire

We have all come across a million articles and listicles on the internet – what is wrong with modern day dating, how romance has been lost in this century, lust over love. And let’s be honest – there is more than a semblance of the truth to these. But why? Why has traditional love and fairytale romance morphed into one night stands and no-strings-attached relationships as the conventional if not ideal lifestyle?

Pardon me but I am going to say the most abused phrase of this generation, which is also the biggest truth – our lives are fast paced. When they say this world is a competitive jungle, they aren’t talking about the job markets alone. Like everything else in this age, our relationships are about convenience too. I mean, what else was a life ruled by technology and invention going to lead us to anyway.

Let Hollywood bear witness to what I am saying here. Before there were movies like ‘Pretty woman’ and ‘Notting hill’ in which love came out of the most unlikely of encounters. (Ok. I know these are classics and almost exceptions among examples, but you get my point!) Now we have ‘Friends with benefits’ and ‘No strings attached’. Both of them have the clichéd happy endings too, but see the route the plot takes?

To say that the world, especially the newer generation, is seeing a revolution would be an understatement! We no longer care for the importance traditional ways of life placed on the balance between education, work, marriage, family and eventually retirement. New age philosophy is understanding that one cannot have it all and will have to choose those aspects most important to them. Our lives are simply not as simple as they were in older times. Temptation is everywhere, and it is okay to err!

Hey, I’m not complaining! I’d rather each person live his or her life their way, on their own terms, than having to succumb to what society says is right or wrong. And I am as much a culprit by having contributed to (or at least partaking in) the turn modern day romance has taken! To be honest, I would have it no other way.

But are society and modern lifestyle the only factors to the choices we are making in our love lives? What about what love does to us at a personal level? And if it was always so hard to love, why are we more afraid today? Or have we just learnt not to be happy with what we have, so much so we have trouble settling? 

Magique

Magic is what I mean! That’s how the French say it though. See what changing three letters in a word can do to it? Makes it sound chic, enigmatic and classy, all without changing its meaning. No wonder the world loves French, it is MY favorite language. And the people - they just know how to find elegance in the simplest things and how to savor the beauty of those aspects in life most people do not even pay attention to. 

But isn’t that what life is all about? Or at least what it should be about? The small things, the precious memories, the way of enhancing even everyday experiences… the fairy dust! 

Otherwise, what is the point of it all? There is no flavor in bland, nothing special about mundane, nothing exciting about routine, nothing dreamy about reality! That’s why we all need a bit (or a lot) of it – the fairy dust. Magique. 

Now before you brand me a hopeless romantic (although I am just that), bear with me! Fact of life is – it happens! As much as we try to stay free-spirited and carefree while growing up, as much as we promise ourselves we will never be like the boring adults we met when we were younger, as much as we promise ourselves we will never EVER indulge in deep philosophy once we are grown-ups, life happens!! Worst part is – you do not even realize when it sneaked up on you and changed you. Yea, no shit!

We are all born with the proverbial clean slate. No memories, no knowledge no skills. Also no trust or reservations, no confidence or shame, no friends or enemies, no pride or regret. We are born with the clean slate for the world to write on. And write it does! It writes bold, in-erasable experiences and memories that make us broken, apprehensive, vulnerable, strong, courageous, and fearsome adults. 

No. Contrary to Hollywood’s portrayal, damaged people are not always the result of a childhood scarred by abuse or a parent who abandoned them. You know what I mean if you have ever been bullied at school, been called fat or skinny, been insulted by a teacher, had a friend betray you, had a partner cheat on you, had the world judge you, lost a loved one, been in a near fatal accident or been a victim of any kind of violence. Every experience in life leaves a mark on us. Some of them scar us badly, permanently!

Ever met someone who is happy, optimistic, idealistic and sees only the good in the world? And wanted to punch their face? I have! It’s like Meredith says in Grey’s Anatomy: “I don’t like happy, chirpy people!” Neither will any self-respecting person who has been living or trying to live their own life on their own terms! Not because we are jealous of the chirpy, infuriating happiness. It’s because it is unreal. It is like they lived in a bubble. A nicely protected, warm, reflective, shiny, isolated bubble; they grew up inside it and decided to step out once they were happy, chirpy, annoying adults! It’s like they do not understand how this world works, like they have never had to deal with real life issues and are mentally still inside their stupid bubble.

If you never had someone love you, if you loved so unconditionally that you lost yourself, if you never learnt how to trust, if you trusted blindly only to be stabbed in the back, if you were forced to live against your own choices, if the decisions you made for yourself went awfully wrong, if something you took for granted suddenly fell apart, if you indulged in substance abuse or if you watched someone die – you have probably had to deal with life in all its evil glory at least one time. There are a million things that can mess a person up. Any one of these can scare you to the core of your being, so much that you are hardly the same person anymore.

The way I see it – life is designed to fuck you up! There is no way you can get out of it unscathed. But you go on and on, live it one day at a time, deal with the smaller blows on a daily basis, put on a smile (or a bite-me attitude) and hope to find the bigger purpose. But then would you have it any other way? These experiences are what make us. They give us our personality, beliefs, fears, perspective and basically build the road our own future will take.

Sometimes I wish I were one of those positive, content, balanced people. You know the girls with shrill voices, who smile easily, are polite and nice to everyone, say things like ‘live and let live’, seem to thrive on positivity and basically want to convince the world around them they are modern day saints! And then it hits me – they are polite and sweet, but they don’t ever speak their minds! Hell, they probably don’t have original opinions about most things! No real perspective. So thanks, but no thanks!

I would rather be scared to love again and make the choice to stay alone, than feel out of control. I would rather make mistakes and learn from them, than stumble around like a grown up infant. I would rather have been bullied as a teenager, so I learn how to speak up for myself.  I would rather be hurt by a friend, so I know where to put my trust the next time. You learn, you grow and hence, you are capable of making your own choices. Yes, life takes its own course for the most part, but would you not want to control the parts that you possible can.

But these realists with tons of life experience and a badge of damage are in fact the people who need magic most in their lives. Most of them unconsciously even believe in it. See, for those who believe in beautiful, cliché philosophies about life (that all things happen for a reason and that the ending is always happy, etc.!!), faith comes naturally. They hope for better, they move forward expecting better and it is easy for them. These people, from the bottom of their heart and soul, believe in happiness, fairy tales and love. They also as naively believe that they deserve the fairytale!

But for those who have had their trust broken, their faith shattered, their love rejected and their souls basically sucked out of them as if by a dementor, it’s an everyday battle to even go on. Because what are you moving towards if there is no light at the end of the tunnel? So they have to, in some part of their being, believe in magic. There is something I read a few years ago and it has stayed with me forever. ‘I am strong cause I know my weaknesses, I'm a lover cause I'm a fighter, I am wise cause I've been foolish, I laugh cause I've known sadness!’ 

This quote from my favorite tv show sums it up perfectly - 

Damaged people are not lifeless and lost. They are strong, courageous, bold people who will stand up for what they believe in. They have fears but they understand them better than anyone else and deal with it. Every day. Those are the people who need magic. Those are the people who appreciate the small things, the precious moments, the beauty of life! They see what most people miss, they cherish what most people let pass. They hold on to special people and beautiful memories as if the earth turned over and if they let go they would free fall into the never ending abyss. 

In the depths of their soul, these people long for the magic. The fairy dust.