A Matter Of Perspective

Break-ups suck. It’s a universal truth that everyone accepts as gospel at this point. It doesn’t matter if it was painless, if you and your ex are still on speaking terms and are very friendly with one another (please note that there’s probably around three people in your life who mutter a ‘fuck you’ internally whenever you relate that fact to them) – regardless of the circumstances, the actual act of ending a relationship is not a fun process; the shearing of that particular sort of connection, the realignment of your thoughts towards a person, the loss of the closeness and intimacy you might have acquired during your time together.. it’s something that takes time for a person to process and get through, and even then, you’re not entirely in the clear. Some of that stuff stays with you for years. Maybe forever.

Sounds like a lot of fun, no? Kind of makes you wonder why we put ourselves through that whole ringer, over and over. Something about the fact that the waves of our hopes and dreams just keep crashing against the rocks of that particular inaccessible island seems a little…unwise, perhaps.

But what can we really do? I mean, of course there are people among us for whom the idea of perpetual singledom is something they wholeheartedly welcome and enjoy (and believe me, I’ve tried my hand at that so many times. It’s hard. The people who manage to do this are wizards, in my opinion) but beyond the adjustment of perspective that allows one to appreciate the times when you’re single, alone and by yourself, the deeply natural desire of wanting to be around someone and to share parts of your life with them remains a strong, almost pulsating thing in the back of one’s mind that pushes you to keep trying to satisfy it. It sounds a little insidious when I paint it that way, but come on, how many times have you cursed yourself for being back in that same loop where you keep waiting for a text that takes a little too long to come along, only to feel entirely dumb when it does and you realize that your crush was just talking on the goddamn phone. It’s deeply silly and entirely human (perhaps the reason it’s silly IS that it’s human, honestly).

So we can probably agree that we’ll keep trying (or hoping) to meet that special person someday, and that we’ll go through a breakup (or a dozen) in our attempt to do so, and that it’ll hurt like a motherfucker almost every time. Right? Well, not to get all relationship advice-y on you – and that ship might have sailed already – but I’ve found that there’s something that helps me look back at these experiences with a feeling that’s not just a mixture of sadness and bitterness.

Fact is, regardless of how things ended, the experiences you went through changed your life in some way. That’s usually what I stop to investigate for a little while, and the things I discover often do astound me. Sure, sometimes the impact is minimal, but it’s balanced out by the times when someone allows you to change your whole outlook on what you want out of a relationship, and what you’re able to compromise on vs what’s gonna be a hard pass for you. But even beyond that, sometimes I think of what I’ve learned from prior exes, or the small ways they’ve enriched my life, and it’s often a thing that makes me smile. Yes, they may no longer be with you, but there’s a part of you that’s forever changed because of them – and hopefully that’s a thought that introduces a bit of gentle warmth into your heart.

For fun, let’s see some of the ways things have changed for me. My first long-term relationship left me with a deep appreciation for better kinds of tea (seriously, how I managed to just drink Lipton for almost 26 years at that point is beyond me), and introduced me to the marvels of sriracha, a thing I never knew existed but cannot live without at this point. Others have allowed me to question my place in the world, and what I want for myself. They made me think about international politics, and how deeply I ought to engage with that in comparison to more local affairs. They made me work a little harder, study a little more, just to live up to their example. They’ve made me care about good design, and introduced me to so…much…music that I’d have never found on my own (this comes with the caveat that sometimes that music reminds me of them, but..you know). And, on a slighter but hardly more minor level, they allowed me to finally get around to watching shows that I should’ve been checking out many years ago.

So it’s not really an exaggeration to say that those people have been instrumental in making me who I am today, and while there are aspects of me that I’d like to change, there remain parts I like a lot that can be traced directly to the influence of those people. I couldn’t be grateful enough for the time they spent in my life, and I can only hope that they could one day look at me with equal kindness. I hope we all can.

Anyway, give it a go sometime, yeah? I promise, you won’t be disappointed.