LOVE IS...

To digress slightly from the inane ramblings of the last few days and touch on a topic I know we all think about. Love. It has been a rather rollercoaster of a year for me in terms of love and the feelings and outcomes associated with this rather enigmatic and highly volatile emotion. The Cyclist and I broke up a year ago and I thought at that time that I would never in my life be able to breath or function again as a normal human being. The pain was so immense and consuming that to try and think of anything else was tantamount to being in the ring with Muhammad Ali, gloveless and without skills. To get myself off the kitchen floor (which became my safe haven) was one of the biggest challenges I could face at that stage. But I did. And I am here today, functioning and on the road to happiness. The lessons I have learnt in the past year have been hard, eye-opening and scary; but they have taught me about myself and how to poke fear and darkness in the eye with a teaspoon!

I have learnt to breath. One of the most fundamental things we humans do on a daily basis, but the first thing that becomes impossible when your heart is breaking. It seems as though taking in air when your brain has convinced your heart to give up all hope, is like trying to suck molasses through a straw. Although is can be done, the energy and concentration required to perform it is so extreme that your body just cannot do it on the reserve fuel it has just keeping you from stopping breathing all together. Breathing becomes something you have to consciously do, something you have to allot time to perform, otherwise the darkness comes and there is no escaping.

Time. I have learned not to wish time away. Not to say things like “please wake me up in 6 months when this will all be over”. Because it won’t, it will just extend the grieving period for even longer. Time is manageable and always keeps going. That’s its beauty, it is always moving forward and you can break it up into any number of imaginable segments just to manage. But don’t wish it away, each second that passes; painful, heartbreakingly agonizing and scary, is a second you can never get back and in that second that you wished away, you may have just wished away something that could make you smile.

I have learned to listen to my heart. She is always right and for as long as she is the one keeping me alive, I will listen to her until the end. My brain and heart are two very different animals. My brain is rational, she is structured and she performs her tasks with the cutting ability of a criminal lawyer. Her arguments are good on both sides, her research is always thorough and she does not live in the grey area. She is always right in a world of robots, non existent feeling and a flawless emotional justice system. I have learned that we do not live in this system; we live in a system fraught with grey areas and emotions. A world where emotion is what drives economies; greed, lust, power. My heart knows me; she knows every organ in my body; what they do, how efficiently they perform, and what makes them tick. She is the voice in the back of my head saying something that my brain can so easily ignore/rationalize/justify; but she is there and she does not desist until either she has been heard, or what she has said will happen has come to fruition. She is my guide.

Love is the one emotion that fuels all the others into being. It is easily translated into rage, fear, despair. It is the one each and every person seeks out to fulfill a need they may have. It is all around us on a daily basis; but always the most elusive to grasp. It comes in many forms, each unique to the individual, but often coveted under the auspicious that someone’s else’s can also been mine. It cannot. Love is personal, unique and powerful. Let it happen to you. Let it find you and fill you with the unimaginable joys and rewards it can bring. Open your heart to it when you are ready, take a deep breath in and thank the universe that you weren’t wasting time doing something else.

Love is… everything you think it can be and more.

NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONS

Okay Peeps, so it’s that time of the year again when we all, with the greatest intentions, make up our New Years resolutions. I have a strategy this year which I think will guarantee me a 50% success ratio (which in terms of NY’s resolutions I think is a rather high percentage). Strategy: make lots, therefore when someone asks you “How many have you kept?” and you say 12, that sounds really high. Obviously try and avoid the “How many did you make” conversation as this will give away your strategy.

So below is my list which you can all pretty much guess the 50% I’ll be keeping:

1) Stop smoking. Check. Had my last little cancer stick this morning. Good bye cruel little tobacco men, rest in peace in someone else’s lungs.

2) Start training for Oceans. Check. Ran 25kms this morning (and then had the most delicious cigarette ever). Damn you Marlboro Silver’s to hell!

3) Buy utensils for my kitchen so that I can actually use it to cook as opposed to using it as a bar.

4) Learn how to cook.

5) Learn how to say “No”. Otherwise, learn how not to sleep and generate an additional 6 arms.

6) Learn how not to sleep and generate an additional 6 arms!

7) Find a magic genie in order to raise £1500 for the London Marathon.

8) Tell all your friends you are running the London Marathon as they need to contribute to this worthy cause. (As a side note, I really am running this and really do need to raise £1500 for this Charity that I am running for (Phab Kids) so I will be creating a Just Giving Webpage where you guys can just chuck all extra cash lying around into that for such a worthy cause)

9) Find a sponsor for flight tickets to get to London Marathon.

10) Try keeping as many of the above as possible!

Happy New Year Peeps, may 2010 be a little less chaos filled and lot more fun and love filled!

DIFFICULT DECISIONS

Making the decision to be alone is one of the hardest decisions I have ever made in my life. I am a part of a whole type of person. I have always been with a partner since I was able to date. 6 months between long term relationships is not enough time to realize who are you and find out how you like your eggs, scrambled or fried. I think that each person in the relationship needs to be whole individually, before the relationship can blossom. You cannot be a half and rely on the other person to be the other half and support you all the time. Which is why I currently find myself in the position that I am in at the moment. Alone. By myself. Without a partner. Self inflicted of course but I think the best decision for me at the moment. Because as I said before, I am a part of a whole type of person… I need to learn to be a whole.

My decision is hurting the person I am trying most not to hurt, by doing this. I know this sounds very confusing but this is how I see it. Being together I oscillate between saying yes to something one day, and then saying absolutely no to the very same thing the next day. And then I cry. For Hours. I’m everywhere and nowhere at the same time and it’s not conducive for a loving relationship. Not withstanding the issue I have with not really knowing who I am or loving myself or knowing what I want from life, therefore how can I possibly give love to others. Anyway… with all this going on I decided that the best decision for us in the long run and the best decision for me currently was to part and for me to be alone. I do not know if there will be an us in the long run or not. All I am doing is trying to figure me out and this is the course of action I have chosen.

Yes, I know what you all are thinking… super selfish and doesn’t he have a say in the matter. Of course he does! And he has been amazing. We have discussed it a number of times, going in circles, figuring new things out each time and all he wants is for me to be happy. The selfish and unselfish trying to figure out life’s intricacies. He just wants me to be happy, no matter how much he is hurting that is all he wants. How can one person be so supportive when they think the decision the other person is making is so wrong…? Something else to work on I suppose… I think I should make a list.

1. Make yourself a whole first before dealing with issues 2-237.
Right...

Anywho, this is where I am. I want to thank everyone for being supportive and putting up with my crap, most of all the Cyclist.

THAT FEELING...

Nothing beats the sensation of falling in love. The continual butterflies doing little fluttery somersaults in your tummy. The silly smile plastered across your face when you think of them. The giggles to yourself when you remember that time when… It’s got to be the best feeling in the world. And what’s better, I get to do it a second time around with the same person. The Cyclist and I are falling in love again and what makes this time round even better is that there are no unexpected surprises, so the nervousness usually accompanied with the head over heals sensation is not there… just the wonderful wonderful fluttery little butterflies!

We were in The Big Smoke this weekend for a very long overdue wedding. The couple is question had known each other for 18 years and been together for 15 of those years. Wow! They were the first to meet of their friendship group and essentially the last couple to tie the knot. It was gorgeous. The groom’s face as she walked down the aisle was unforgettable. She was crying, he was barely keeping it together. It was one of the most romantic weddings I have been to purely because of the nature of the couple. You could see that even after 18 years, those butterflies were there and fluttering away as if they’d just downed a couple of redbulls!

The Cyclist and I sat together smiling and giggling to each other like teenagers. We even took pictures of ourselves smiling and giggling and kissing. It was magic! After spending almost 4 years together and then taking an unexpected and rather emotional 6 month sabbatical from each other (and ourselves I think), we’ve managed to find the best parts of each other again without forgetting the bad stuff, but rather with a better understanding of how to deal with and help each other through.

I’m beginning to be happy again. There are less days filled with tears and more days filled with smiles. I have more of a want to spend time with people rather than huddling under my duvet and sobbing myself to sleep. He reminds me what it feels like to be happy and how wonderful it can be spending time with family and friends making them happy. He smiles at me and his eyes sparkle and I love knowing that that is because of me. He is my Cyclist and I am his Crazii and we are happy.

I love being happy.

LOVE… WHAT KIND?

When someone you love is hurting and you are partly to blame for that hurt, what do you do? When being around them makes them hurt more but all you want to do is take away the pain, what do you do? When you can’t do what they ask you to do to take the pain away, what do you do? When they have made a decision to bare the pain alone, what do you do? How do you make someone you love see that doing it alone is not the best option? How do you make them see that what they are asking of you is not the right thing? How do you tell them you’ll always love them and make them believe you?

Love is a strange thing. Infuriating, wonderful, awe-inspiring and lethal. The Ancient Greeks had 4 different words for love: agape, eros, philia, and storgē.


• Agape: general affection, feeling of being content or holding one in high regard

• Eros: passionate love, with sensual desire and longing

• Philia: friendship, loyalty to friends, family, and community

• Storgē: natural affection, like that felt by parents for offspring

I think there should be more. More to describe situations where there is pain involved or situations where there is joy. Situations where there is surprise or situations where you need to say ‘love’ but differentiated depending on your relationship with that individual. I wish there was a way to describe the changes in love. How situations have caused that change, but by no means diminished it’s power. How you can feel one love for a person one day; and another form of love for that same person another day.

Love is not enough. It is often not enough to see a relationship through it’s ups and down, and the word itself just does not do emotions justice in difficult situations.

Love is a strange thing. Infuriating, wonderful, awe-inspiring and lethal.