You Learn. (Or You Don't. It's Your Life...I Can't Tell You What To Do.)

I started this post early on Tuesday, in a completely different frame of mind than I happen to be in now. For starters, I've had a couple of drinks. For enders, I realized - in thinking about how to finish this one off instead of leaving it in draft limbo like so many of my other posts - that this post is not intended for anyone who I know regularly reads what I write. Honestly, at midnight on a Tuesday after a couple of Margarita-flavored near-beers, I couldn't really tell you WHO the intended audience is. This may not even be a very coherent essay, for all I know.

Maturity is first the shedding of what you are not, and then the balancing of what you are in relation to the human being you love, and allowing the selves of that person which are not related to you to exist independently, outside of the relationship.
- Anaïs Nin

I've carried a copy of the poem at the end of this post, which is titled After a While and was written in 1971 by Veronica Shoffstall, around with me for many years. For a long time, I incorporated it into a sort of personal manifesto (not always a well applied personal philosophy, but so few manifestos are). A recent piece on Brain Pickings on the anniversary of Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique, which in many ways was a catalyst for modern feminism, brought it to mind.

I'm not much of a Capital F kind of Feminist, as most self-avowed Feminists would probably be quick to point out. Instead, I ascribe to the same philosophy as contemporary folk-singer Ani DiFranco, who says, "My idea of feminism is self-determination, and it's very open-ended: every woman has the right to become herself, and do whatever she needs to do."

That being said, After a While is a treatise on the importance of being your own person. That couple-hood is no guarantee of happiness or personal validation, or even of love. No one is promised romantic love. Not ever. And the idea that a woman is not complete without a partner, that gifts are a quantifiable display of love, and that all relationships are based on what each participant can get from the other...well, I reject these ideas totally.

Look. I don't have a perfect relationship, not on any level. None of my friendships or my marriage or my working relationships is without some flaw, some deeply ingrained fault. But to me, that lack of perfection is what often endears the relationship to me. The best relationships are those built on mutual love and respect, without expectation, the ones that grow stronger over time and as the individuals begin to let their guard down.

I have been lucky to have some deep and lasting friendships in my life based on simply the joy of the other person's company. Things in common. Shared experiences. But relationships do take work. It is not and should not be effortless. You have to put in some kind of work to get a return, on anything worthwhile in this life. Anything that came to you too easily can go from you equally easily, you see? Anyone who tells you love is easy has probably never experienced it very deeply.

Let's look at the concept of perfection for a second. What the hell is that? Is it attainable? No. Is it sustainable? Not at all. Should you want to attain it? Why? How boring! Perfection is a state of achieved ideals. Ideals! Not actual messy reality, but the idea of something beyond the reach of the real. Once you've reached the pinnacle of something, achieved that thing you've allowed yourself to be convinced is the defining moment of your whole entire existence, you know what comes next? The downward spiral of disappointment and resentment, because nothing compares to the bland stasis state of so-called perfection that you have held up as the standard by which to judge every aspect of yourself.

And if you ever, somehow, by some miracle or force of will, get to that "perfect" moment...Congratulations! You've met a goal, reached some kind of arbitrary milestone. You've gotten everything you ever could have wanted - your heart's desire. Now what? No. Seriously...what now? See? It's the peak before the crash. Not only is the concept of perfect happiness by its very nature unrealistic and unattainable, it's also a trap that we set for ourselves. "If only this and that happened, then I'd be happy."

Bullshit. Because that doesn't work. It never happens like that. You just move the marker to the next thing that you are sure will make you "happy" and life will be "perfect." And if you're the kind of person who can't easily find contentment, you continue to make a witch's house of your misery, trapping any little happiness you find there and feeding it to the flames of your unreasonable expectations.

Listen. Real life is not some stale, regurgitated fairy story that's been sanitized for mass consumption and ease of retelling. You should not be holding yourself up to the dubious yardstick of Happily Ever Afters (which I highly doubt were ever that happy in the ever after). If you want a prince, why not rescue him from the dragon? Slay a few wolves and don't wait for the woodsman. Be the heroine.

You are not your body. You are not the labels on your clothes. Why define yourself by these temporary and shallow measures of status? Life is not a contest or competition, or a game. Because if you think it's a game you can win with the accumulation of wealth and stuff and an emptiness of self, you are a walking exercise in missing the point. If life is a game, it's one we all will ultimately lose.

Learn the empowerment of being able to pay your own way. Learn to be an individual first and foremost. Learn to move past the past: your history is only a story. It does not define you in the here and now. The past is like the Goblin King: It has no power over you. Don't wait until the end scene to finally figure that one out.



Sweetheart, you're going to get older. What have you got to give to the world, when the inevitable happens and you start to join the ranks of the invisible? What defines you, then?

Climb your happy ass down from that crumbling ivory tower you built for yourself, Princess, and start living a self-determined life of "I want you, but I don't need you."

After a While

After a while you learn
the subtle difference between
holding a hand and chaining a soul
and you learn
that love doesn't mean leaning
and company doesn't always mean security.

And you begin to learn
that kisses aren't contracts
and presents aren't promises
and you begin to accept your defeats
with your head up and your eyes ahead
with the grace of woman,
not the grief of a child

and you learn
to build all your roads on today
because tomorrow's ground is
too uncertain for plans
and futures have a way of falling down
in mid-flight.

After a while you learn
that even sunshine burns
if you get too much
so you plant your own garden
and decorate your own soul
instead of waiting for someone
to bring you flowers.

And you learn that you really can endure
you really are strong
you really do have worth
and you learn
and you learn
with every goodbye, you learn...