I Begin to Know Myself

I have  no idea how this blog is going to flow.  Usually, I try my best to work it out, have an idea, and stick to that schedule.  I have done some of that.  However, I am tired and I know that will affect it.  But, here goes:

Today, I read two articles.  They are below.  You don’t have to read them.  They are good, but I just wanted you to know where my thoughts gathered.  These articles added to all the stuff I have been feeling and going through for months.

Articles:

Maintaining Your Identity in a  Relationship

What People Need to Know to have Great First-time Sex

As I read these two articles, I realized part of why I haven’t been dating or gotten back into any type of permanent relationship.  Now, there are a lot of reasons, but try these on:

1)  I am afraid of losing myself in the relationship.

2)  I am afraid I am not good enough.

Before I get into this, I want to thank one particular blog for helping me:

August McLaughlin   You, dear lady, have helped me through your posts to say things I felt I needed to say.  You know those comments.  I treasure the certainty that I felt when making those on your blog because I knew they would be accepted.

Nearly all of you out there in blog land have helped me to feel more confident and able to speak out freely over the last 16 or so months.  Thank you.  I have grown and this is one of the products of that growth.

Now, some people who might read this post are going to be angry with me.  They are going to be angry simply because I mention that I don’t think you have to be in a marriage to have a full-time relationship.  I don’t think that sex is valid only in marriage.  ( I can hear the screams now ) – (too bad)

It’s a bit difficult for me to write like this because I don’t know who is reading my posts.  I have friends and family who would be appalled at the above statements.  It helps me to understand what many gay and lesbian people go through when they believe they have to not tell their friends and family that they are the way they are.

This is precisely the reason I decided to go ahead and talk about it all.  I should not have to be afraid to say who I am and what I feel and what I believe.  I am not hurting anyone; I am just stating facts.  If those facts hurt, then you are allowing that; I didn’t do it.  There’s enough there for many self-help books and the reason statement 1 bothers me a lot.

1)  I am afraid of losing myself in the relationship.

In the past, I have chosen rather strong women as the females in my relationships.  Not all, but a lot.  What happens then is that I begin right off doing whatever I can do to please them.  In other words: I lose myself.  I become them.

This is a bad thing.  There is no real upside here.  If you get lost in a relationship, you will get to the point in which you no longer enjoy it.  Something will cause you to want to see it end.  You may bring that about directly or indirectly.  The other person may well not like you always doing things for them.  They may feel as if they have nothing to offer you and become uninterested too.  Whatever happens, the relationship is going to hurt and, without help, it will fall apart.  Bad thing is that a lot of relationships fall apart, but never end…they just stay together “for the kids” or “because you promised”, whatever.

Sex, on the other hand, is a hot topic that makes a lot of people uneasy.  Part of what bothers me is that many people do two things during sex.  One is that they don’t ask for what they need and get mad when they don’t get it.  Two is that they are seldom willing to give what they are asked to give and then don’t understand when the other person is upset they didn’t get it.  There is, usually, both of these going on at the same time from both people.  It makes for a messy, nasty time when it should be wonderful and sharing and giving and loving.  I am fairly open to a lot of ideas and thoughts and different things when two people are alone sharing sex.  I have always preferred the term “making love” but, more and more, I am realizing that it doesn’t have to be that so much as just care and consideration between two people who wish to be that close.

If it’s a “conquest” for you, then it won’t work.  If it’s something you feel you “have” to do, then it won’t work.  If I have to explain either of those statements, then no wonder you are having problems.

Back to me before I stop here.  I have kept myself a bit held back in regards to both sex and relationships.  They haven’t happened and haven’t worked well because I am afraid.  Those two fears mentioned above are kill joys.  They will completely decimate affection, love, and enjoyment.  They are what I am thinking about now and I believe I am on my way to an answer.  It will just take time.

What do you think about any / all of this?

Namaste,

Scott

And So It Goes

Since I did the post on Amanda Todd, the young woman who killed herself after being “bullied” for years, I have done a lot of surfing. That issue came up again, but in a little stranger place and, kinda, caught me off-guard.

So, I am surfing. I am, actually, reading new posts and trying to get a handle on the fact that I started following a whole lot of people that I didn’t mean to and am working on fixing that situation. If I follow you, I try to read all your posts and, in some way, let you know I did. But I can’t follow 137 posts and I know it, so just know that, if I stop following you and I have been for several months, let me know – I can fix that if I know.

OK, back to the article.

I was reading The Scarlett Heartt‘s post for today.  To the right side was listed some articles.  I decided to read this one: Porn producers threaten to flee LA over condom rule http://t.co/FOBr1NP6 .

When I read that the porn industry does over a billion dollars a year of business in that county, I was a little amazed.  I decided to try a post concerned with how this amount, though small in many respects, is measurable against our country’s national debt (Yeah, about 1,200 years of that income would clear it if we don’t increase it again).

Sorry for the pic, but thought you should kinda “see” what I am talking about.

Reading that article, begged the reading of this one: Girl Power Eroded by Cheap and Smutty Schoolgirl Photos .  Now, that one would’ve made a decent article (“decent” taking on a, perhaps, different meaning here), but I started reading the comments (as there were 211)

As I read through them, I was irreverently struck by the idea that so many people out there have little or no feelings for how “kids” are being treated.  Then, the article topped it off with a reference to Amanda Todd.  That got my attention and my article here was born.

I would encourage you to read the three links above and start reading the 210 comments.  See if you don’t get inflamed by the callousness used there.

Now, I will state that, when a person turns 18 (in the US), then their decisions (Unless a mental problem exists) are law-abiding and should not be considered “underage”.  However, so many of these comments were firing insults and harsh tones at the younger ladies (14 or so) who made the mistake of going into a bar while underage and drinking, then making choices (flashing), getting their pictures taken this way, and those pictures finding their way onto Facebook and other sites.

Underage means not old enough to make clear, good choices.  A lot of people forget that the US lowered that mark from 21 to 18 in the last 40 years.  All of a sudden people who had been “kids” were automatically adults.  Do you remember being 14?  That’s usually about 8th grade.  Did your decisions all make sense back then in the context of the world?  I trusted people I shouldn’t have trusted.  I got angry with people I shouldn’t have gotten angry with.  I made all kinds of mistakes.

So, my simple, humble opinion is that a 14 year old can’t make a good solid decision to stay out of a nightclub and can’t make a good solid decision to not drink once in there.  So, if they want popularity and to feel, temporarily, good about themselves, how can they make a good solid decision, while drinking, to not flash a little for someone who is complimenting them highly?  Then, they wake up the next day and soon find they did these things and want them to be deleted.

Why not?

They should not have been done in the first place.  There was no consent signed and, even though it was a public business, if they were going to pose a little compromisingly, the owner (ah, an adult) should have been the one to make certain he had both permission and legal rights (id) to post those pics.

I am not totally disagreeing with everything  said in the comments.  What I am saying is that we, as adults, have this tendency to either treat young adults (18-23) as children or to tread kids (12-17) as adults.  Neither of these is correct and will lead to problems.  I bring back in Amanda Todd here as a prime example.

Many of the comments told readers that the girls needed to “grow up“…right, precisely my point.

Namaste,

Scott

More than Just Getting Through

Or, is that what you are doing?Do you find yourself so tired at the end of the day that you are dragging, yet you don’t feel happy, fulfilled, or even satisfied? Do you already know what will happen tomorrow or, worse, are you so lost that you can’t even think about what may happen tomorrow?

I need you to know that I was that way. I was so worried each night that I couldn’t sleep, which only made the next day worse as I was now tired. The cycle continued until I got sick and had to stop for a few days (or, at least, slow down). Of course, then I was behind from slowing down, so now it was even worse.

This repetition goes on in more lives than I even want to count. I hear this all the time; sometimes, the people telling me don’t even know that it’s their problem; they are too “protected” from it by ignoring it or telling others (and themselves) “it isn’t so” or “it’s not my fault.”

So, what do we do? Well, I had a stroke that reset my life and showed me what was important and how I need to live the rest of my life. It slowed me down and set my priorities more in place. I wouldn’t suggest this method; painful, time-consuming, and you might die (I did).

Short of that, what I know is that nothing can change until you acknowledge there is a problem, and you take a big portion of the responsibility for there being a problem. You see, what I have found out is that, until you take responsibility for the problem and your other actions, nothing can change because you have removed yourself from both the problem and any power to change it.  Let me restate that:  If you are blaming others then you have no power to change anything.

I am not saying to blame yourself for everything (or anything, for that matter). Blame does no one any good; it only does harm. No, what I am saying is to put yourself in the driver’s seat, begin changing what needs to be changed, and welcome the new situation.

Talk to God about it; you can call it prayer, meditation, or whatever makes you feel good. Just know that God looks out for you and is just waiting for you to catch up so you can really make changes and enjoy them!
Namaste,
Scott