Monika Basile's Blog: Confessions of a Bleeding Heart - Posts Tagged "alone"
The Myth of Meant to Be
I have been hearing a lot of, “If it’s meant to be it will happen without you looking.” And “If I were single again, I think I would rather be alone and to myself. I wouldn’t want a relationship.”
Not true. Not true at all.
If that were true, you would not be in your relationship now. If it was much more exciting to be alone and doing it all alone—you would be. If life with your mate were so terrible you would not be with them if you were as strong and capable as you say you are.
It is easy for someone to say, “I would just be alone and enjoy myself.” When they aren’t and rarely have been. It is easy to talk that talk when you haven’t walked that walk. It is easy to say it and much harder to do.
There are wonderful things about being single. There are joys in being single. I am not denying that in the least. There can be a lot of freedom , and sometimes that very freedom can also chain you in. When there is no one to answer to, to decision make with, to give a damn about what you do, we can strangle ourselves with our freedom. It is easy to think that being single is an episode of Sex in the City when you have no one to be responsible for but yourself. Everything can then be about you, Yay, that’s wonderful—but that isn’t my life at all.
For those who are attached and say it, try doing it. Try thinking about relying on no one but yourself and the choices you make. Think about when you second guess those choices in the dead of night and you turn to the space next to you and say, “Did I do the right thing or not?” and the pillow is silent. Think about being alone in your grief as well as your joy—no one to share both the good and the bad. Everything is handled solely by you. You learn to do it alone or you give up, but just because you learn to adjust does not mean you like it. I have realized how strong and decisive I really am yet many times, I wish I didn’t have to be.
When you have no choice but to carry on by yourself, it becomes much less glamorous. The grass is not always greener on that other side and if it is, it’s because I am in full charge of the lawn care with no one to help me and I’m exhausted too. Being alone is manageable, it is tolerable but it is not an easy thing and it is a constant challenge. And sometimes it’s just plain lonely.
The “if it’s meant to be it will happen” I actually believe that. However, I very much doubt the universe will drop my ideal love through this second floor apartment roof into my living room while I’m watching reruns on my cable-less TV. I am thinking I need to be out in the world for that to happen. I am not ashamed to be actively seeking someone to share my life with. I don’t feel anyone truly finds someone when they are not “looking”. I don’t believe that anyone who wants to have someone in their lives is actually closing their eyes to all the potential mates around them while they are waiting for it to just happen.
They are looking—even when they say they are not.
If they weren’t, then they would not be open to the experience when it showed up. They would pass it by without even knowing it. They would miss out on it. I don’t want to miss out on any opportunity by closing my eyes. Heck, I may even stop blinking.
Monika M. Basile
Not true. Not true at all.
If that were true, you would not be in your relationship now. If it was much more exciting to be alone and doing it all alone—you would be. If life with your mate were so terrible you would not be with them if you were as strong and capable as you say you are.
It is easy for someone to say, “I would just be alone and enjoy myself.” When they aren’t and rarely have been. It is easy to talk that talk when you haven’t walked that walk. It is easy to say it and much harder to do.
There are wonderful things about being single. There are joys in being single. I am not denying that in the least. There can be a lot of freedom , and sometimes that very freedom can also chain you in. When there is no one to answer to, to decision make with, to give a damn about what you do, we can strangle ourselves with our freedom. It is easy to think that being single is an episode of Sex in the City when you have no one to be responsible for but yourself. Everything can then be about you, Yay, that’s wonderful—but that isn’t my life at all.
For those who are attached and say it, try doing it. Try thinking about relying on no one but yourself and the choices you make. Think about when you second guess those choices in the dead of night and you turn to the space next to you and say, “Did I do the right thing or not?” and the pillow is silent. Think about being alone in your grief as well as your joy—no one to share both the good and the bad. Everything is handled solely by you. You learn to do it alone or you give up, but just because you learn to adjust does not mean you like it. I have realized how strong and decisive I really am yet many times, I wish I didn’t have to be.
When you have no choice but to carry on by yourself, it becomes much less glamorous. The grass is not always greener on that other side and if it is, it’s because I am in full charge of the lawn care with no one to help me and I’m exhausted too. Being alone is manageable, it is tolerable but it is not an easy thing and it is a constant challenge. And sometimes it’s just plain lonely.
The “if it’s meant to be it will happen” I actually believe that. However, I very much doubt the universe will drop my ideal love through this second floor apartment roof into my living room while I’m watching reruns on my cable-less TV. I am thinking I need to be out in the world for that to happen. I am not ashamed to be actively seeking someone to share my life with. I don’t feel anyone truly finds someone when they are not “looking”. I don’t believe that anyone who wants to have someone in their lives is actually closing their eyes to all the potential mates around them while they are waiting for it to just happen.
They are looking—even when they say they are not.
If they weren’t, then they would not be open to the experience when it showed up. They would pass it by without even knowing it. They would miss out on it. I don’t want to miss out on any opportunity by closing my eyes. Heck, I may even stop blinking.
Monika M. Basile
The Ultimatum
I have never believed in ultimatums—at least until I needed to give one. I never thought it was fair or right to expect someone to do anything if they did not choose it themselves, if they did not come to some conclusion that something must change. I never felt it was good to impose what I believed on anyone else.
What I didn’t realize is that an ultimatum doesn’t actually make anyone choose anything one way or another. The choice is in the giver of it. There comes a time in life when we inherently know what we can and cannot not live with. There comes a day when we look on our life and ask ourselves, “Can I do this another 20 years, another ten years, another year, another week, another day or even for one more hour?”
I discovered that no matter what prayer I had for another to change, the ultimatum given is to me. I had to decide that if what was destroying me did not stop—that I was worth saving. You would think that this kind of choice would be easy but it isn’t. It is devastating. It is an earthquake even if it is only that way to me. It is an actual shattering of something deep inside of a past, a present and a future even. How can that decision possibly be easy? And how do I decide and believe that I am worth saving, when for the majority of my life, I was too busy saving others to bother to examine my own existence which had been teetering on the edge too closely?
I have never been one to give up too easily—not on anything and especially not on someone I love. I guess I have always looked at it as a failing to give up on the people around me whom I hold dear. I mean what would that say about me as a person? What does it present to the world for me to put my salvation before another? What will I think of myself? I am someone who has lived their life in service to others and if I turn my back, if I say, “enough”, if I shut myself off from another—how can that possibly be true? And how do I live with the ultimatum? How do I keep going on knowing that my decision has hurt someone else?
This past year has been one of immense heartache and loss and yes—guilt. I chose me. It is not something I am used to doing. I chose my own well-being, I chose my own safety, and I chose my own peace by holding to an ultimatum to allow myself an end to what had become quite miserable. It is the aftermath part that pain lingers in. It is in this spot where I doubt myself, wondering if I tried harder for longer and did not give up. This is the thought that keeps me up at night.
It is different than regret. My mind and my heart both tell me sticking to this ultimatum is what saved me. I know the choices were very few. In the end there were only two things to choose from—fall to pieces in someone else’s destruction or go on alone. That is where the ultimatum I gave came from. Them or me. I am just not used to choosing me. I wasn’t even sure if I was capable of choosing me as the end approached.
I surprised myself. As you see, I am still here—going on.
Monika M. Basile
What I didn’t realize is that an ultimatum doesn’t actually make anyone choose anything one way or another. The choice is in the giver of it. There comes a time in life when we inherently know what we can and cannot not live with. There comes a day when we look on our life and ask ourselves, “Can I do this another 20 years, another ten years, another year, another week, another day or even for one more hour?”
I discovered that no matter what prayer I had for another to change, the ultimatum given is to me. I had to decide that if what was destroying me did not stop—that I was worth saving. You would think that this kind of choice would be easy but it isn’t. It is devastating. It is an earthquake even if it is only that way to me. It is an actual shattering of something deep inside of a past, a present and a future even. How can that decision possibly be easy? And how do I decide and believe that I am worth saving, when for the majority of my life, I was too busy saving others to bother to examine my own existence which had been teetering on the edge too closely?
I have never been one to give up too easily—not on anything and especially not on someone I love. I guess I have always looked at it as a failing to give up on the people around me whom I hold dear. I mean what would that say about me as a person? What does it present to the world for me to put my salvation before another? What will I think of myself? I am someone who has lived their life in service to others and if I turn my back, if I say, “enough”, if I shut myself off from another—how can that possibly be true? And how do I live with the ultimatum? How do I keep going on knowing that my decision has hurt someone else?
This past year has been one of immense heartache and loss and yes—guilt. I chose me. It is not something I am used to doing. I chose my own well-being, I chose my own safety, and I chose my own peace by holding to an ultimatum to allow myself an end to what had become quite miserable. It is the aftermath part that pain lingers in. It is in this spot where I doubt myself, wondering if I tried harder for longer and did not give up. This is the thought that keeps me up at night.
It is different than regret. My mind and my heart both tell me sticking to this ultimatum is what saved me. I know the choices were very few. In the end there were only two things to choose from—fall to pieces in someone else’s destruction or go on alone. That is where the ultimatum I gave came from. Them or me. I am just not used to choosing me. I wasn’t even sure if I was capable of choosing me as the end approached.
I surprised myself. As you see, I am still here—going on.
Monika M. Basile
