One of my previous postings (Seattle Love Cycle – Hormonally Yours) generated a slew of emails and feedbacks. I asked myself: why don’t I receive such feedback on other postings? … The messages included both agreements and disagreements and there was one central theme asking/telling me about the solution. I don’t write about love and relationship. If I do, there should be a veiled dark humor somewhere in it in addition to the fact that my past track-record proves my inability of fully understanding relationships. All that being said, arbitrary observations and common sense suggest a few common themes in lasting relationships:

> Repeated Experience – A long or lasting relationship is mostly a repeated experience after the first few years. There won’t be much up and down as it relates to emotional or basic human needs. Occasional boredom is a part of any long experience whether it is our career, family, or other forms of continual association. Some people take this repeated-experience as a negative sign and try to challenge it by doing "exciting things" that might stress out the relationship. Excitement is not the only form of happiness. Peace of mind and consistency are also contributing to happiness. Long and repeated experiences are about peace of mind more than anything else.

> Selflessness – The essence of love is self-giving, the surrender of one. This is something different from and more than attraction. These are all the ways by which one person goes out towards another. To give oneself to another is something more than merely desiring what is good for another. It’s about this another becomes "I" as it were my own. Then the question arises whether any person can give himself or herself to another because everyone is always, of one’s very nature, protective. Self surrender as a form of love is the result of a process within the person, and presupposes a mature vision of values, and a will ready and able to commit itself in this particular way.

> Responsibility – Phrases like "You only live once", "This is about you so do your best to be happy", "you didn’t fail, the relationship ended" … expose the idea to make it all about "You" without placing any responsibility on "You". These expressions are just too simplistic, on-dimensional, and naive means to comfort you – temporarily I must add! I find these pseudo-advisers to be narcissistically self-involved. Where is the sense of accountability in this logic? Responsibility in a relationship is simply the affirmation of another person’s value and well-being in the most careful way. There is no fine line between responsibility and selflessness. This is one of those thick gray lines … and the only way to know where this line resides, is to cross it!

… … This line is about understanding that responsibility, the most selfless of all obsessions, is only another name for love.

(to my charming parents, the most selfless-beings of all)

 

> an email message inspired this posting …

Listening is one of the most important forms of art. I personally learn through listening and to a lesser extent reading and observing. I’ve always believed in the power of words and the way the message is framed -or- the discussion is structured.

I believe good listening makes it easier to build trust, rapport, and confidence. Listening is time well spent in my view. Listening is not just what we heard, it’s also what we understood. We can express that we’re actually engaged in the conversation and we’re paying attention by:

"Attending": By head nods or eye contact. This shows you are paying attention to the other party. We should never look around when someone is talking to us without providing explanation.

"Paraphrasing": By reflecting back key words and messages. We should reflect back the content and the emotion of what the speaker is saying. Paraphrasing shows that you have understood the main message.

"Summarizing": or recapping is used to call out the main points and provide focus to the conversation. I try to summarize after several pieces of information have been disclosed.

"Clarifying": By asking questions. I think this ensures understanding and gain more detail about the subject. I make sure to clarify information that is vague or unclear before proceeding to the next point.

…………. We should listen, let’s the words swirl around our heads, and then form an opinion.

What is stability as it relates to us? How do we measure it? Who is stable? Does it have something to do with one’s state of mind or status? I didn’t like someone yesterday, I reexamined my reasons and the facts today, and I might like that person tomorrow. Does that make me emotionally or philosophically unstable? On a broader scope, is it wrong to examine things you believed in your entire life – specially as in one’s case if they were shoved into one’s head when s/he was three? Does the capacity of critical thinking make you an unstable person?

I happen to believe that critical thinkers have less conceit – and that doesn’t mean their actions are completely blemish free.

Obvious aspects of stability in today’s society are perceived to be style, physical appearance, and financial strength. But the most important aspects of stability (which frankly not many people have) are: state of mind, confidence, listening attitude, and introspection.

Just because some people are doing all the talking doesn’t mean they are the most stable. And remember: if someone "seems" to be stable today doesn’t mean they will be so forever, or tomorrow for that matter.

Human-beings are extremely social, insecure, and susceptible. Unfortunately, this could lead many of us to attach importance on other people’s opinions. So it becomes easy to go from super-stable to flat-out unstable. In my view, reasonable volatility blended with introspection is not a negative trait.

The secret to survival is to question and critic yourself -but- not give damn when others question you!

I feel guilty and blameworthy today. It’s that state of mind that one feels remorse caused by perception of responsibility for some committed offense or hurt towards another person. I’m angry at myself for feeling this way because guilt is like a heavy suitcase handcuffed to you full of regret and disappointment. Guilt doesn’t let you move, think, or concentrate. It stands in the way of your revival.

At times, guilt is described as the inability to forgive oneself for a perceived wrongdoing. The wrongdoing may or may not have had negative consequences for others. If others were involved, they may or may not still be hurt. A wrongdoing may be an action, a thought, or even what we said to someone. If the wrongdoing was an action, you probably think of it as a mistake. You feel guilty for the wrongdoing because you cannot forgive yourself for it.

If you speak to your therapist, they try to convince you that the root-cause of a perceived guilt could be lack of self-esteem, perfectionist tendencies, tendency to be depressed, frequent anxiety, or a possible need to be in control. For me the root-cause is certainly none of the above! I’m convinced that the guilt I’m feeling, is neither perceived nor justified. The wrongdoing is related to the things I said to someone. Silly things I wish I had never said. Thoughtless points that caused anguish to a hopeful person. Now I’m just hoping the hurt is either cured or no longer there.

Sometimes we try to the mend the fences by going back and trying to explain, convince, or express regret – but the opportunity might no longer be there. The person we hurt might have been changed and we should expect to face indifference and negligence. The damage is done. The only available option is to acknowledge, take responsibility, and move on.

Sometimes in life, it’s important to pause every now and then and look back – even if every step of the path might feel right. I look back and do see that I would have done a few things differently, if I could. When I want to look forward, I want to see a line that’s going somewhere – not a bunch of random dots that might, sadly, illustrate an elusive line. So, scary as it is, I’m stepping off this path and choosing a new one, even if the destination of the new path is much less clear than the old one and there are no guarantees that I’ll be happier with where it leads.

This is about acknowledging and responding to another part of me. The part I never thought existed.

Have you recently had one of those depressing Seattle days? Every Seattleite certainly has one of those days every now and then! In those days, you feel nothing less than a miserable, disconnected, and insignificant creature who worth nothing. You feel like all of your previous decisions have been mistakes and that’s why you are where you are. These thoughts get more and more complicated and at the end you start wearing out your self-esteem. On those days, you’re so sad that it feels like you just returned from your own funeral.

The gloomy Seattle weather has something to do with it, so do Seattleites. One of my friends said it best "Seattle is like that popular girl in high school. The one who gets your vote for homecoming queen because she always smiles and says hello. But she doesn’t know your name and doesn’t care to. She doesn’t want to be your friend. She’s just being nice."

In Seattle we do a lot of things alone and without a sense of community. More than three-quarters of people participate in an individual sport but only 13 percent play on a team. We ride bikes alone; go on walks alone; troll bookstores alone, then go home and read alone having a glass of wine or a cup of tea. Coordinating a dinner with a friend seems like a shoddy effort because traveling from the Eastside to Westside (~5-7 miles) is, in the eyes of many, a huge undertaking.

Seattle has some elements of a boring place during this time of the year. But the bigger problem is its people – most of whom being transplants from other places who decided to attend lovers and other strangers’ funerals.

I saw this documentary over the weekend. On the surface it seemed like another tacky work out of Hollywood but I stayed patient and non-judgmental and tried to get something good out of it. After the first half an hour, the film started portraying an important message … a cliché message — but the form of delivery is amazingly intelligent and blended in thought-provoking humor.

"If you don’t take risks, you’ll have a wasted soul"

For some people, the concept of "working" has evolved to "emailing". These professional emailers produce enormous amount of unnecessary email and include the whole world to say that they exist. Their professional existence depends on email.

There is no question that email is a powerful tool for exchanging ideas and answering questions fast. But email is also motionless and leaves a lot of room for interpretation because the tone of conversation is missing.

There is a famous saying in the legal community that says: if you can whisper, don’t talk and if you can talk, don’t email!

Last Monday, I had a long conversation with one of my friends. She has this tendency to make me colonize everything I convey. The topic of our conversation was self-awareness and the importance attached to it. We were talking about how self-awareness can broadcast itself to every aspect of our personal and social life.

I think there is another layer between our personal and social life which is connected to both: our imagination. It’s such an underestimated facet of our lives because of its fancy nature. I think we would be able to know everyone much better if we could somehow dig up their imaginations (if they got one that is).

It is in our imaginations where we deliberate what we would like to have/do beyond our daily needs and wants. It’d be nice to know if we would ever think about anything that doesn’t immediately benefit us. That way we would know how self-aware, selfless, or selfish we are.

By searching thru our imaginations … we would know how far out we dream. We would know what "love" means to us beyond our emotional and physical needs, and more importantly beyond our fears. We would know if the outer calm is the reflection of inner peace. We would know if we are passionate or passive, growing or grown, fulfilled or foiled.

One of my friends who constantly reads my blog asked me to write a few interesting things about myself. Well, here you go:

– I love cooking. Specially slow-cooking when you spend hours in the kitchen
– I was drafted by a professional soccer team when I was 15 years old
– I have lost 3 best friends so far. They are all in the better place. Sad but true …
– I have an Independent Filmmaker (producer) diploma from Hollywood Film Institute
– I don’t like white truffles. I don’t know why they are so expensive
– I want to have four children – all girls
– My dad says "My great grandfather was Russian". I don’t believe him … it’s yet to be proven 🙂

 What to do when people you consider friends continuously rail you with impressions of insincerity?

Friendships are the byproduct of human-beings being stuck to live together. The most crucial element of a friendship is "trust". If there is no trust there could be no relationship of any sort.

Human nature has a huge tendency towards aggression and stepping over the boundaries. That’s a fact. Period! Responsible parents control their kids by the virtue of proportional reward and punishment, healthy societies require governing laws to control the public in order to keep them honest, but what controls the aggression and insincerity in a mutually-governed friendship where there is no statement of superiority?

The answer is "Manners". Manners are our awareness of the feelings of others. In friendships, there is no tangible tool to control the other party’s behavior,  so level-headedness and balanced behavior become individuals’ responsibilities. Believe it or not, in modern days your friendships are the only venues available to you to realize whether or not you’d be a fair, just, and adequate queen if you were born a princess. Tough luck! You were not born a princess but at least you can choose to be sincere and unpretentious.