the path of least resistance

that was the previous name of my blog when things were in its apparent harmony. having found a partner to settle down with and making future plans for marriage. it was an age of aquarius.

of course this has so far been the reverse with upheavals and well, let's just say best laid plans gone awry. but that again was a concerted choice so it's futile going back there again.

i've been riveted by the writing of aaron sorkin in the newsroom of late (few good men, west wing) and he has the dialogue and human dynamics down pat. namely how age doesn't determine one's management of emotions, namely in relationships. here's a protagonist with a slew of career highs and lows and he gets out of every spat with dignity and self-respect, yet his dealing with an ex who had cheated on him continues to plague him to the point of irrational behaviour and juvenile regression. fascinating and spot-on.

what i relate most is the intellectual engagement or should i say, fixation on our proverbial challenges rather than stepping back to sort out what is 'really bothering you.' i've used logic often to escape from feelings and perhaps that bites me in the ass when you don't deal with it soon enough. my latest break up being a perfect fuck up. i spent more than a year rationalising the reasons to stay rather than the emotions. i had long 'lost that loving feeling' and i reasoned that sometimes relationships do not require that. one can actually develop the bond and not be actually 'in' love. that maybe the case when you're in a business partnership but sacrifice and effort requires a lot deeper considerations. see, even here i've used consideration and not feelings.

so by the time i acknowledged that i didn't really love her but more i was used to having her around my life, i realised the superego had long taken reigns of this direction, wanting to keep her for my stability rather than to be prepared to give of myself, go the long haul to accomodate her expectations and goals, values even, it takes so much more rather than to just go along with everything which makes sense.

i guess i'll look back some day and really acknowledge the learning curve. for now it just fluctuates from guilt to missing, but that again is completely exclusive from love. love escapes me really. and maybe a large part is from never really allowing it to happen, everything hitherto has been a whole lot of self-convincing and moderation. i don't think i really know love at all, as one joni mitchell once postulated.