It has been said that we learn much more from our mistakes and failures than we do from our successes. Also many people believe that setbacks, pain or even tragedy represent opportunities for personal growth and change. In his book "Clapton" the great guitarist Eric Clapton details years of personal relationship failures and severe character failings that left him fragile and vulnerable. All the while he was having tremendous professional and financial success while at the same time failing miserably in his personal life. Along the way he experienced the loss of family and friends, the death of his beloved son Conor and a downward spiraling existence that lead him to eventually try to commit suicide by swallowing an entire jar of Valium pills. On the surface, to outsiders, it looked like Eric Clapton "had it all". However he was desperate, alone and unable to cope. Fortunately for Clapton, he eventually was forced to confront his demons and in a moment of desperation he begged for Divine guidance as his only relief and hope of escaping his cycle of misery and self destruction. I think many of us are like Clapton. We lose focus, get off track and try to fix ourselves with "things" or others who tell us what we want to hear. We may be lost in denial and feel that no one could possibly understand us. In these moments our only hope is to learn from the cycle of our mistakes and misadventures and take action to make change within ourselves.
3 comments:
Reading this post reminds me of the area of our life with the greatest potential for mistake and misadventure - the looking for Mr. Right, something I am uniquely unqualified to comment on. The little wisdom I have acquired in this domain has been learned late in life. Sadly for me, my mother was not a dating oracle and, although I was gifted academically (#11 in my graduating class), I never actually had a date in high school; alas, there were no proms for me. I know that it is hard to believe as I WAS voted "Most Lovable" by my senior class at graduation. Never having had much experience, I suck at dating, a fact less than fortuitous as my odds of success are diminishing further. Where was Jamie Bufalino, Time Out's Sex Columnist, when I needed good advice in the early 70s?
Q I am an 18-year-old “woman” who is still a virgin. Many of my friends find it odd that I still have [my virginity]. I want to lose it and get over the whole legend of doing it with “Mr. Right,” but I have a fear of it being painful. I don’t know how to approach [sex], especially since I watched a woman get raped when I was three. I want to see what the big fuss is about. I am talking to a guy online that I don’t know personally and who I am planning to screw (excuse me for being blunt), but I feel like I am still hanging on to the whole Mr. Right thing. It’s aggravating. I feel like I am on some sort of seesaw labeled SEX. I know I am a young, but I want some actual hard-core advice. Help!
A Let me just say up front: I don’t know if you can legitimately classify my advice as hard-core. I can get a little gangsta now and again, but usually it’s just because of my R-rated language and those times that I bust a verbal cap in people’s asses because they’re being fuckwads. Now, on to your issue. I generally find it hard to recommend having sex to anyone who writes me a letter with the word seesaw in it. I was considering making an exception for you, but truthfully, I don’t think you’re ready for it, and especially not with some random dude you met online. I would not underestimate how scarring it was to see a woman getting raped when you were three. Keeping your virginity has been your way of being self-protective, and it would be a shame to suddenly give that up just because you want to see what the fuss is all about. Yes, having sex is great, but the fuss is still going to be there when you finally find a guy who you can trust to devirginize you in a nurturing way. I’m not saying you have to wait for “Mr. Right,” but you should at least wait for a guy who has all the qualities of a Mr. Right.
We know that the ubiquitous search for Mr. Right continues unabated whether at 18 or 55, as age does not limit our desires. Is it possible to find him via online dating, the venue of necessity and choice of so many eminently eligible singles these days? Entering this world as I did on a whim, I have been wildly successful with self-discovery but not with scoring a date. Here is a small sampling of the available dating pool:
Let’s start off strong with:
1) cameltoehunter (might also be a hound dog)
2) LonelySenior (sad is so not sexy)
3) Fly13 (asks me repeatedly if I want a good black man...hmmm)
4) Marine1957 (the ex-military are always a good bet, especially with the offer to "sit on my back while I do push-ups")
5) yourdreamlover (too obvious – boring!)
6) Sybarite2 (a brainiac swinger)
7) Funxguy26 (if you’re into May/December)
8) Mickeymouse9999 (this is a little funky…)
9) Rustyknight4U (is this as in ….rusty load?)
But I leave the best for last:
10) Recentrelease55 who tells us ladies that “he’s not much into sports except those I can do naked”.
For some of these guys, lovable as I know they must be, I have to control my urge to contact their loved ones to ask them to stage an intervention.
cont'd
As for me, my virtual encounter with M, a playwright, began auspiciously. An inconvenience arose as his writing style, without caps & devoid of clear punctuation, drove me slightly batty. So difficult to decipher, I dreaded reading his emails - not a good sign. What became even clearer was that he was not able to respect my boundaries, understand my needs or listen to what I was saying. This simply became no fun and I tried extricating myself like a nice girl, with class. Not willing to accept this change in direction, he began to push all my negative buttons, becoming aggressive with bad syntax, and continued his pursuit. As he became increasingly strident, his actions began to bring out the worst in me and I found myself wanting to retaliate in ways unrelated to my usual diplomatic self. Finally, I had no choice but to be brutally honest and a little unkind as classy gave way to a large dose of sassy. Working through this uncomfortable period brought me to the understanding that my association with him brought out the negative in me and I wanted none of it. This helped me to realize how much I wanted to find validating relationships which encouraged me to become a better, not worse, person.
With M a large part of my unease was feeling as if I was reprising my relationship with my ex and in fact, I was, as I had indeed played out this dynamic during my marriage. Upon closer inspection, it was in a different manner than I had anticipated and was revelatory. My marriage was chiefly defined by me wanting something from my husband that he was not able to give. The fact that what I desired was the norm of any marriage – that he engage and be reasonably present as a spouse and father, does not change the heartache. He was unable to give this to me, to his children and we all would have been better off had someone realized this sooner. Our norm became me wanting the unattainable and, as a result, I slowly became unbearable to him. I now can see that the more I wanted what he wouldn’t, couldn’t give, the worse I became as a person as I continually invaded his boundaries, pushing him to a place he couldn't go. One always prone to detachment, he became further detached from me, the family, everything but his own pursuits. No one wants to be asked – continually for 30 years – for something they aren’t equipped to give.
This sad reality became even more apparent during one particularly painful therapy session near the end as he, without guile, openly admitted that he had married me, not out of love, but because he knew that I would be a good mother, interestingly, on the advice of his own mother from whom he was notoriously estranged! It doesn’t make me feel better that he (not I) got what he wanted out of the marriage as I was known to all as the uber-mother. In retrospect, I poignantly recall that his only compliments to me concerned my stellar qualities as a mother.
cont'd
All relationships hold the promise to make us better or worse and I can now acknowledge that my marriage, as with M, brought out the worst, not best, in me. As I make it a life objective to “live who I am”, why not be generous of spirit and let others do the same and be respectful of where they are in this moment of time? Gone are my former predilections to make things happen or affect change. It’s more satisfying to expect nothing but the anticipation of surprise. Your blog, whose purpose is the pursuit of success, paradoxically gives me the opportunity to come face to face with all my failures, to even embrace them! Taking the knowledge that I gain from this examination, I am able to divest myself of my pain and find joy. Now in my life I am finally learning to self-validate and by owning my actions, making my own joy. I no longer have the dependence on others to make me happy. Although finding someone who will be “the butter to my bread” will add to my joy a thousand-fold, it will be as a compliment to who I am. So I “wish for nothing larger/than your own small heart/or greater than a star; Tame wild disappointment/with caress unmoved and cold/make of it a parka/for your soul” knowing that a kinder, better heart just might find me the most lovable.
N.B. “Expect Nothing” Alice Walker
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