Have you ever had those people in your life, who you got along reasonably well with, even maybe, were close friends with and now, things have changed. They have changed. You have changed. And now you don’t really care too much for them. Maybe they don’t care for you either. That works out fine.

But what when they have offended you and you don’t like the way they are with you anymore? They haven’t realized what they’ve done and they don’t have any “issues” with the friendship.

There are two such “friendships” I clearly remember. In the first case, I don’t know what snapped, but I just couldn’t take the guy any more. Everything from his laughter to his mannerism to what he talked about annoyed me from the inside. I began to question my shallow self, “How did you tolerate him earlier?” My BFF (it’s cute, no?) says, he always annoyed her. So, let’s just say, I grew up, gained some depth in the process.

The other case was pretty straight-forward. I know the break-off point. The two women in question had an up-handedness when we were together. For the sake of argument, let’s say, my low self-esteem had something to do with it. But then there was this one incident when families were together and there was a snide remark about Navin. “That’s it”, I decided. Maybe, I used it as an excuse. Maybe, that was confirmation of what made me uncomfortable. Maybe both. What I knew was I couldn’t talk to them again. So, I just cut it off. I stopped taking calls, replying to texts, etc. They pursued for a bit and then eventually gave up. “Why did they pursue?” is something I never understood. I was civil when we met at a social event, but that’s about it.

* * *

What when, you still like the other person? You still want to share, want to talk, want to listen. You know they’ll understand, you know they want to know and tell.

But, there are these host of other things that went wrong. That are incompatible and will remain so. How do you let yourself forget about those? It’s all about protecting yourself from the anxiety and stress all over again. If I have to let a person consume all my energy, I’ll try a new person, no? So that I feel like less of a fool. If something happens twice, you cannot blame it on misjudgment. Even to the mirror, you cannot lie then.

And then there are those things, that felt like a knife through my veins. They’d hurt really bad if I let myself feel. The distrust, the inferior treatment, the total lack of compassion or care. I mean how does one start with a ‘clean slate’ when, “money value” was attached to a friendship. Will time ever heal that?

What if you were judged constantly for the person you are? What if a “special” friendship is “called off” by saying “I tried my bit” because two text messages went unanswered? What if your decision to not react to the hurt is blamed on my ego. When I put it this way, I wonder what is it that I “like the other person” for. What is friendship, if these basic tenets have already gone wrong?

I think the confusion is because I know not what I want. In a moment of weakness or outright listlessness, I want to rebuild the bridge. Maybe it’s general depression that makes me think that if I “shake hands”, “share”, “become normal”, I’ll feel better. At that moment of being “down”, I feel like I really, really want to do it. And every nerve-ending that has anything to do with rationale shouts a big NO!

It isn’t a brain vs. heart thing either. Because the heart would feel the hurt, if I allow it to, that is. And the brain knows that the other person is trying hard to make up. Really hard, even going out of their way?

Should I let my brain melt? Should I let my heart make me feel the hurt?

Girls (and actually it won’t hurt boys to read this either), try this -

• For today, DO NOT talk/think more than once about (only, if you complain about them/think of them with negativity. If positive, then think of them all you want) -
  • The all-important bai (Maid servants)
  • Kitchen and cleaning up
  • Husband/Boyfriend(s)
  • In-laws
  • Kids (homework, disobedience, ungratefulness, and the like)

Anyone who causes the lovely lady that you are, pain – is SO not worth it.

Once you have done this today. Lather. Rinse. Repeat. Every day.

• We love the way men look at us. We love it better when they appreciate it in words. But, you know what? Nothing like a compliment from a woman. It always makes my day! (Hint-hint. Nudge-nudge)

• Hate the pain you suffer?…say while threading, try this -
  • Relax ALL your muscles
  • Think of something else. Thinking about relaxing your muscles might be a good start, but – good, bad, anything…take your mind elsewhere.

From threading to labor pain, it works. I promise.

Hurt to the heart might also feel less painful with this technique! WARNING! Don’t try this on a fresh wound. Start from the 5th day, no pun intended.

• First 4 days, find someone to talk to. You are not meant to let yourself go through trauma alone. If you were, you would be a MAN!

• Yeah, yeah, yeah…men are dogs and we can write that in ‘caps lock’ too. But, each of us, each one of us is a lovely, charming, bitch.

Oh come on, you know that. We aren’t any easier to deal with. No one nags better than us. And get this, each one of us hates nagging and the nagger! This is only one example that classifies us as a bitch. We expect, we obsess. We assume, we extrapolate. We act and we over-react. Sure men do this. But that doesn’t make it right.

To a better me. To a better you.  To a better woman for that man to woo.

(and now let me get to doing at least half the things written above ) Oh yeah…and a very happy woman’s day to you too!

There are people you see and you sense an instant connection. You want to know more about them, just like that. Happens to me all the time. Hell, even tweets and blog posts make me want to know the person better. I’m sure this phenomenon is not unique to me.

Another thing that goes hand-in-hand is hesitation in letting the other person know. Of course, this is not in the romantic sense. A recent school reunion happened just in time for me to realize how all of this actually relates to the age-old, now-clichéd adage -

if you love a butterfly , let it go.

if it comes back to you it was always yours.

if not. it never was.

… or something like that.

At the reunion I noticed that a lot of people I wanted to connect with 21 years ago actually wanted to know more about me too. A recap of my relationships is evidence of that too. Recently, I exchanged this conversation with one of my best friends today.

me – girl, you are so approachable, but you seemed so completely in your world when we first met. i could never myself come up and talk to you.

she – get outta here. you were the one who didn’t wanted to be talked to!

But, this is more than wrong interpretation of body language. It’s about timing and I think it’s about not pursuing too hard. The latter is not about ego, it’s more about letting the butterfly fly back to you.

The catch here though is that this can be said only in hindsight. When I first met this friend, wanted to talk to her, but couldn’t make myself to because I thought she was way out of my league, it bothered me. Every time, I thought of her or she was mentioned, I would sense this nagging feeling I’d learnt to ignore. Had I known, that not imposing on her was actually the best for this now super-friendship to bloom, I’d have waited blissfully.And this is true not with just this one, I’ve seen that happen with so many other relationships.

Now the catch over the catch is, it doesn’t always work out this way. But if history is to be believed, for the people I want this to workout with, I have to learn to let go and make my peace with it. Deep breath, let go…

* * *

ps. Yeah, I’m a people’s person and I can’t have enough people who I can connect with and wonder about the world around us.

As I read through Sakshi‘s post on how changing yourself is not that bad if you are really doing it for someone you love, I got the feel that she’s right, but there’s something completely off. It’s one of those things that sounds sensible and yet is making huge assumptions. Yeah, you need to change, but being a spoon, or at least without thinking about the implications, might not be the right thing to do. Here’s what I was thinking while reading through the piece -

Do you get angry with an eye on the solution, are your fights directed to a solution?

It’s nice to have your eye on a solution. But, as so many damn situations have it, not all problems have a solution. The two views on some issues are just two parallel tracks of the railway line. Say, you love having pets and she just can’t stand them. Neither can you stop loving someone you care for nor can she be asked to fall in love with non-humans. (Obviously, this problem is specific to couples living together. But I’m willing to bet each couple encounters a solutionless problem at some point or the other – ofcourse guys, there’s difference between ‘awareness of facts’ and ‘pessimism’ – this is the former.)

you’re not any less of yourself if all you want out of life is to keep someone else happy

That’s the sweetest thought in a relationship, but its impractical and thus in an unsustainable state. How many people out there can really say, “this is all I want out of life”. The “this” could be anything, “this” promotion, “this” project, “this” child getting 99% marks, “this” child becoming the best dancer, etc, etc, etc. There is no permanence. Our needs keep changing, escalating even, whether materialistic or otherwise.

AND, with very change that is not there for the next 3-4 decades you are becoming less of yourself…

So, what do you do?

Quit? Never!

Be at each other’s throats for ever and ever? Like that got us anywhere but farther away from each other.

What we could try is -

Spot the differences.

Recognize them; certainly don’t turn a blind eye to them.

Accept them – Don’t yell at each other, sleep over it, mull, and then discuss it. The discussion will have to involve prioritizing the issue at hand in line with all other issues in life. This is possible – slowly you change from shouting instantaneously to waiting a couple minutes, to a couple hours, and so on. Believe me you still might not have a solution, but it gives you a better chance of accepting the difference. By accepting, I mean coming to terms with the difference. Like I have my view, she has hers and that’s how it’s going to be.

The solution ultimately is to get a pet or not. There is no third option. Either choice involves adjustment/change/sacrifice by one. One person has to change their priority and the other person has to acknowledge it. Not acknowledging is taking it for granted – another thing you shouldn’t be doing *all* the time. The two still can’t come to a resolution, then what? I really don’t know…

If that issue is *so* close to your heart, it would have done good if you’d known it before you got in so deep into the relationship. But now that you have, what? I don’t know…

Maybe it is to accept at first that there will be non-optimal solutions or solution-less problems. We can take solace that this situation is not unique to us. But by acknowledging this fact we are giving the much required room…and that’s what both of us need after the “I love you so much that I can…” phase is over…

Once issue resolved/acknowledge, bow a welcome to the next, and then the next…basically…lage raho…
* * *

More things I had problems with digesting –

Relationship has got less to do with the people in it, and more to do with their attitude in general

The attitude is the people. Our attitude is the basic-basic part of who we are.

All we needed to do was dip our heads in a basin of cold water, rearrange the way a few nerves are placed, and bring about a fundamental change to our thinking.

Can you really take the red wire off and plug it in the green socket and the green wire in the blue socket? Even if you can, you’ll be using a lot of duct tape to keep it in the new places which ultimately might wear off with time.

So, maybe you can rearrange the way the nerves are placed, then comes the real question. Can you guarantee that it will stay that way for ever and ever?

There is no ‘all we needed to do’. It’s always one thing followed by the other. And just being prepared for that is a good start.

simply by making a choice keeping in mind your partner, you’re not changing yourself

Acting with your partner’s choice in mind is doing something differently from the way you would have done it if the partner was not around. And this doesn’t happen once or twice, you keep the partner’s choice in mind constantly, and do things differently constantly. Sometimes these are little things, sometimes not so little…and then 2-3 years later you wake up from the “aware but yet blind-in-love” state to “oh $%&*, where did “I” go?” So, in effect you ended up changing yourself.

If one is happy with that, “great! Nothing like it!” But, my guess is that any independent, opinionated, well-exposed person is not going to be. Better blow the bubble the right size instead of having it burst in your face later.

That waking up next to the person you love is truly the one thing you should have throughout your life
That saying you’re sorry every now and then will help you get that

Saying you’re sorry, is not a thing that should be thought of, or done because you like waking up with this person tomorrow…it has to happen naturally because you feel sorry for what “you” have done wrong.

* * *

Does this mean you think, think, think and just quit enjoying?! Geez no! Relationships too can use a balance of ‘work’ and ‘play’…

Quite a few friends around me are looking for partners or the families are looking out on their behalf. Invariably, “How do you know this is the one?” pops up.

My typical answers -

• Make a list of how you’d like your partner to be – from outer to inner beauty. Prioritize that. And go around making check-marks or giving percentages. – very flaky, and highly impractical. I look at it as my stop-gap, “give me time to think” solution.
• Have an elimination process. Some things are big no-nos. Reduce the choice and thus the confusion. – Yuck! I know…
• You’ll know it, go by your gut feeling and you’ll be fine. – could I get any more abstract!?

Come on guys! It’s been over 11 years and I was just 22. (And being 22 then was very different from being 22 now, but that’s a discussion for some other day.) You cannot expect me to remember the process I went through. All I remember is let’s take it one day at a time, meaning one boy at a time. Who knew the time would come with just one boy? Shebing-shebang-matter-close. All okay because it has worked out great…so far…except for the regular ups and downs… (another topic for another day) …but not everyone can or should take such a risk. Never!

Ruminating over the topic long enough, and going by my experience so far, I think this is one all-encompassing question that needs an answer -

“How much will I be required to change to be able to sustain this relationship for decades to come?”

And conversely, how much will I need this person to change.

This question needs an answer after the mush-mush-gush-gush “I love you the way you are” period is done with. So, in an arranged marriage scenario, there are practical problems due to social issues, like time spent alone before engagement, etc. Then again, there is no mush-gush in an arranged marriage before the engagement anyways. And society is getting more and more liberal towards time spent alone before you are announced fiancés, so there is hope.

The question needs an answer after the reality of “opposites attract” sinks in. Analogies do have their limitations, you know. That theory applies to magnets, not people! Okay, it applies to people, but NOT in the long run. In the long run you need common interests, common things to talk about.

Think about it, your partner is talking about some major philosophy of life and you cannot get over your fascination with the mathematical beauty of matrices. Or you are completely into making this country, your city, your society a better place to live in and your partner is absolutely content with keeping their self content. None of these are bad things, but a lot of them are incompatible. They sound trivial, but ultimately it’s the conversation that keeps the relationship going. Think about how you’d react if this happened today, tomorrow, a decade later and a quarter of a century later.

So, I think my new “way to go about it” mantra is -

“Judge how much you’d have to change for this person.”