Being in Love versus Falling in Love, or Maybe the Art of Banishing

When a new relationship starts, losing yourself is real easy.

Since I am an island, I don't know how other people respond to being in love. Although I admit there's that thrill like being on a roller coaster, I've always felt unbearably anxious, like I was making a life-long investment in something so important that if I were to lose that person, my world would end in one crushing blow.

Earlier in my relationships I was an anxious mess and I am still fighting my breakdown instincts. All sorts of neurotic thoughts would run 'round my head: will he call back? am I making a fool out of myself? what do I do if he...?

I dated a Cancer who was ridiculously slow and passive-aggressive, and even though (or because) I am part Cancer, the Leo in me gets perturbed at how cautious we Cancers are, like a new driver who can't move forward in a busy intersection because she's too busy looking both ways and checking every entry point, and meanwhile the coast is clear and the traffic is backing up. Anyhow, I was worrying about losing my Cancer boy so much that during one office meeting lunch break, they threw me out of the meeting room because I was pacing like a lion in a cage and making the other people stir-crazy. I went into the bathroom, curled up in a dirty corner, and cried. Oh woe was I!

Perhaps women are more susceptible to this type of co-dependent anxiety. Even though we'd like to believe we're in the post-feminist revolution where women are working moms, too many a woman is still raised with the attitude that her identity is dependent upon her ability to maintain an intimate relationship.

When I hear a woman just rattle off about her boyfriend or even mention one in any indiscriminate side-manner, I just flare my right nostril in disgust. Perhaps this is a dark reaction formation of some inner self-hatred and dependency. But I flare both nostrils at working women who throw themselves into an impossibly ironclad corporate working schedule and brush it off by saying, "I don't have the time for a man in my life." A healthy psyche should be able to balance both a family and a job.

Perhaps people don't really know what they want from a relationship? Is love supposed to be forever? That's what I've heard growing up, but I've found it's not healthy to plan your marriage on the first date. Do we just discard a relationship the minute we feel wrong? What is life like under this new 21st-century philosophy: "get a new one"? Are new relationships just about going out and having a good time? Well, isn't that a friendship then? Relationships need to have that thing call sex or passion to them and there lies the emotional danger: the emotional needs of a relationship. What do we need? What do we want?

I still get the anxiety but I tend to Banish these thoughts. The term Banishing originally applies to a ritual that Dr. Strange-type magicians do in order to prevent themselves from getting lost in all the entheogenic craziness with which they're involved. Banishing usually involves something simple and everyday to ground the magician into the real world. When God appears to John Denver's character in Oh, God!, God tells Denver's character to continue shaving: it would make him feel more normal. Shaving, making breakfast, making the bed, taking a walk, breathing deeply, yoga, all of these are Banishing rituals to help the anxious person find their center of control again.

I've been doing a lot of Banishing lately. I had a brief fling with another Aries -- and that's all Aries is good for -- and I had to Banish every morning to deal with his obnoxiously independent and aggressively dysfunctional personality. I'd take my morning walk, make breakfast, do my work, clean up, and by then he would either get in touch with me and continue our relationship for another day or I would simply not care as to whether I heard from him at all.

I wasn't crying on the floor anymore. Another few Aries or perhaps another Cancer and I think I'll finally get ahold of myself.

What are some Banishing modes of thought that have worked well to bring me away from my bathroom melodramas to a more functional state of mind?

1. Presume that all relationships are short term. Don't plan your wedding on the first date. Don't get yourself involved in long term plans. Most relationships will fail. It's not a sign of incompetence on your part but simply the name of the game. Relationships are experimentation and some couples just aren't right. Presume that it won't last. Now you can relax. You don't have the pressure of making it work or last. You don't have to keep it up forever.

2. Presume at the end of each day that you have completely screwed up the relationship and that the relationship is over. Oh well, better luck next time. Don't set yourself up for the possible letdown of "will he call back?" Presume that he won't, like a job interview: you go on one interview and when that is done, you go to another. You don't wait around for them to call back. If the person does get back to you then you have a pleasant surprise. You'll find that after awhile you'll actually find the person annoying because they keep coming back!

3. Never rearrange your schedule to accomodate a date. Chances are that date won't happen and you'll end up with an empty weekend. I can think of at least three cases. I was with my Cancer boy and I kept my Sundays open for him. Then he suddenly disappeared (which Cancers are known to do) and I was left holding my Sundays open for nothing for close to a month. The only reason I stopped waiting was because my family was planning my (then alive) mother's birthday and they said, "hey, Kristen has her Sundays open so we'll schedule the party on a Sunday so she can come." A couple years later, when faced with a choice to date my second Aries boy or to do an open house, I did the open house and right on cue, if I hadn't I would've had another empty Sunday. As a side note, I took a Sunday off afterwards for my Aries boy and we broke up the Wednesday before.

4. Don't take an available date just because you desperately need to spend time with someone. I've had a couple dates where I just needed to spend time with my guy but it just wasn't a good idea. One time my Cancer guy was having some serious problems and suggested we rearrange our date. I said, no, no, I can do it. Big mistake! You ever see a Cancer and a Leo (with Cancer tendencies) fight?! It would have been better to have postponed the date...

5. Keep dates simple. My Aries boy loved video games, particularly Crash Bandicoot so for his birthday I was making plans to rent out a hotel room, rent a large screen tv and play station from Wal-Mart (renting from Wal-Mart means buying the stuff and then returning it later) and then throwing a party. It would've cost me close to $2000 and a lot of work. That party never happened, thank God, and never will, thank God. If you go in with this type of mentality, you'll get burned out and stressed and possibly stood up.

6. Plan dates for yourself and then include your companion. I may be old-fashioned but I used to believe that dating meant actually going out and doing stuff, but my past couple experiences have involved a couple weeks scheduling the date and then having a lame date then never seeing the person again. The dates are lame because too many people plan dates simply for the purpose of going out and seeing someone rather than for entertaining themselves. It's like being hungry for tacos and eating burritos. No matter how many burritos you eat, you get fat but never filled because you wanted a taco! If I'm dating someone, I want to go out and do stuff -- stuff that I normally don't spend the time to do outside of a relationship because when I'm single I tend to sacrifice my social life for making money. A new relationships makes me refocus on having fun but I never actually do what I wanted to do. I wanted to check out this type of Portuguese restaurant called a churrascaria which is like a meat market with reportedly symbiotically excellent service. When am I going to get to go to one, Aries boy! Instead, I take that list and do it with or without him. If he happens to be available then he can come along. It's a good time to re-evaluate my life's experiences.

If you're thinking that I'm playing games, yeah, I probably am. Playing games is a part of life. Successful people learn how to play the game instead of complaining about the game. People who say they don't want to play games anymore are usually the first to get hit by this stupid statement. My sister almost lost my brother-in-law because she told him that she didn't want to play anymore games, so he proposed very early in their relationship and she ran away from him!

If you want to troll me and call me insecure, you'd probably be right. But I've found that "insecure" is a word that abusive people use to blame the victim. What, I'm suspicious of you because I keep seeing you with this blushing grin on your face txting people? I must be insecure thinking you're cheating on me. What, I don't like the idea of an open relationship where you can go around and screw other women? I must be insecure. What, I don't want to dress up like a French maid and have a lesbian tickle my fancy while you video tape it? I must be insecure.

I like bad guys, I admit, and whenever I think I've met someone different, it ends up being another big ol' mess. I need to keep my distance from these guys until I see their intent. My first Cancer boy was a bad deal. My second Cancer boy was a bad deal. My third Cancer boy was the moodiest bastard I'd ever dated and pulled away whenever I started respecting him, but I have to give him credit for being a good man. The first two I needed to Banish to protect myself, the third, to save my relationship.

And yes, there's always the chance of me driving them away. But I've found it's the opposite: these Banishing thoughts will give you your own life and people actually admire an independent person.

I actually don't mind falling in love. It's hitting the bottom that really hurts.

Long Term Plans in Dating

Never, ever make the suggestion that you are in a relationship for the long run. Guys can be like Gremlins -- no matter how much they beg and scream, never, ever feed them after midnight -- guys (yes, and us ladies, too) will try all sorts of ways to trick you into revealing long term plans. The dirtiest trick is when they trick you into a comfort zone where you think that they too are making long term plans but they're not: they're just pretending in order to trick you into revealing yourself.

I got caught at least twice that I remember. The first time he said, "we'll have time to talk about that [the personal topic of our conversation] later" and boom, the minute I thought he was a stayer he was gone like silver spoons. Another time one guy started prompting me into getting more involved in planning our dates so I rattled off a list of about a dozen things I wanted to do. The next day his schedule suddenly became really tight: "We can't go out on Fridays and Saturdays anymore." Translation: he was sleeping with someone else. I made the situation even more claustrophobic with him by responding to his "we can't go out on Fridays and Saturdays anymore" by saying "yeah, I'll think about that."

Why are long term plans bad in a relationship? Because people need desperately to feel free in their relationships. Once they get that feeling that the casual enjoyment that they're having for free with no obligations is going to start costing them, then they feel trapped. It's fight or flight and they run.

What are the solutions:

1. Never, ever reveal long term plans, no matter how safe it seems.

2. Take each date one at a time and never suggest the possibility of another date until after an obligatory waiting period.

3. Don't rush things. Instead of forcing him or her into a relationship, become a need in their life so that they give you what you want rather than you having to ask for it. That's a topic for another blog.