Do Stop Believin’

Posted by fxckfeelings on October 14, 2010

Dreams, like deep religious faith and extreme weight loss, promise happiness, which should warn you right away that you’d better check out what you really need and what you need to do if your dream, exciting as it is, doesn’t come true. We don’t enjoy reminding you, over and over again, that life usually destroys dreams, that fate can be mean, and that you should never throw away your fat pants. We do it because we don’t think dreams are nearly as important, or as fulfilling in the long run, as doing what you can with what you’ve got.
–Dr. Lastname

I’m over 50, independent, and make just enough money to have a middle class life style without any great financial reserves, and I’ve had a steady boyfriend for several years who lives with me on the weekends, but works in another city during the week. We’re both happy with one another and this arrangement, and I feel I can count on him, but I’ve been wondering what we’ll do as we get older. Ideally, I’d like us to pool our resources and take responsibility for caring for one in sickness and health, but I get the feeling he’s hasn’t faced the issue of aging and I don’t know if he ever will. My goal is to get him to consider these issues so I can figure out where I stand.

It’s great to find a good companion, but it might be easier to find the kind of commitment you want, if not the care, from one of the companions listed on petfinder.com.

In other words, beware romanticizing what you and your current companion actually have; ask yourself if your friend is truly prepared to give to you what you’re prepared to give to him, and how you’ll react if he isn’t. You can’t be angry with him for breaking a promise he never made in the first place.

The person to blame will actually be you, for committing yourself to giving more than you can expect to receive, under circumstances that may compromise your health and security.

There’s nothing wrong if you want to make such a commitment, knowing the risks. What you’re suggesting, however, is that you want something better if you can find it, and that you’ll think seriously about finding it with someone else if you’re sure your partner is unwilling.

Don’t try to get him to say what you want to hear. If you do, you’re more likely to make him feel bad and say what he doesn’t mean, or make you feel bad for trying to tie him down. It’s like forcing someone to apologize; you might hear the word sorry, but the only person who’ll be sorry is you for pushing someone to say something they don’t mean and probably didn’t want to say in the first place.

Either way, you’ll probably find a way to hear what you want to hear, no matter what he says, so try instead to get a feeling for what he really wants, accept it, and decide what you want to do.

It sounds like you might have that feeling already, but are still hopeful that he might not realize what he wants, or doesn’t know how to express it, or could possibly change his mind, etc, etc. The only way to know is to tell him what you need without making it personal. After all, if he can’t meet your level of commitment, it’s probably because he doesn’t want that from anyone.

If you want the truth, ugly as it might be, express your preference without apology. There’s nothing to stop you from being positive about your feelings for him and your relationship, but there’s also nothing to stop you from implying that, if he’s not ready to commit, you’ll be keeping an eye out for someone who is, not because you’re angry or disappointed or lacking in loving feelings, but because you respect what you need.

The partnership element of relationships is often overshadowed by the romantic side, but the older we get, the less we should be snowed by bullshit. No matter what you hope for, be honest with him, and more importantly, honest with yourself.

STATEMENT:
“I love you and feel we have a wonderful relationship and that it would be ideal if, as we get older and closer to retirement, we could make plans about sharing our lives and resources and caring for one another in case of medical problems. If this is a direction you wish to go in, let’s get more specific. If not, I won’t feel personally hurt, but I will need to make other plans which may eventually get in the way of our sharing as much as we have.”

Three years ago, I left a boring but well-paying job to pursue my dream of opening a restaurant, because cooking is what I really love and I figured everyone should try to get some fulfillment in life. I didn’t mind making sacrifices—I lived on practically nothing and shut down my social life so I could work all the time, do everything myself and keep my costs down—but a week ago I realized my restaurant just wasn’t going to make it and shut it down. It was a good concept, but between the economy and someone else’s opening a similar restaurant nearby, it couldn’t take off. Now, I feel empty, I don’t have any friends, and I’ve lost my sense of direction. My goal is to find something to do with my life that I can care about.

Dreams of creative fulfillment are responsible for a few thrilling and well-publicized achievements…and a much greater number of depressed people who feel like failures, including many of those who achieved something great but were unable to do it again.

So much for worshiping outcome rather than process; bad for dreamers, good for me and everyone else in clinical practice.

You deserve respect for pursuing your dream of creating a restaurant, but you play with a grease fire unless you remind yourself, repeatedly, that other priorities will always be more important. These include making a living, being a good guy, and sustaining friendships that will be there for you whether your restaurant thrives or dives.

If you place too much value on your hunger for creative fulfillment, then the failure of a great project will make your life seem meaningless. Your feeling of failure will have no trouble convincing you that you have, indeed, failed, and that, of course, is a gross disrespect to yourself.

Forget failure. Remember your courage and intense hard work, the fact that life is hard, and that there was never any way you could control whether your restaurant would succeed or fail.

Your feelings of failure are unavoidably painful, but that’s all they are: stupid fucking feelings. You deserve respect from yourself, so ignore them and be proud.

You may have lost the urge to take on another project, but your sense of direction should never change, because it is based on values, not the feelings we so despise. So go ahead, make a living, wait for another opportunity, and build it into your life, not your life around it.

STATEMENT:
“I feel crushed to have lost my dream, but that’s an unavoidable pain. I’ve always been willing to work hard and make my own way and be a good friend, and my values haven’t changed. I deserve respect for following those values, particularly when I must bear the frustration of having no creative satisfaction.”