Nope still not fond of them. Relationships that is. A lot of people probably ought to skip this entry, it might be a long one. It’s probably going to get maudlin and most of you are going to disagree hugely which is not to say that I don’t enjoy a good heated debate on this blog and in fact encourage it but I can imagine some of you are probably bored with the subject by now.
I am not a creature suited to being with anyone else in a romantic situation for an elongated period of time. Which is not to say that I won’t try my damndest with the Jellicle Cat because I will, but…things end. All things end eventually and you know when it comes right down to it; what is the point? Of course thats an argument for doing nothing but I’ve always found it quite a liberating thought as well.
I don’t think that people should even try relationshps until they’ve got something of themselves sorted. Or at anyrate I don’t think that they should go for the socially accepted norm (a mano a mano) until they’re well out of their teens, until they have some sense of self. Actually I think that everybody ought to be locked in a room on their own with a pen, a pad, maybe some paints, a needle and thread for about a year and then they can try to be with other people. Learn to live with yourselves, if you don’t get a grip on yourself how on earth can you be expected to live with another? Live with a million others first, live with a thousand others, live with yourself then go for broke if you must.
So thats my thoughts on the rest of human society, turn and turn back to myself as I always do eventually.
I don’t trust it. I don’t trust love and I don’t trust myself when I’m in love. What can I judge the rest of you by accept my own thoughts and self added to observations. The rest of you get the benefit of the doubt, myself I don’t. I can predict the cliffs for myself and theres something that urges me on to dance at the edge of them. Theres something that wants to fall over them, to jump, to plunge and it’s most evident when I’m in love.
How is that for everyone else the constructive and beautiful is emphasised whereas I see the destruction, the lines and the blood just waiting? I’d rather have a thousand connections that just one. None would be favourite but I think that’d only happen if I could somehow blag my way into solitary confinement. Of course I would say that the worst sides of myself are in evidence when I’m in a relationship, but thats no longer true. With the Jellicle Cat the stress is minimised.
Relationships of the romantic kind seem to encourage dependancy, apathy and they lessen people. There is a book I read a long time ago called Namedropper by Emma Forrest, most people can’t stand the book and as far as I know all the reviews have been fairly dire. But it stuck with me, how people have such spark and then plunge it into nothingness, how people lessen themselves for love. No I don’t trust love and I don’t trust the threads that suck at people.
But not all relationships do, some seem to strengthen people, perhaps I admit. The difficulty is the ones that do encourage interdependancy and I don’t see them hardly at all. Why does interdependancy seem to be so hard? Why is it that couple plunge into nothingness after having such sparks?
I am musing on the general and the personal at the same time. Yes a lot of this is generalised and yes most of this is based around my slanted take on the world. So no it doesn’t hold true for every situation and it has been a while since I heard of a relationship that made me wince upon it’s start up.
As for myself. All things end. I will try to do what I do not believe in, because I can see intellectually that I probably ought to believe, because at base I am a contrary soul and because certain other people know better. And if there is a certain amount of pointlessness to it that is only because every other thing is pointless as well. When it comes down to it the only points there are, are the ones you make for yourselves. No one can ultimately judge you, only hold opinions. There is nothing unless we choose there to be and so the pointlessness of it all whilst I admit it to be a little disheartening, is also liberating.
I love the Jellicle Cat. Spider light threads merge and change and dance and never stay the same.
"It takes only the acceptance of a single belief to make someone a magician. It is the meta-belief that belief is a tool for achieving effects. This effect is often far easier to observe in others than in oneself. It is usually quite easy to see how other people, and indeed entire cultures, are both enabled and disabled by the beliefs they hold. Beliefs tend to lead to activities which tend to reconfirm belief in a circle they call virtuous rather than vicious, even if the results are not amusing. The first stage of seeing through the game can be a weary cynicism or Buddhism. The second stage of actually applying the insight to oneself can destroy the illusion of the soul and create a magician. The realization that belief is a tool rather than an end in itself has immense consequences if fully accepted. Within the limits set by physical possibility, and those limits are wider and more malleable than most people believe, one can make real any beliefs one chooses, including contradictory beliefs. The magician is not one striving for any limited identity goal, rather one who wants the meta-identity of being able to do anything. "
Peter J. Carroll in Liber Kaos (Weiser 1992)
Wouldn’t want to accuse anyone of looking like an orthodox chaoist…but you have to admit you’re at the same tea dance!
ttfn
I’ve always found it funny how you and I agree on so many things concerning relationships, but I’m curious over one point. Do you take your stance on relationships out of a conscious decision or have you, like me, some part of you missing – the part which says "find another person!". That missing part removes all inclinations and free will in the matter- being single is not a choice in the same way you decide between socks; it’s just how you are in the same way you can be happy or sad, funny or maudlin.
Either way, life is a funny Christmas cake. Full of all sorts of fruit, nuts, spices, and the gooey brown stuff that goes in between. Then there’s the marzipan, the icing, the decorations…
I find the statement often repeated ‘that relationships make you dependent’ is wrong. Relationships should not make you dependent, as that makes any relationship a power relationship. Someone controls something that you need. That is not good.
You should not be with someone because you have to be with them. You should be with someone because you choose to be with them.
which is more flattering:
A) I need you, baby, I can’t breath with out you. Without you I would die
or
b) I don’t need you. I can stand on my own to feet. I can do all the things that make me a man without you. That said, I’d still rather be here beside you. Forever.
To Jez:
Oh not AGAIN!
To Lucrecia:
You know how everyone dreams about the future? And usually they have a blank faced human shaped blob in those dreams? I always was missing the blob. But I’m great at mimicking…so I mimicked, got hurt and decided it was a mug`s game I didn’t need to play. Then the Jellicle Cat turned up…
To The Yellow Dart:
Yeah I’ll agree with that one all the way.
It’s the weary cynicism thing…or maybe the ‘relationship’ topic…I just can’t help stirring!
;o)
Oh, and nice point Mr Dart.
ttfn.
…dances a little dance and sings ‘Mish the Chaos Magician’ to the tune of ‘Puff The Magic Dragon’…
Gotta say I agree with Jason there too. If you are in a relationship where you’re dependant on someone else then it’s not good, but to be able to live on your own and still *prefer* to be with someone is a wonderful thing 🙂
Gotta say I agree with Jason there too. If you are in a relationship where you’re dependant on someone else then it’s not good, but to be able to live on your own and still *prefer* to be with someone is a wonderful thing 🙂
Oops. Bloody thing.
cheers guys; its not often I’m agreed with on matters such as this (on diaries such as this) I shouldn’t take my words too seriously though: I have operated on this belief system for a long while now and I have been single for quite a while as well. For someone who is fond of relationships, I often wonder if it IS time to try a little dependance.
But then I laugh. For I am the Yellow Dart!!!!
And we love you Yellow Dart!