Sometimes I look back on my list of ex-boyfriends and ruminate about what colossal assholes they were, and how I am lucky to have gotten out alive. Other times, I think back about how much in love I was, and I find myself wondering what went wrong. When it come to breaking off a relationship, we always hold on to the idea that we can still be friends. This phantom “friendship” rarely happens, however. When I consider my own list of exes, none of them really appear to me as someone I would have been friends with in the first place. Are we just fooling ourselves with the idea of befriending our exes, or are we dating the wrong people to begin with?
There are certain qualities we look for in a friend, that when identified can become much more than a physical attraction. I have several friends that I find physically attractive, but have turned off that sexual attraction in favor of something with much more longevity. Consequently, when looking for a guy there are certain things I look for that I don’t require in a friend. Is there some intelligent way for these two things to exist in the same person?
When I think of my friendships, a timeline doesn’t even enter the equation. Once you get to a certain point with me, you are basically stuck with me forever. There is never a sense of an impending end, or any sort of “breakup” in the future. There is no pressure. Is that the difference?
In a relationship, there are certain expectations. You are expected to be half of a partnership, and want to spend the majority of your time with one person. There is a lot of pressure in deciding that you want to spend your entire life with someone in a romantic sense, and none when you allow someone a permanent place in your heart in a platonic sense. The difference between these two things confuses the Hell out of me.
My only suggestion is that perhaps we are dating the wrong people. When we first meet someone, we make the decision about whether they are a potential love interest or potential friend, immediately. Is it possible that our barometers are off? Have our first impressions been wrong all along?
I urge you to look at your pool of exes, and see if any of them are people you would actually want to befriend. Then, look at your friends and ask yourself if any of them are people you could actually fall in love with. My sneaking suspicion is that there is a little bit of crossover there, and all it would take is a proper tweak of your mental outlook to open doors that you didn’t even realize were there.
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