Always the Healer, Never the Healed

You know how it is. You know what it feels like to be the one person that your friends come to to confide in or tell their secrets to, and you know that your always the one giving them advice or vice versa. You do everything in your power to ensure that they are able to live their life the best they can by providing an outsiders point of view on their situation. You never want to give them bad advice, and then again you never want to give them none at all. That's when you do the research and get back to them. We all offer our friends rides to the hospital if their sick. Pick them up from BFE if they get too drunk to drive home, hell, we may even bail them out of jail in order to keep their parents from finding out (as long as they pay us back of course).  But have you ever been in the situation we it has felt weird when you are the one asking for help? Needing some advice on a situation that you think you should have complete control over? 

That has been happening pro me a lot lately. I always offer help and advice. I offer to drive in road trips or give people lifts when needed. But here lately, I've found that I've been relying in my friends much more than I do on average. And not that it's a bad thing at all, it's just out of my element. 

I've been needing advice on relationships that I feel like I have lost control of. I've been needing rides for the ER on several occasions because of a surprise attack of seizures or intense stomach pain. I like to be the giver, not the taker. ...in most senses of that phrase anyway. 

But where it comes most as an eye opener is when you give advice to so many other people about their relationship issues and problems even setting people up on dates. But then you pause and reflect and realize that you aren't so practiced in that area yourself. Why are all your tips working for other people, by yet you're still trying to find a good person with a car and a job and that isn't convinced that you're just after their penis and their money (another summer experience that is an entirely different blog). So what am I doing wrong? More importantly, do trust the people that I'm advising to help me for a change? 

Well according to my current motto; betters can't be choosers, that answer is yes. 

I need my friends and they bed me. Because as the platonic relationship grows you will discover that one of you has more experience or a better sense of knowledge on some subjects than others. For example, if my roommate has an infection, he is going to ask me what to do about it. If I can't figure out which shows I should wear with an outfit, I go asking for his help. Friendship is give or take. That's a lesson we all need to learn. 

But above all when asking or giving advice you have to remember that a person has feelings and aren't looking to get hurt my your advice. The people that I find myself having hearts to hearts with I am the best of friends with. We know when and how to yell at each other and when definitely not to do it. But when you have established a close enough relationship then you realize that pure 100% honesty is exactly what they are looking for. 

Sometimes you just. We'd an outsiders perspective on something. Someone who doesn't have money, time, or any emotions invested in the same issue that your having who can honestly tell you what is best to do. They also. Optics things about you that you may not realize. Like whether or not you're truly happy, or if he situation is. Ringing more stress than enjoyment. Some of those things have to be told to us rather than thinking that we know exactly what is going on and how to handle it. Especially if it involves a problem with the opposite gender, then it is really safe to assume that you have no clue what is really going on in their head. 

So I guess this blog is to say that friends are their for you to lean on, and that asking for help is o.k.. It often takes years to learn that those silly cliches are honestly true and they work in most situations. But once you do learn it then you can open so many doors for yourself. So even if I consider myself very wise and advisable, I still need my friends to help me through tough times and through things that I really shouldn't deal with on my own. 

So thank you to my friends who look after me, and thank you for not being afraid to cry on my shoulder. Because their will be a day when I'll need yours for the same reason. But hey, what are friends for?

The 'Unpredicted' Worst Part of the Break-Up

When you experience a heart-crushing, time-stopping, seemingly life-altering break-up, you expect the tears and the fact that you miss them to be the worst part. It scares you that every time you walk into your bedroom that you'll cry because so many things in there remind of you of them. And you will, at least for the first few days, but that's only because you love with all of your heart. You feel lonely all day without your best friend to text and update, and lonely at night when you need comfort and they are no longer wanting to offer it to you. It's always the same.

But once you find a new routine and no longer feel the urge to send that text pleading for your missed normalcy, you'll smile again. You will find a new routine that takes your mind away from the pain. But then before you know it the worst part of the break-up happens.

After the time passes that a person needs to be them self again, once you raise your gaze from your feet and start to notice the world around you again you begin to notice the opposite gender. And you begin to catch some smiles and lock eyes with a few people as you rediscover what attraction between two people feels like.

Just like clock work, you are preparing for your first date. The entire work day you spend thinking about it, excited or dreading it. While you fix your hair and chose your outfit carefully is when the emotions hit. You are really doing this, you're moving on. Then the thoughts of the one that left you creep back in. That's who you were comfortable with, you already know he makes you happy and knows all your preferences and dislikes. He is the one you wish you were getting ready to spend time with tonight.

But you catch yourself. Putting down this person who you haven't even really given a chance to yet. You know it's not right to compare him, someone you haven't got the privilege to get to know yet to someone that was already molded to your life style. We all have to fight to remember there is a reason that this last relationship didn't work. A reason why the two of you are no longer together, a reason he decided to leave. Maybe this new person, the one that you could have an amazing time with tonight could have all the same qualities as the last, but knows how to use them. Know exactly what to say will hear you out and not make assumptions that ended things so quickly.

Dating is scary. It's starting over. It's having to trust someone that you barely know with your feelings, while you're in the car you might even be trusting him with your life. And that is scary.

No matter how many dates you go on or how many people you take these first night adventures with, the last one that made it work will always be in the back of your mind. Maybe you'll find someone that will know how to make it work like he did, will know exactly what to say to make you fall head over heals for him. Can make you love and respect him like you did the one that gave you up without a second thought.

These fears, these thoughts are what I have tonight. I'm taking a leap to move on and forget, possibly even forgive, the damage that my last relationship has done to me. I can't hold on forever. A lifetime is so short, and I need to find happiness for myself, and find a companion that wants to share that happiness with me. Tonight I will keep and open mind and give this new guy that I don't know a chance. A chance to prove to me he is nice, and caring, understanding and exciting.

A chance to prove that I deserve to be happy.