As most of my friends would know, I am the "hopeless romantic" in the group. My life theme song, as quoted by them is "My heart will go on" by Celine Dion in Titanic and "I will always love you" by Whitney Houston. Sometimes I share about the love stories I read and I squirm a little, and they'd dismiss me as being dreamy or young. What I don't understand is, Shouldn't love be this way? Fill your insides with sweetness, have the power to break you at the same time? Love is no doubt the greatest mystery of mankind; it is a strong word (that is now thrown around carelessly) It is a force by itself and gives us hope, (another source of undying strength) In recent times, I realise that people forgot/misunderstand the meaning of love. Yes, I am young and I still don't know what love really means but I think I know what it should not be. In reading The Rosie Project (TRP), I've had several insights on this topic called love and I'd like to share my thoughts with you. Before I start, let me introduce you to the book. Professor Don Tillman is 39 and single. He is a geneticist and thus is like a total geek who knows nothing about dating or social skills. He is very precise about time, has every small detail scheduled to the minute. He even has a Standardised Meal System so he does not need to think of what to eat. (eg. Every tuesday he eats the same thing) All his attempts with women have failed previously, but he wants to find a wife now. So one day, he came up with this ingenious idea. He creates a 16-PAGE questionnaire, to sieve out potential candidates: THE WIFE PROJECT He puts general questions such as "Do you smoke?"/ "How often are you late?" and would immediately reject any girl who puts yes/sometimes etc Other questions are based on his past bad experiences. Once, he dated a vegetarian, and he feels that it's difficult to have to deal with their dietary needs, so he has a question to ask if his respondent is vegetarian! HONESTLY, I thought this was a brilliant idea. You already know what you want, so you can save time dating all the wrong people. I even thought, this would be an awesome concept for a dating site. You create an account with my dating site. You set up your profile. You craft up your questionnaire, with MCQ and open ended questions. And you wait for responses. Respondents can leave their contact details, so if you are interested, you can chat them up! BUT I REALISED, there would be many liars. which will render the whole system USELESS. So I guess, no choice, we just have to use extra time to sieve out the people around us by asking the correct questions in subtle ways and observing their lifestyles and hearing what they say. BACK TO TRP, Prof Don finds it difficult to find women that meet his criteria. His best friend, sends a lady his way; a lady that obviously does not meet Don's criteria. She has a tendency of being late, she smokes, she has a sustainable seafood/vegetarian diet and she drinks. She brings chaos to his schedule, and of course his life and eventually his heart. <3 One day, Don actually meets someone of his criteria but finds himself rejecting her. He has fallen for Rosie! it is completely illogical, but love is illogical. You fall for people you never thought you would. You do things for them that you normally wouldn't do; break your habits, try new things, feel totally different. HOWEVER, it is still always good to have a guideline, to know what is important to you and what you seek for in a partner. And if it happens that you grow into someone, despite them not being what you were originally looking for; means you really like them (I suppose) If you ask me what I would include in my questionnaire, these would be some of the questions: - Race (my mum has a strong preference for Chinese, not that I wanna be racist :/) - Nationality (If I marry a Malaysian, I have to spend a large part of my life travelling to and fro across the border, my dad is already Malaysian) -Age (Although maturity and age does not always run in tandem; but I don't think I can date a guy too young(more than 2 years younger) Or a guy that's too old (more than 5 years older) -Height (okay, I have dated not so tall guys before and I realised, I cannot live without heels because I am short myself -161cm. Besides tall guys give nice hugs?) -Religion - How often do you spend time with your family? (I think a guy with a healthy family is more whole as a person. I wouldn't want him grumbling when I spend time with mine!) - What dreams do you have? What is your future ambition/plans for the future? (When guys talk about their passions/dreams, their eyes light up in the most magical way) -Do you smoke? (I have my own perceptions towards smokers, which I shall not go into here) -How much do you care about your image? (I personally put in effort to dress up, but I don't think I can date someone vainer than me, hahahhaha) -What do you spend your money on? (Just for fun haaha, I spend on food, clothes, WATCHES) -Do you believe in horoscopes? (I really don't. Why let star signs dictate your life?) -Do you have a cause you care about? (I have an autistic brother, so naturally I'd care for them. I fight for the family cause too) HAHAH, will add more to this list when I think of more. "In a relationship"Another thought that I got while reading the book, is how "In a relationship" is MERELY A STATUS and not indicative of love. These days, people throw the word "relationship" and "love" around very loosely. Many relationships these days are out of: 1) Habit "I don't remember a time without him anymore." 2) Practicality, for companionship(in the sense of merely just to relieve loneliness/boredom), sex, money 3)Everyone else is in a relationship 4)Because he/she likes me and I don't mind. COME ONNNNNNNN. 1) You lived for years and you were okay without him. What do you mean you can't live without him now? Since there are no more feelings to speak of, why hold on? Aren't you afraid that by doing so, you'd miss out on someone you'd really feel for? "You think you may never get over it. But you also thought it'll last forever." If it's just purely out of habit, please just stop. End things, take time to readjust your life, find yourself again. 2) People are not tools. For you to use for a certain purpose. Respect the person. Earn your own money god. It's much more satisfactory than living off another person. 3) Yes, I know sometimes it sucks to be the single one and everyone is like "Why don't you have a boyfriend?" But seriously, there is nothing wrong with being single. I'd be single than be with the wrong person. I think we should all have an ideal person in mind, and spend some time; to see if we can meet someone of our ideal. It's always nice to daydream about an idea. Take this time to discover and develop yourself These days, people all list what they want in others. THINK: If this person of all your wants come along; WOULD THEY CHOOSE YOU? If the answer is no, then you jolly well become the person your ideal would want. (well, I'm thinking the standard you set for your ideal should be the standard you set for yourself as well?) 4) DON''T SETTLE Don't tell me "We accept the love we think we deserve." EVERYONE deserves someone who wants to be with us as well. Don't ever sell yourself short because you are a beautiful person. You should not be judged by your pasts. You should be loved because you are you. To avoid settling, you need to love yourself first. Know your worth, know what you deserve. Find someone who's really sincere, who would stick it through, who would put down their ego for you. Don't give yourself away too easily. I DON'T MEAN TO SOUND LIKE I AM A LOVE GURU Just sharing my thoughts (: If you have any relationship problems and you need a ear, chat me up! my Ask.fm: http://ask.fm/AmandaYong or you can drop me an email as welll! (; People dismiss me as young or dreamy, but I would like to consider myself hopeful.
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Amanda YongLifestyle blogger from SG. Archives
January 2018
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