Hearts Under Maintance

Athenas, My Dear,


I understand your fear. I have it too. It’s hard for everyone to live with the fear of loosing a loved one. We all want a relationship that lasts forever without problems. Well, I hate to tell you that there is absolutely no rule for this. My best advice would be to try relax and let things go with the flow. I’m sure that worrying won’t help. And, what about when things are not under your control? Like, a father letting his only child going out at night on her own? Or when the so-called love of your life goes to one of the dangerous place on earth? How to handle this fear? We live with it, is one great answer. Just learn to live with it, and it no longer will be a big deal. I live day-by-day doing this. Went from struggling to surviving to living. And I’m sure I’ll miss those days. Probably years from now, when I’m old and relaxed.
“Those days” will always exist, too. We will always look back and think how wonderful it was when we were younger. How everything was always feeling so fresh and new. How tender people were. We always had a better life in the past cause we tend to forget bad things. At least most of us. In your case, you cannot just let the past go. Don’t be too attached sweetie… I’ve been hurt and almost sure I will again someday. Doesn’t matter who, but somebody will hurt me again. Will I ever stop believing in Love? No. Will I ever stop dreaming and fantasizing? No way. I’ve learned my lesson. I have been deceived, I have been tricked. But no one seems to hold me now.
I’m sure I will be devastated if - after all - this waiting were in vain. Of course my darling, only natural. For a while I decided that I would break up, leave everything behind and move on. “I didn’t try enough”, I thought. The worst feeling, regretted for so long, you wouldn’t believe. But I couldn’t do anything anymore. I “deleted” him, literately. Untill he came and open one last door. This one I’ll leave opened until closure.
For now, I can only quote William Wordsworth: “What though the radiance which was once so bright; Be now for ever taken from my sight, Though nothing can bring back the hour; Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower; We will grieve not, rather find, Strength in what remains behind;“

Fear

Dear Aphrodite:

I wish I could wait a little longer to post. I have been trying to understand my feelings lately. I know you have told me that writing here will help to understand and organize my thoughts but I am not sure where to start. So, this letter will probably read very confusing. I hope not.
I have met someone. At first, he did not seem my type. Although I have to confess I do not have a type, I can tell he was not mine . After my broke up I have been comfortable with flirting. See, I guess it is safe that way. You look, he looks and from there nothing happens (rsrsrs). No complications, no trying to figure it out, no strings attached. I think I was playing safe. It was safe that way. The good part about all this is that the other person was also willing to flirt. That is it. So I was able to play my game because all the players were following the same rules. Then I met someone who did not want to play by the rule and everything changed. See, when you have been playing a game for quite some time and now you change tactics, it is hard to keep up. You get caught in obstacles unknown to you. And then you are unfamiliar with the game, what you are suppose to do, how to behave, how to be aware of the traps (oh yes, the traps that come when you least expect!!). You feel so vulnerable, so fearful.

Ok, enough with metaphorical explanations. I am afraid to commit. I thought that after therapy I would have learned to be more secure and enter another (still under construction!) relationship. But I think I still have some resentment from my past relationship. Maybe that is not the right word. I think I am afraid that it will happen again and I have not acquired the tools to survive this time. I will go all over again through the pain and suffering that I went through my past relationship. I told this to a friend who replied saying that if this or any other future relationship does not work out, I will have the tools and strength to deal with it. But right now, all I feel is anxiety. And instead of enjoying (he is a great guy, so far at least!!), I keep holding on. And you know how that hurts me. How I feel so bad when I have to refrain from being how I am and enjoy what I like.

Oh Aphrodite, I wish I could know the answer of the things that are happening to me right now. I have so many things going on and I feel that I need to hold on to my heart so I can keep on going. It is funny because I was reading Paulo Coelho’ book, the Alchemist, and I saw this great text from him. It is the prologue of the English version of his book. So, he is explaining the four obstacles for reaching your personal calling, what it is. The one that I want to point out for this post is love. This is what he says: “If we have courage to disinter dream, we are then faced by the second obstacle: love. We know what we want to do, but are afraid of hurting those around us by abandoning everything in order to pursue our dream. We do not realize that love is just a further impetus, not something that will prevent us going forward. We do not realize that those who genuinely wish us well want us to be happy and are prepared to accompany us on that journey.”

Yes my dear Aphrodite, I need to understand this; to realize that love and life go together. I think that I am actually really afraid of to commit. I am afraid of getting hurt. I am afraid of realizing that I do not have the tools to deal with loss again, to start over, to recover. I am afraid to be weak again. And because of that I think I have refrained myself from relationships (remember this one is under construction, it is not a relationship yet!!!). I am afraid of the new, the unknown. I am afraid of the ride.

Hope you are doing well. I miss you very much.
Take care my dear.

Love always,
Athena

When Is Soon Enough Before Is Too Late?

My Social Butterfly,

Interesting you say that. I’ve been thinking about the same thing. We share the same thoughts. And been there a few times, and also must say. I absolutely agree with everything that I read on your last letter. Actually I was there just a while ago.
When is soon enough before it’s too late? With my beloved one there was no such thing. We went straight away with a sort of no intention on doing anything. Looking back I think it was really sweetie, really slowly and respectful. At the beginning I didn’t want it. So afraid it would devastate our friendship. So natural, like we didn’t know what we where doing. Amazingly I didn’t started - as I said I was afraid -, he came all over me. We were so innocents and pure. Never played hard-to-get with him. It was almost impossible to fight that feeling.
Strange the fact that I was always so shy with him. All the nights weren’t planned, but the second. The night we went to the mess together. I left this home knowing we were going to this party together. Everything just felt so right. It felt so right to be together. Absolutely perfect nights, even because there was a lot going on with both of us. He never made me feel less than perfect, not even for a second. He knew me before he touched me. So stupid to say this but, it felt more like my first time, then my real first time. Like I was making love for the first time. Feeling, embracing and loving – with all qualities and defects – for the first time. Magical is not even close for how I felt.
To hug him tight, as he hold me while I crossed my legs around his body every time we said goodbye. Every time it felt like it would be the last one for a long, long time. The last goodbye was really hard though. I stood there looking to his train. As it started to move I received a message on my mobile saying that he would miss me.
We could, as we are doing now, stay a long time apart. I don’t need him here. Because I know that we will be together. Even miles away, a year apart, he is still the first thing I think when I wake up and the last thing I think before I fall asleep. But is still not the right time for us to be together. Eternity can wait.



Truly loved,
Truly loving,


Aphrodite

Does sex complicate things?

Dear Aphrodite:

I will not apologize this time. I love every moment of contributing to this blog; however life is just really hard sometimes and 24 hours is not enough. I have been crazy trying to achieve my goals and dreams and I have not had the time to think about some things that I know is happening around me. Important things, however. But there is a subject that I think I spent quite some time thinking about these days: sex vs. constructing a relationship. I will explain to you what I mean by it.

I do not think that the guy that I was interested wants anything with me. Fine. But, I am sharing this to a friend and she says that the reason for this is that I had sex with him too soon (after going out with him 3 times). See, it is not the first time I hear this. And every time I hear this comment I cannot believe that this is true. I mean, we are on the 21st century for god's sake and I cannot believe that people do not think that you can build a relationship just because you have had sex before, I don't know, 3 meetings, maybe. I mean what is the amount of time necessary to spend with someone before you can have sex? Is there a rule? If you are attracted to the person what do you do? Hold your feelings, wait until it is appropriate to go forward, keep wondering if they both will connect emotionally and sexually? I am not sure. The way I see is this is Sex (cap letters) is something very simple. I know people think that it complicates things. But I do not think so. I think it can be part of getting to know someone, sharing. But, I also think that because people see sex as something complicated, a barrier even, I can understand why I hear so many people saying that you should not have sex right away, and wait until you are crawling up the wall and you can explode of desire for the other person. That is just painful!!!

See I am not like that. I am not good at playing games, playing hard to catch, or complicating things. I hate to hold my feelings, to not be able to do what I feel like doing, to be reserve, and behave like a lady should behave (what is that suppose to mean anyways?). I am really upset about that. It made me cry. I feel like I cannot be me because I can scare, give the impression that I am reckless, or that I do not care. I also think that men, and particularly women, should change this way of thinking. I know that not all men and women think that way. I know this is not an universal rule, but you go through a lot of disappointment until you find someone that understand self-expression. Not a lot of people like secure, self-assuring women. Other women just think that they are too much, whores, or not well-behaved; men think that they are whores, hard to handle, or can leave them very fast. We need to move away from this. And I think we can only do that when we are secure about ourselves. This way we do not feel overpowered by the other person, no jealousy, no resentment. I can say to myself that I have achieved a great place in my life, I am doing what I chose to do for the rest of my life (I hope!!), I love what I do. And I think that not a lot of people feel that way. This can bring a lot of insecurity if you are with someone that does not have any idea what he/she wants, like, care. I am secure about my feelings, but sometimes when the world tries to complicate things I doubt myself. And that makes me sad. It frustrates me, makes me claustrophobic.

I am really tired of trying to be someone else because people think that i am too much, I overwhelm them, it is not appropriate for a lady. I am going to be me. I love be intense, I am passionate about my things, I overdo, I am a social butterfly, I like to talk to people, I like sex, I enjoy love, I can kiss the entire day, I do not care. You should enjoy people every moment of your life. You do not know when they are going to be there next time. Enjoy them like there is no tomorrow.

I am me and I like what I see. And I am not giving this up for people that cannot understand the benefits of uncomplicated joy.

With uncomplicated love,
Athenas