Friday, July 5, 2013

How to Become Disillusioned with Finding Love


Watch Hollywood romantic movies.  Believe that everyone has a one true love.  Etch into your soul the conviction that you will find that one guy who will inevitably accept you for everything that you are.  Who will love you unconditionally and without question.

Create a list of the qualities the love of your life must have. Set high standards.  Reach for the stars.  He must be tall, handsome, brooding and mysterious.  Intelligent and quirky.  Wealthy.  He must go to the gym regularly. He must have dimples dotting his face when he smiles. His hair must fall a certain way all the time.  

Envision showing him off to your friends and telling them how you fell in love with him because of his lovable personality, or because of how good a person he is.  How you fell in love with the way he laughed.   Or touched your hand.  Or played with your baby sister. Or any other quirky little habit that remind people of how cute he is. Subtly insert a few anecdotes that show how great in the sack he can be.  

Know that you don’t need to tell them how impossibly handsome, intelligent, and wealthy he is; they would see that for themselves. Imagine seeing your friends’ eyes widen with envy.

Stamp down any notion that there might be something wrong with you.  That’s impossible. Remind yourself that you are perfect, or as close to it as anyone can be.  You deserve this, and you deserve someone like him. Cosmopolitan said so, and it can’t be wrong.

Go out on date after date after date.  Constantly be disappointed. Rejection, both rejecting and being rejected, makes you cynical. Build up walls. Surround yourself with the emotional equivalent of a moat. Insult people, and point out how they can never live up to your standards.  Stop dating. Or date with the knowledge that these people will only prove why you are better off single in the first place.

Watch Hollywood romantic movies only so you can make contemptuous comments on the stupidity of their plot. Smile patronizingly at friends who believe in a one true love.  Remind yourself that it doesn’t exist.  That it couldn’t exist. That its existence would imply that there might be something wrong with you.  And that couldn’t be true.   Convince yourself that you like being alone.  No, that you love being alone.  That you don’t feel lonely, and that whatever hole you feel in your life can be filled up by friends and family.  Sleep at night with the nagging sentiment that you are missing something, and hope for the best that things will be better in the morning.

32 comments:

  1. Finding love is easy if you take the pragmatic approach...Find someone who you still like after spending more than 8 hours with them. Also, a nice ass never hurts.

    But that's not helpful advice, since you are clearly a romantic.

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  2. I've never been lucky in love ever. I think that true love does exist but that it's kind of a lottery. Especially true today in America, appearance is everything. I also think that if you are willing to completely support a shiftless layabout, you could buy/find love that way...I see it a lot from people who are lonely. They have one worthless bum that agrees to love them for years while they remain unemployed and the other person supports them entirely. I don't like that existence.

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  3. I don't believe in true love and all that, especially not the Hollywood portrayal of perfect relationships that survive forever; however I do think it's possible to find something close-ish, slightly less long-lasting, and maybe not so perfect.

    Possible, not frequent.

    Love this post, you're a fantastic writer :)

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  4. i have always tried and just as often failed, to express in prose not how my life is but how my life feels. it touches me so delicately to so read what i have invariably wished to write. your post is very me fickle cattle and since it is rare that one gets to read himself, i thank you indeed.

    esf

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  5. I'm really a fan of romantic hollywood movies. And paper back novels too. And you know what, no matter how I had numbers of unrequited love for the past years, that sometimes i think of disillusioning myself with finding love again, i just can't do it myself. coz no matter how i try not to think about it, the thought of me finding my one true love always plays in my mind over again, just like in the movies. so that's how hopeless romantic i am.. :)

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  6. Totally agree with areyoukiddingme

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  7. Ah, what a sociological treatise was this! Hollywood movies drive people to despair and it is a known fact that there is nothing like ONE TRUE person or SOULMATE or THE RIGHT ONE exist. We have to make ourselves believe that all these exist somewhere. We cheat ourselves into saying that we believe in OTL as we classify ourselves as "hopeless romantics." Balls.

    Joy always,
    Susan

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  8. Regarding your lats paragraph, I reached that stage when I hit 30. But then I continued to be single. And I discovered something beyond cynicism. ;-)

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  9. I came from a very comfortable relationship until it crashed and burn. I'm cynical about love but I'd love to be proven wrong.

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  10. I hate when people tell me they have a checklist. If I had a checklist I would not be engaged as it turns out the person who is most perfect for me likes some things I don't and does not like somethings I do. This is fine. I watch shark stuff without him and he watches zombie stuff without me. Love is fairly mysterious. That is why it rocks. So I agree with this a lot.

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  11. I'm in a point where I don't care anymore if I'm still hopeful or cynical about love. Whatever it has in store for me in the future, I'll just confront it heads up.
    .
    .
    And I don't watch romantic Hollywood movies anymore.

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  12. I'm a hopeless romantic myself really, but I like to think I've reached the point where I'm not that interested anymore.

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  13. My idea of love is a warm and fuzzy chitchat with my pet rocks.

    So...no comment.

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  14. You defenetly summed up what a lot of people do!
    And having found my true love I can't help but laugh at people like that! I'm in love, but cause I (and her) made it work through talking and small changes to acomodate eachother, we both over look the fact that neither us will ever be a supermodel or a millionaire. We are happy with what we have and not what we could have.

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  15. Dear Fickle Cattle:
    I enjoyed this post. So much that I re-posted the entire thing to my blog. [brookeshoko.blogspot.com]
    Many thanks,
    Brooke Shoko

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  16. hmmmm.. isn't this a little bitter? hehe.. just like everything else, LOVE comes and goes or.. it may never come at all..

    by the way, do you mind checking out on In Love But Practical"?

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  17. I love watching romantic movies just because they are seemingly infectious and make me feel good. Oddly enough, I just don't see myself ending up like the characters in those Hollywood films. Maybe I do dream about it. But when I wake up, I realize I'm so much better off alone.

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  18. life is definitely not an easy task....

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  19. I think this pretty much sums up what's wrong with this generation. That and songs about pechay.

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  20. I often feel like that. unfortunately i can't think of a way to rationalize it away.

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  21. I really like how your post is so relateable. I also like how you were able to write about a common topic with your own original flair to it. I believe true love does exist, only because I've seen it with my own 2 eyes, but I'm constantly riding a roller coaster with the emotions that come with it.

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  22. oh! love love love!

    -not really my thing :D

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  23. Thank you for your lovely comment.
    As for Love - It's better to be alone for the right reasons than to be with someone for the wrong ones!
    I strongly believe that.

    Nice blog, following...
    http://sassycasual.blogspot.com/

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  24. Great tips! i'll definitely show your post to a friend of mine! I think she desperately needs them!
    xx
    http://dontcallmefashionblogger.blogspot.com/

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  25. Great post as usual! :)

    I have a big Armani giveaway on my blog, dont forget to look! :)
    Modafobik.

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  26. I think this would make an amazing movie. Funny how we are about reaching our goals. We might miss something really good in our lives and not even know it. Thanks for your wisdom..and the note too.

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  27. Love this post!!!Tottaly agree with u..;0Follow u..:) Follow me back?:P

    xxx

    Angie

    P.S:chasingkitesbyangie.blogspot.com
    Don't bother to pass by anytime..:D

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  28. i feel the same way. "Lower your standards, raise your average" is all i have to say

    +following

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  29. Thanks so much for the note. As my grandpa told me..you gotta kiss a lot frogs before you find your prince.

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  30. sighhhhhh these are just in the movies

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