I have a tendency to preach that things in this life are a lot easier than they seem to be; we only make them difficult because we assume a plethora of social guidelines and taboos that we live by to the death of us. For the most part, I stay true to my mantra of living in the moment and fully living life, but when it comes to opening up to that one special person or committing to that one goal I seem to have some trouble adhering to my own guidelines.
You can pull instances from my last relationship or even my childhood to explain why not active commitment, but emotional commitment is so hard for me buy in to. It’s one thing to actively be committed to a person; it’s easy, it becomes routine and everyone can do it. But to emotionally buy into someone and fully commit your soul to him or her is completely different and far more frightening thing to do.
As a young man, my identity is challenged every day because I am constantly trying to physically and socially equal the concept of the alpha-male, the Adonis the All-American, the Renaissance man, the man who looks the part and can do it all. This is superficial, this is a projection of man’s ideal form of himself; it is Nietzsche’s Overman if you will. But it is completely necessary to inspire us to move forward in this life and be the best we can possibly be. To maintain a path to the physical and social manifestation of these ideals, a lot of work is required, literally and figuratively speaking. And while doing this, I’m still trying to lead an authentic lifestyle… be a real, genuine person. Be an open book, with the people I meet and the experiences I live penning the chapters. But undoubtedly, I face obstacles and from time to time lose sense of what is real. Why am I doing this? Is it for me or for some other purpose that will only give me superficial satisfaction?
This constant struggle makes me quite vulnerable, and the fact that I am aware of my own vulnerability makes very defensive in a sense, walls are put up to keep an already fragile ego intact. This is why as a 20-something male in college, quality over quantity concerning the opposite sex can be so attractive. As boys, we were taught that real men are adorn by many women, that they are strong, that dark emotion is a sign of weakness, that a smile is better than a hug at your worst moment. While reality was at our fingertips, the superficial was constantly served up on a platter in every direction we turned. Some stayed firm in the realm of reality, others completely gave into the superficial, and many more, like myself are struggling to stay afloat between the two.
Now this brings me back to my original intention for this piece, allowing myself to emotionally commit myself to someone in order to foster a relationship that is healthy, dynamic and will help me grow as person. A relationship that allows me to realize that empathy is so very necessary, to embrace and appreciate the dark and depressing emotions that I will inevitably get with my limited social knowledge at this age, and to buy into the idea that a great man is defined by his actions and the integrity with which he performs them (obvious, I know…).
I say being a great man, because I am one and it’s my perspective, but these thoughts go for both sexes. For as many conflicted young men I know, there are just as many conflicted young women who are battling with the concept of what it is to be a woman and the reality of it. The same walls are put up to protect the same egos. The same internal questions are raised on a daily basis and in the middle of the night when one cannot sleep due to the irrational existential crisis they’ve thought themselves into due to the unnecessary paranoia they have as a result of some random encounter they had in the day, or because of some random movie they watched that struck a chord.
But for all of these internal and external struggles that we put ourselves through, the solution is right in front of us. We live and breathe it; we just have to pay attention to it. All these other concepts and ideas on how to live (including this one, depending on how you interpret it) should be white noise, road signs at best, merely guides for the paths we choose to take to form our reality.
(I swear I’m going to tie this back into the emotional commitment thing, just wait.)
Here we go…
Okay so, once we wipe away all these social spam ads that we are constantly pelted with, and get a grasp on what our individual reality is and who we are; strengths and flaws included, then we can allow ourselves to emotionally commit to someone or something. Take note though, depending on where you are in your life your reality might be a complete farce and you may have to start from the drawing to get back to who you really are. But not to worry, it shouldn’t be too hard if you completely let go and simply live.