Hello Everyone! I hope you’re experiencing sunshine on your shoulders and mid-summer breezes. I’m living and working casually this summer. My world is full of people lately — old friends, close family, new dates, new mentors and fascinating clients. My introverted soul is up and down with energy, but mostly up. I feel a sense of calm and good.
In the spirit of ease and sunny-ness, my post this week is a list. I didn’t do a lot of research for this. I am not corralling my thoughts into a cohesive narrative. I’m giving you partially processed thoughts and ideas to ponder, as I am.
This week’s things that make me go hmmm?
- I experienced an evening by myself that felt lonely and uncomfortable. I am usually good by myself but I think I reached my threshold of aloneness tolerance. My kids were with their dad two weekends in a row. Despite dates, friend time, ample books to read and work to do, I was at a loss of what to do to make myself feel good. I hadn’t ever fully hit that spot before. I also noticed I was not motivated to work during this time. I felt kind of paralyzed.
- This time around in the dating scene, I’m pointedly adjusting my focus toward Beta males. I’m looking for emotional availability and empathy. I’ve found it in a couple of men, but the physical chemistry is missing.
- Over the last few months, I have developed several platonic relationships with men and women in their 60s or older. All of them approached me and welcomed me (into church, out to lunch). I have had the most enriching conversations with them. I like the feeling of having elders in my life.
- I go into each first date more worried about whether I’ll like them than if they’ll like me. Not sure if that is conceited or mature.
- After listening to PsyD, couples therapist, Stan Tatkin, on Jayson Gaddis’s podcast, I’m considering what kind of relationship I can have with someone as much as I’m considering who they are.
- I’m working on seeing what is versus forecasting and using my introverted intuition (Ni) to predict outcomes based on pattern recognition. In online dating, I’ve noticed I’ll read someone’s profile and if they say, for example, they are a vegetarian, my mind starts spinning a story for them. They’re going to be thin and smaller boned than me, they will leave all the planning up to me, they will be frustrated and disappointed if I use plastic water bottles. I am consciously stopping myself and making myself look at the actual behavior and responses exhibited. This is hard. My intuition has been fairly accurate in the past, or did I create a self-fulfilling prophesy situation?
What do these thoughts bring up in you? If any of these topics interest you and you’d like me to expand on them, let me know in the comments. I’m open to further exploration.
Sending you much love and warmth,
Thanks for sharing; all interesting musings for sure. As someone who has chosen to spend quite a lot of time alone, I’m drawn to your comment about hitting “lonely”.
I’m at a little later stage of life, children are adults, and married to someone who’s pretty independent.
What I find when I get a stretch of time alone is that I watch my internal compass go through many different phases over the course of say five days. I may cycle into a period where the mood is blue, not thrilled to be there, but sit with it. And during the same period of days, I may have moments of real bliss, just feeling at one with life, walking the beach one afternoon in solitude, or bumping into someone and having a heartfelt exchange.
What I’ve come to value after doing this sort of “retreat” many times is to just allow all those different feelings and moods to take their place as part of the tapestry of alone-ness.
Sometimes I write, sometimes I read, sometimes I just sit and be, sometimes I partake of strenuous physical activity, sometimes watch a movie (very helpful for finding the tears)…
and all of it is just perfect.
even leaning directly into that loneliness is part of the journey, something to learn, I would guess.
all the best,
Thank you Steven for the perspective of seeing the aloneness in different states or periods. I think for the first time, I had too long of a ‘lonely’ period. Usually, I move through the different moods/states with agility. I even lean toward a greater percentage of the bliss/solitude stage. I’ll view the next ‘retreat’ with more perspective thanks to you. I’ll try to see it as a whole tapestry. Thank you so much for your thoughtful comment.
Hi Brenda
I love how you’ve written your random thoughts … I smile at and understand quite a few of them well too at the moment. I too am valuing having ‘elders’ in my life, there’s something mature about being able to rest in and absorb some of their wisdom. It feels good. I too am strongly motivated to find a beta male, and know too that in the past, the attraction/physical chemistry just hasn’t been there though. I have read that this is the way I have conditioned myself though, and am hoping to be able to re-condition myself, and give it time …. see ‘love’ in a new way and not recognise it in the way I always have … and find it’s hasn’t actually been love.
And I was just saying to my friend that I know I am growing and in a better place because I now want to know if I like the guy, way more than knowing if they like me! It feels like a healthier, easier, more balanced and more authentic way to be, I am excited by this growth and see it as maturity, and a sign I have way more self belief and self respect …. certainly not conceitedness.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts, as always it’s so reassuring to see someone else feeling and thinking the same (and being so open and clear about it).
Stephanie X
Thanks Stephanie for sharing your experience with some of the thoughts I’m processing. I especially found your comment about re-conditioning yourself to know what love is. I think I am in the process of doing that too. In the past, if someone took care of things for me I accepted that as love. Now I want a conscious and compassionate partner who works with me.
Thanks for the affirmation that wanting to like a potential mate is more mature than wanting them to like me. I do believe it is a sign of self-respect and acceptance. 🙂
I really appreciate your input Stephanie. Thank you!