August 4 2002

In one of my groups, we were talking about the responsibility of love. If someone loves you, are you responsible to love them back?

For the longest time, I felt that it was important to love someone back. I felt that I was doing them an injustice by not feeling the same way. I had low self-esteem for a while, so it was just natural for me to want to love someone who said that they loved me. So I did.

That was how I ended up with my first husband.

I can honestly say, I did love his children, and perhaps that was the only reason I stayed with him for as long as I did. Sad, huh.

But since then, I have grown up. My self-esteem improved once I finished college. I knew I could be my own person and that if people loved me, great, if they didn't, so what. They prally didn't know me anyway, or just didn't take the time to get to know me.

During college, though, was when I realized I didn't need to love everyone who loved me. It killed me for the longest time that my dear friend loved me deeply and perhaps passionately, yet I was unable to feel the same for him. After just leaving a relationship where I made myself love someone I couldn't let that happen again.

I would have had a good life with this young man, but the love, the passion, the chemistry just wasn't there. So we just became good friends, and I think I hurt him, perhaps not, but I always feel that I did in some way. I don't think I led him on, but I will never know for sure.

More and more I get careful about flirting and caring. Too many people take my carefree feelings the wrong way. I have hurt many a young man because of this. Yet, I continue to flirt, but I do try to be more careful.

Once again, it comes back to, am I responsible to love them back? No. Am I responsible to keep them from loving me in the first place?
I don't know.

Here is a quote from one of the people in the group.

"Hey Gang;

I have to agree that there is no responsibility to return love. You tell someone you love them to express yourself or to make them feel good, but not to hear someone else say it. I have told people I love them and immediately followed it by telling them it really made no difference how they felt about me I was just expressing my emotion and did not expect them to understand or reciprocate. I feel that love is the eternal commitment to make another person's goals and feelings equal to your own. The giddy emotional rush is more akin to wonderment or lust. But there is a certain confident peace that comes from knowing someone else is there and shares your life and dreams.

On BF's or GF's or whatever; you look for support for the things you want to do with your life and to make your path/tasks easier. I have worked with partners that were always by my side, armed and covering my every move. But I have also had partners that were more like the ring man in a boxing match, they brought you back together every 3 minutes or so. And I have had partners that were more like a corporate office support person. they supplied intel. took care of the books, screened your calls and covered for you at boring meetings. Each relationship has to work out its own dynamics. I have also had and have partners that do not involve sex That I know would kill for me or risk their own lives, its been proven more than once.

There are plenty of people (all genders (7)) that do not know what they want out of life, do not have a path and have no known tasks; therefore they do not need a partner to make their life easier. They may want someone around for company, or to keep house, or for sex or whatever but if nothing big is riding on it they will not go to extremes to keep that person. The classic fear of commitment types may just not be ready to lock into a relationship that may not suit their goals when they find them, or they may have nothing in their lives they are willing to commit to. Timing in your life is always an issue in relationships. I have met many wonderful people that I thought would be great partners but they or I were in the wrong or different phases of our lives. In my current relationship, my wife keeps changing her goals or refusing to set a target, so I try to help with the hunt but its a bit stressful since I'm sort of results oriented. Needless to say its tough sometimes. Oh and as her goals and directions mutate then the goals of mine that she supports changes. I can understand modifying a plan to account for new factors and previously unknown obstacles but not scraping the whole thing. Besides if you wait until you know everything about something (you will know everything about everything), or until the time is just right; you will end up doing nothing but waiting. Action is scary, commitment is scary, but life is scary.

In relationships and life and tasks; I believe you make the best decisions you can with the information you have and then; "YOU MAKE IT WORK". If it takes going beyond your limits and fears so be it. If it takes changing the laws so be it. If You have to find a way around a mountain, you do it. It has been called bullheadedness, lawless, fanatic and occasionally magic. So be it. Magic is just the bending of elements and perceptions. The last good case I saw was at one of those office "team building" games this summer. Remember I currently work in Civil service (arrrggghhhh). We had one of those silly multi part over complicated tasks that has to involve everybody doing many tasks and lots of organization. Well I found a way to achieve the goals outside the rules. I explained it to 2 other people I knew would listen and we did it, while the team leader was still assessing the situation. Total time for the hour exercise that less than 5% of teams achieve was just under 4 minutes. Lawlessness, creative, magic; who cares it happened. And the rules got rewritten. Ask Henry Ford, Gengis Khan, or George Patton about it. Miracles are more often made and designed than coincidence. Just like good relationships. I often see thing I can only explain as magic, illusion or wondrous miracles; I know that they are only things I do not understand or know enough about. Hell I count on the Voodoo Magic part of everything I do, I don't know how, when, or why it will happen; but Experience says it will.

Also; there is a law of conservation in effect. Every action causes a reaction, even if you do not see it immediately. You can only get out of a system what is put into it. Others may get more than they put in or you may or none of you may see what’s coming out but outcome is limited by input. Many systems are lopsided, so part of what I get out is educational. The cruelest thing you can do to someone is education.

Ergo, I am a cruel bastard! Its part of my task here, as I see it. Which is all I got since I have met few who I took seriously when they were telling me what I should do. I know I have this life and a few more maybe a thousand or so I don't know. Looking for the destination of a journey makes you miss the trip. There are times when I know something is coming that I do not like. Not liking or not wanting it usually seems to have little effect on it. Which ironically enough is how my attention to something is sometimes described. Not wanting this life or another one will not change the reality of it happening, and personally I would rather deal with the here and how that I know than the unknown. Now ignorance is really scary. One reality that should be obvious; When you actually reach the last straw, or it land on you, you won't be around to say so. Being fed up with something just means its time to back out and hit it another way or go around it. The "last" attack is the one you did not survive. One of the only guarantees that never change is that things will indeed change. Unfortunately we get locked in to routines and perceptions that often do not let us see change. Of course that gets into the whole perception/reality issue.

Oh, and the male/female life thing was something the Hindus made out of the earlier daoist duality of nature thing. Which leads to why religions seem to get more ritualistic and complicated? Which is weird, cause life is relatively simple on a base level. You do until you die and then its not your current problem anymore. we complicate it with right and wrong, teams/relationships in order to do more, social growth etc...

Enough ranting from the mad Hill-William"

Blessed Be!