There's this girl I know. She broke up with her boyfriend over a month ago and spent most of the intervening time in suicidal depression. She's convinced that she is ugly, unlovable, stupid, (she's a graduate student in numerical relativity, which is something fiendishly difficult and involves a lot of computing and that's all I know) a failure at life, and will never have another relationship again.
Aside from the blatant stupidity of such an attitude--like it's going to get her anywhere to sit around and mope about how much her life sucks--she's very sure that her ex was the love of her life and there won't be another man for her.
This "love of your life" concept is one that has interested me for the past fifteen minutes or so. Movies use this all the time. It's the love of your life, therefore you get a free pass to be pathetic, idiotic, and irrational; because in the end as long as it ends happily it doesn't matter what you do to get there. Because it's the love of your life. Life isn't worth living without this person, or so the writers want us to believe.
Is it true? I know I don't believe in one love per person, that's just statistically silly. But if you lose the person you've loved the most, does it knock your life down a level? Will you never be as happy again?
I think "love of your life" is a relative term--for me, it's defined primarily by how much I've loved the person over what proportion of my life. And I feel I've finally hit a point--for the first time in about five years--where I don't have a love of my life. I'm not pining for anyone. I'm not dying to get to the future with anyone. I just...am.
I'm pretty cynical and/or practical about strictly romantic love, really. I think that s.r.love is a choice, that you can choose or otherwise to love a person, always. I don't think that s.r.love is all you need. I think you need a whole lot more than s.r.love; I think there are many, many things more important than s.r.love for a happy union.
I'm twenty-one years old, and I have a number of failed relationships behind me, three of which might have ended in marriage and one at least in a long-term commitment. Maybe I'm cynical. Maybe I'm shut off because I've been hurt too much and blah blah more cliches. For me, being swept off my feet by emotion only ends up with everyone reeling.
Edited so I don't seem quite so harsh: Of course it's reasonable to feel hopeless in the wake of a breakup. But this girl is putting up away messages that say "Well, I guess my life is over, he didn't love me enough to stay with me...etc" and worse, telling people who don't even know her these things...it's not just a feeling. It's her life philosophy at the moment. Which is why it irritates me so. I'm not advocating tough love on those recently out of a breakup if they're struggling along. It's her desire to sit and wallow and never get better that pisses me off.
Example: "Life without ________ is simply empty and meaningless. I lost the love of my life. I'm still wishing he'd come back to me."
Why is it necessary to let the rest of us know this?
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