A big part of that is learning to be alone, comfortably--to enjoy your own company and not rely on the constant hum and sputter of the world at large to keep you from getting to know (and love) yourself.

Filmmaker Andrea Dorfman created this very nice little video that resonates well with me and may be a help to you:

I don’t find the idea all that outlandish. In fact, it makes plenty of good sense to me.

Now there are two things I want to know from you:

1. What do you think of the assertion made in the study?
2. What music gets you “in the mood”?

Talk to me people, I’ve been away from this blog for the better part of a month now, help me dust it off.

No, not the kind that’ll be going off in the sky this weekend… the kind between you and another person.

That old trope used in everything from classic cartoons to sitcoms to bad teen poetry, like many cliches, does have a granular bit of usefulness and truth to it. In this case, while it completely misses the specialness of, it accurately conveys the beauty and danger of falling for someone.

These days, fireworks are common. Once upon a time they weren’t. You’d only see the sky light up on really special occasions–not with every rock band and baseball game. Back then, it was really something special and awe-inspiring. The “ooo!” and “aaaaah!” of the crowd was genuine and not simply a conditioned (and/or ironic) response to something just slightly off from common.

The same is not true of the romantic kind of fireworks. In the sea of noise and distraction we live in every day, it’s become a little harder to feel those first bits of romance kick in. It’s not until something deep down speaks up loudly and explodes across our emotional field of view that we really take notice. And by then… well, by then we’re neck deep into something we didn’t necessarily see coming.

Even if you are among the lucky group that pays enough attention to see the nice sparklers we run into every day, it’s easy to get caught up in the moment and not see the risk involved in the beauty.

The simple truth is, the risk is what fuels the beauty.

One of the reasons fireworks are awe-inspiring is because they’re made out of fire. Seriously. Touch them and you get burned. Treat them improperly and you can just get yourself killed.

When fireworks hit in a romantic relationship, they can blind us to incompatibilities we’d otherwise see. All too often, our personal fireworks are lit by physical attributes and not much else. That’s just the nature of the human being.

But the show is oh-so-pretty and it’s difficult to not end up in awe.

We should all take some lessons from the fireworks masters who put on the best shows: always check your setup before you light the fuse.

A moment of hesitation, of clarity, is a very important part of protecting ourselves and those we care about from a needlessly negative experience. In that moment, we have to take stock of who we are, what we are willing and able to offer, and where the firework-indicing attraction has come from.

That way we can make the firm decision to move forward, burn hot, bright, and high, any maybe, just maybe, actually become a star in the sky.

Yes, sometimes the risk is more than worth it. The most spectacular displays of pyrotechnics are also often the most dangerous.

In matters of the heart, the risks are more personal and intangible–losing face, losing friends, being rejected–but the success, of finding just the right chemistry with someone else, bring far more joy.

Talk like that is, realistically speaking, useless.

We are different every minute of the day–always changing based on internal and external stimuli. The same is true of everyone else we interact with. If we’re not the same minute-to-minute, we’re definitely not the same year-to-year. And if we’re talking about interaction with another person… well, there’s very little “the same” even if you’ve been with that other person forever.

Because we’re ever-evolving and because everyone else is, too, you are never going to recapture exactly the same feeling as some point in the past. You are never going to find someone like the (mostly mythical) person you remember your ex being.

(Yes, I say “mostly mythical” because our minds change things on us all the time. If we’re longing for “the good old days” those days will seem all the more good. If we’re pining away over an ex, we’re more than likely going to forget or gloss over all the bad times that lead up to them being an ex.)

If you spend all your time and energy trying to reclaim something that is impossible to reclaim, you will constantly be disappointed and exhausted.

I’ve seen this again and again. I’ve done this myself more times than I’d care to count. It’s natural and it’s human.

But we have to be aware that we do things like this so we can work to change our wasteful and self-destructive patterns.

The feelings we have for others are beyond comparable to one another. Each is unique and rich and valid in its own way. It is possible–and more common than most think–to have equally strong feelings for multiple people.  It’s one of the bigger sources of internal dissonance we run into. “I can’t possibly feel that way…”

Bottom line is, we all have to realize that, yes, we are never going to replace that person who’s no longer part of our lives. We don’t need to. We’ll create something different with someone else–or ourselves. Something that will be different, but give us a similar satisfaction, a similar rush, a similar joy.

Love is never the same twice. And trying to make it be is a recipe for dissatisfaction.

WordPress (the content management system that runs the site) just released it’s newest version, 3.0, last week. I’ve upgraded and I’m taking some time to play with some of the new options. So far, pretty neat stuff (most of it invisible to those of you who only see the front end of things, but for others who run their own blogs, useful things, indeed). If anything glitches up, let me apologize in advance… it’s probably from me fiddling with things. If something’s not working, drop me a note or just wander away for a few minutes and come back later.

In the ongoing effort to get some more eyeballs here, I’ve added a few things to the front end.

First, you may notice that new toolbar across the bottom of your browser when you’re on the site. (If it’s your first time here since I turned it on the other week, it’ll even pop up a little message announcing itself.) That’s from a company called Wibiya and has a whole host of neat buttons that I now don’t have to include in the site design. Useful? You tell me.

Second, I’ve just turned on a fan page over on FaceBook. Along with that, I’ve enabled a few modules on the site’s back end that (once I get them all running properly–a wee bit trickier than I thought it would be, or maybe I just need more sleep before I tinker with this stuff) will keep that fan page up to date with info from the site and allow all of you who have FB accounts to log in over here and more easily comment and share things.

Third, I’m working on a new design for the site. This is probably still some time off as I am not at all a designer. I’ve got some vague ideas of what I’m looking for, but I’m open to suggestions–or offers of theme design services. I’m not even close to making any money on this site (yet), so I can’t actually hire someone to do it… so it may be a while before it’s all in place. But, if someday you drop by and things look really different, well, I’ve been successful and hopefully you’ll like it.

July is quickly approaching and I want it to be jam-packed with new and worthwhile content (especially since I’m aiming to get so many new people browsing through here). If what I’ve been writing resonates with you, help me tune it a little more. (And if everything I write just kind of leaves a bad taste in your mouth, thanks for continuing to come back, but realize you’re probably not going to benefit from the main purpose of this site.)

There are a few other things on the horizon–including an international connection or two. Exciting things that are still in very formative stages… so I can’t say much more than that.

Mostly, I just want to take a moment and thank everyone who comes through here and to encourage you to share your favorite articles with your friends and point anyone you think may need it to the site.

Little by little, we can build a community that uses the Grown Up Crush to live happier and more fulfilled lives.

When you’re tired, you’re not quite as quick to react. When you’re angry, your blood pressure rises. When you’re in a good mood, you smile.

What we often don’t realize quite as readily is that they way we make our body behave can have a distinct effect on our mental state.

One of the most direct routes to this body-mind connection I’ve seen (and experienced, and make use of) is breathing.

I am, by no means an expert on the physio-psychological connection between breathing and mental state. What I do know is that the breathing techniques I learned while taking some martial arts in college and from some books on meditation have helped me get anxiety, negative spirals, and near chronic giddiness (yes, being too happy can be a problem) under control.

Breathe Low, Not High

Far too often, you’ll find yourself breathing by expanding your chest and, perhaps, raising your shoulders. While common, it isn’t necessarily optimal for oxygen intake or the best way to relax.

Better breathing comes from using your diaphragm more thoroughly. When doing that, it’s your abdomen that should expand (as the diaphragm and lungs expand down as well as out). It makes better use of your full lung capacity and works different muscles–ones not often involved in our stress bearing habits (tense chest and shoulders? Probably stressed out.)

The Count

Frequently, when we panic or get otherwise worked up, the speed of our breathing increases. This triggers a host of other physiological things. Those things can cascade, loop around, and increase the amount we’re worked up.

To help get this under control, make use of an old trick we’ve all heard before: take a deep breath and count to ten.

The benefit here is two-fold. First, consciously taking control of your breathing and counting takes your mind off of what’s been bothering you, even if it is just for a moment. Second, that deep breath brings with it a rush of oxygen that replenishes what you’ve been keeping from your brain by the increased (and often shallow) breathing you’ve been doing.

It may not be a perfect solution, but it is a stop-gap that can give you the moment of clarity to implement another solution or extricate yourself from the stressful situation that triggered the panic.

Inhale, Hold, Exhale, Repeat

A close cousin to the ten count solution above, this takes things one step further by adding a repeating cycle.

This cycle not only gets your breathing under control and further distracts your mind from the problem that’s getting you all riled up, it helps train the body in proper breathing and gets more oxygen into your system.

Inhale for a solid four or five count. Hold it for a seven or eight count. Exhale slowly for another six or eight count.

After a repetition or three, your head should clear and you should feel a bit more lively.

Other Resources

A couple of quick articles with a little more information:

• Anxiety Breathing Techniques and Acupressure: A Powerful Self Therapy For Anxiety and Stress
• The Importance of Kung Fu Breathing and Meditation

Try it out and let me know how the different breathing techniques work for you. Ever better, what do you do to help get your anxiety, anger, giddiness or whatever?

Research shows that women have a harder time coping with a breakup, but the guys are the ones who feel more stress and strain when the relationship hits a rough patch, researchers found. On the upside, men also get more of a psychological and emotional boost when the relationship is healthy.

“Common wisdom says that women are more hurt by problems in a relationship,” says Robin Simon, lead researcher on the study and a sociologist at Wake Forest, “but we found that the benefits of support [in a relationship] and the disadvantages of strain are exaggerated for the men.”

“Men are more sensitive than we often think they are,” she says.

So my question to you is: How does this track with your experience? Discuss!

A lot has changed in the five years since then.

One thing remains true: by uncovering the real truth in the things that my mind has rewritten has allowed me to be a better, happier person.

Our minds are often our worst enemies. The attacks of the mind, though, are coated in a sweet sugar–it plays to our ego, to our hopes. It rewrites our painful transgressions to deflect blame, to make things seem better than they were (at least in the context of the person we want to be).

The worst part: this is all normal functionality for the mind. It’s how it keeps us going.

“Broken” minds can take the opposite route: making everything seem worse than it was. Taking on more blame than could possibly have been, assigning malignant motives to those who never had them. Twisting everything into a worst case scenario that was inevitable.

We all have our negative spirals, but some minds are much more predisposed to them than others.

When our minds bury things, those things–like my not calling Jessica all those years ago–can turn rotten and begin to poison the well that the rest of our person drinks from. If it’s not eventually dredged out and dealt with, there is a weakness that permeates our being, serving as a vector for all sorts of future nastiness to get in.

This is why I encourage everyone to write down their joys and sorrows, to tell their stories (if only to themselves), to talk to the other people who were there. By doing whatever you can to fill in the blanks and reconcile memory (or fantasy) with a more objective reality, you firm up the foundation that the rest of your life is built on. Having reference material to look back on can remind us of a lot and give us good starting points for recovering what our minds have suppressed.

Yes, this is difficult and some people don’t seem to need to clean house in this way, but more than a few people–myself included–wouldn’t be anywhere near as functional or happy today if they hadn’t done the hard work of mucking out their psychological aquifers.

The hidden past can be a threat to our future. Secrets we keep from ourselves weaken our foundations. The longer they sit, rot, and seep, the more damage they do when they are ripped out, brought to light, and are dealt with.

Faulty memories are something that are normal. Accepting that and working to correct them will put you firmly on the path to better understanding yourself and allow you to better deal with the situations you encounter.

These stories I tell are my life. They are important scenes and sequences that have made me who I am now. They are memories, made more real through repetition and recital. They remind me who I am, who I was and who I am working toward being.

When there is a fundamental change to the stories, it requires a fundamental change in my self. We are intertwined, the stories and I. Living a healthy symbiotic relationship. Without one, the other will cease to be. Or at least cease to be in any recognizable form.

About a week ago, I told you all a story about Jessica. That story, I discovered shortly thereafter, was wrong. I have remembered it wrong for at least a decade now, probably longer.

Correcting this story, to make it match with reality, is not an easy task. It is rooted deep within my foundation. It has supported many other angles of my being. It is not something that can just be trimmed, dug up and replanted.

Over the past week, I have very been spending a lot of time thinking deeply on how this affects the me that I am today. Some things have become much more clear. Other things… well, other things I am still working on.

This is how it really happened:

It was the beginning of my sophomore year of High School. I was riding high on a good summer and had equally high hopes for the year to come. The center point of life for me in high school was lunch. It was when the most diverse group of people was gathered together in one place. It was also one of the only times we could all freely interact with one another.

Lisa was the new girl in school. She had lunch with me and a few friends. She was also a bit of a matchmaker. In the first week of school, she hooked one of my friends up with a guy and, as time went on, she would be the catalyst for at least a few other relationships. As time went by, we would also end up hanging with the same Smallwood crowd.

The first big event of the school year, especially for me, was the first school dance. It happened in the first week of school and gave everyone a chance to make an impression. Even though it was held in the cafeteria, it was held at night. Regular school rules–those of rigid social structure, reinforced by the segregation of class schedule and extracurricular activities–took a back seat to that other adolescent urge. The need to show off.

That first dance, in September of 1990, was extra special because it was also the first video dance of the year. (Back in ’90, that was a big deal.)

As always, I went alone. Not that I stayed alone for long. Even back then I felt it was my mission to make people happy. So when I saw some people I knew, I’d wander on over and, if they were feeling a bit down (like my friend–and crush–Kristen was), I’d do my darndest to cheer them up. Nine times out of ten, I was successful. And it usually involved sharing some of my angsty poetry.

Events that night, while not unusual for a school dance, got me thinking about things like relationships. OK, got me thinking deeper about relationships.

I wrote:

…both K* and H* have gone out with men who do not treat them as they should and who have basically neglected them. What they need are men who are mature enough to know and show respect and who do not treat women as possessions.
…
Any guy who cheats on, mistreats, or disrespects his girlfriend, and ends up losing her, is at fault for his loss. While, on the other hand, his exgirlfriend is better off. However, attempts should be made at some form of communication, it usually help.

A week after the dance, during lunch, Lisa told me that a friend of hers was interested in meeting me. Being a lonely 15 year old guy, I was more than interested in meeting her. I gave Lisa my phone number to pass on.

When I got home that day, Jessica called me for the first time.

We talked, briefly, and I found it quite enjoyable. “I would really like to meet her,” I wrote, “but I can’t get out much. Maybe I’ll have a solution soon.”

I talked to her one more time, with her calling me, before that week was out. The following Monday, Lisa gave me Jessica’s phone number on that pink piece of paper.

From then on we spoke regularly on the phone.

On Friday, September 20, 1990, Jessica and I met for the first time. It was a movie and dessert. The movie was Ghost. The dessert was across the street at the local diner. We talked for hours.

“Jessica’s wonderful. She’s interesting, she’s funny. She is really nice.” Is how I described it back then. It was my first date. Ever.

We talked again that Sunday when she called me. We’d call back and forth every day or so, sometimes one of us would be busy and would have to call the other back later.

On September 25, I wrote:

…I never have anything to talk to Jessica about and she usually ends up doing almost all the talking. Just like today,we were ont he phone for a while and I had no interesting news!

Let’s hope something interesting happens tomorrow.”

On September 27:

I talked to Jessica today, after I came back from the Scout meeting… I don’t know what it is, but something just doesn’t feel right about this relationship. I mean, it seems like something’s missing, but I can’t put my finger on it. But I plan on holding on to this for as long as possible, it’s the best I have.

That Sunday was a group outing to the movies. Me and three women. Three women who were friends. It didn’t go spectacularly. My summation of the day: “Try not to go to the movies with your date’s friends unless they have dates of their own!”

The second dance of the year happened in late October. Jessica and I went together. She had to leave early, and I distinctly remember getting a peck on the cheek as she headed for the door to her parent’s car. That left me smiling for the remaining half hour of the dance.

Her and I spoke semi-frequently. There were some missed calls, come mis-communicated ideas. A party I had been invited by her got canceled. I was busy with the school play and Key Club stuff and school stuff in general. But I had a girlfriend. That was something I had wanted for years.

And then, in November, I called and she wasn’t home. I meant to call back the next day, but forgot. I missed almost a week of school being sick, calling Jessica didn’t cross my fevered mind at all.

Thanksgiving came and went. The Hell Week for the play started and it was all that was on my mind. The play was performed and December crept in.

December 9, 1990:

You know that feeling when your heart kind of stops, jumps up, does a flip and then sinks down to your feet? Well, I do, that’s what happened when I turned around and saw Jessica there! The worst part was I couldn’t take time to talk to her, even if I could have gotten my brain and mouth to cooperate.

I think I better call tomorrow.

And… that was it.

I never called.

I never wrote.

I never really even mentioned her again. To anyone. Until, years later, I started telling that story about the blind date her and I had at the dance.

It ended in silence and I knew it was wrong to let it go that way.

But I did let it go that way. And then I forgot. Regardless of how wrong Jessica and I may have been for each other (and I saw that even back then), I should have at least had the decency to solidly end it. To call her and say, “I’m sorry I haven’t called you in so long. A lot has been going on. I like you, but I don’t think this is going to work.” To say anything would have been better.

I had said it myself, “Any guy who neglects his girlfriend deserves to lose them.” And I did. I didn’t deserve her then.

For the past few days, I’ve wrestled with the idea that maybe, deep down, I’ve never thought I’ve deserved anyone since. I’ve dug inside my self, deep into my foundation, and found that it’s not a feeling of worthlessness I’ve been carting around. It’s guilt.

Guilt that I was that guy that I’ve always hated. That one that just lets the girl dangle in limbo while he goes off and does… whatever. That deep, hidden, secret guilt has worked its way into so many little fears and anxieties in my relationship life. It’s kept me from picking up the phone to call just to say hi. It’s kept me from letting people go. It’s kept me from taking the chance to go after a “maybe” relationship.

But now I’ve found it. I’ve grabbed it. I’ve looked it in its beady little eyes and taken possession of it. Yes, I was that guy once. But I haven’t been since. And I never will be again. That mistake was my own and I most certainly knew it was a mistake when I made it. Unfortunately, I can’t apologize directly to Jessica. If I ever see her, I will.

That pain–what I must have caused her and what I’ve inflicted upon my self in the past fifteen years–is mine now. It can’t hurt me any more.

Long ago (back in the late 80s and early 90s), I kept paper journals. The first was an old ledger book where I crossed out the old dates at the tops of the pages and put the correct ones in. I limited myself, more or less, to a single page. There were other bound books I used, sporadically at times, but the “big one” was the one I used in 1990. It was then that I switched to a three ring binder, giving me a near infinite number of pages I could sprawl my chicken-scratch penmanship across. At least it seemed like a near infinite number of pages back then.

What this notebook actually gave me the chance to do was accumulate a lot of random things. All thanks to the clip in the front and the ample space between pages. (In the bound books, stuffing too many random things inside would prevent the thing from closing right.)

Around Halloween, as I was digging for costume parts, I came across the box I had packed those old journals away in. They’ve bounced around a little since then. Moving from box to shelf and back again a few times. Just the other day, as I was wasting what little awake time I had at home over the weekend, I took the notebook off the shelf and flipped through it a little.

With each page, each random slip of paper, each saved card and ticket stub, a world of memories flooded back…

A torn piece of pink paper, obviously from a spiral bound, three-hole punched notebook, has a name, address and phone number written on it in fading pencil. The writing is not mine. It is a round, clear and only slightly bubbly female printing. The girl who wrote it was named Lisa. The name she wrote is Jessica Catlin.

Lisa was the first–and thankfully last–person to ever set me up on a date. Why she did it, I’m not sure. She was new in town and fell in quickly and easily with the bad kids that I hung with because I had no choice. They were an OK bunch, really, but without a doubt trouble. If it had been any other group of “bad” kids, I doubt Lisa or I would have fit in at all. From where I stand now, I wouldn’t say her and I were friends, but we were in the same group and it was a group that did things for one another. That’s all the reason she needed.

Jessica lived about an hour away, back in the town here Lisa had moved from. I remember that first nervous call to her. Even then I hated the phone, already conditioned by numerous failures at being social in previous years. My mouth would dry up, my throat would tighten, my mind would go blank. The conversation we had is just a blur in my memory. As are the other two or three that I had with her before the “big date.”

I do, however, remember a sly, hopeful grin on my mother’s face every time I’d take the phone to make one of those calls. I really do think she was more excited than I ever was about the prospect of me dating.

The “big date” was one of the video dance parties my high school was doing. We had at least four open dances a year. I never missed one. This one was the first one I ever had a date for. And the last.

Jessica was tall. At least as tall as I was. A little awkward (but weren’t we all back then?) and, it would seem, quite nervous. Her hands were delicate, but clammy when I took them in mine. She had reddish brown hair that was done up kind of poofy (it was, after all, just after the 80s). Her dress was plain but nice. Lisa was at her side, grinning.

I bought the tickets and we went into the cafeteria, transformed through the magic of a big movie screen, a small stage that held the DJ equipment, some fancy lights and a big stack of speakers into the video dance party of the year. (Really, it just looked like the cafeteria always did at the dances, except the screen made it feel more crowded than it was.) Lisa and her date left Jessica and I. There was some small talk, choked out in fits of nervousness. Neither of us danced all that well. We did dance to a slow song that came up in the rotation, swaying back and forth holding one another, not sure at all what to do.

Thankfully, Lisa and her date came back and we were able to hang with them for a little while out in the hallway. It was starting to get just a little bit better. My nerves were calming down, my throat was opening up, talking wasn’t as much of a challenge. (Though finding anything worth saying was.)

And then, on the way back in to the dance, Jessica pretty much just fainted.

Lisa caught her a bit, I caught her a bit, she didn’t hit the ground before she regained her balance.

That was pretty much the end of the night. Lisa, her date and Jessica left a little while after that. I remember a light peck on my cheek before I watched them go.

It may have been the end of the dance, I may have gone back in to mull about on my own some more before my ride showed up. One thing was for sure, I considered the night a disaster.

I think I only called Jessica once or twice more.

Then I missed a call I was going to make one day.

Out of anxiety over having to hear her upset, I skipped another one.

And another.

Lisa never mentioned Jessica again. I never asked about her.

The only other time I would have ever run into her would have been Lisa’s Sweet 16 party… which I had to cancel on due to my parents not wanting to make an hour or so drive in a snowstorm.

This is one of the reasons I don’t care much for the concept of blind dates.

At least now, in the digital age, we can get to know people just a little bit better. And those of us who write better than we speak on the phone don’t have to worry about our brains exploding from nerves.

NOTE: This is how I told this story for many years. It recently came to my attention that this is not at all how Jessica and I met, knew one another or ended. In short, the above memory is a total fabrication of my mind. The real story will be posted next.