Chris and I haven’t seen each other for a few weeks because our schedules have both been really erratic and intense. We have been texting, but texting with him is very laid-back. I don’t feel anxious if we haven’t texted for a few days. I think I’m in a state of mind where I’m both comfortable with the possibility of becoming more serious while also open to seeing other people if I met someone. This isn’t to say that I’m sleeping around or going on a lot of dates and juggling multiple guys. Rather, I’m simply open to the possibility.

However, the other day, I got the feeling that Chris was perhaps ashamed of me. We had made plans to see a movie and he cancelled because it was poor timing and his friends had invited him out to something. Maybe I was in a bad mood prior to this, but I definitely felt like he could have invited me (since we did make plans and all) but that he didn’t want his friends to see me. This sounds absurd, I know, and it’s more reasonable that he cancelled with me because my schedule would have made us meeting too inconvenient for myself. We texted a little, but my sour mood made me curt and uninterested in talking to him.

This bad mood quickly lifted, however, when I realized what was happening. I was being brief and distant in talking with him, and as a result, he was putting in more effort to talk to me. I was unintentionally following The Rules and it was, unfortunately, working perfectly. Then today he messages me “MAKE ROOM IN YOUR BUSY SCHEDULE TO HANG OUT WITH ME!!!” which, knowing how Chris tends to be more reserved in his texting style, reeked of desperation. I burst out laughing, but remained fairly distant.

In turn, he invited me to a movie, a swapmeet, a banquet, and an after party with his friends.

Cue the uncontrollable laughter.

Chris and I had what The Rules would probably consider to be the worst discussion you can possibly have. We asked each other what we like and dislike about one another. The dislikes are the only important part of the conversation.

I told him I dislike that he sets up barriers for himself and makes arbitrary rules to follow that only serve to hold him back.

He said that he dislikes that I don’t have a more active lifestyle, i.e., that I’m not fit. He proceeded to say that my personality is amazing and that I shouldn’t change myself for anyone, but that (I forgot how he put it so I’m rearticulating it) I have so much potential, physically, and it feels like I’m wasting it or haven’t realized it.

Before you start to hate him, he didn’t phrase it as roughly as I did. We were both being brutally honest and he even said that it was pretty vain of him to say. It was good that he brought it up, because I got to talk to him about my body issues.

When I first started The Rules, I believed that I could force some silly nonsense into my head and magically, I’d love myself. I’d exercise and dress well because a book told me to and, in turn, those ideas got drilled into my brain. I thought I’d undergo some magical transformation and become beautiful and thin and perfect.

But that didn’t happen.

Because self-acceptance transcends words in a book. It’s a journey, not a destination. You first have to undo all of the self-hate you created for yourself. Then you have to accept yourself in your entirety, flaws and all. Then you begin the path towards loving yourself. And, once you love yourself, you don’t want to treat yourself poorly. You want the best for your body and you treat it like a friend. You exercise, quit smoking, eat healthier, drink more water, etc. because you love your body and want it to be the best it can be. But that’s a really long journey.

Chris has caught me in between accepting myself and starting the path towards loving myself, which is really kind of a perfect time. On one hand, I need to be alone and learn to accept myself but, on the other, I also need external support for when I fall down. I’m not saying Chris will be this support, but it’s much better than meeting me in any other part of the journey. I’m in a transformative phase and the potential for growth is exponential, but foundations must be laid now while I’m still that ugly duckling to know that people chose to be my friends for more than just my looks.

It’s like this: An unknown musician has a best friend. The musician works hard and the best friend says, you can do it, you’ve got it in you. The musician, eventually, becomes wildly famous. He turns to his best friend and knows that their relationship is genuine and lasting because it was created before status, when both were simply human beings.

So, as you all know, I’ve been going against The Rules lately. This doesn’t mean doing the opposite of every rule, but just doing what I feel comfortable with and not relying on what The Rules say.

I met a guy (Chris) who, at first, I didn’t really expect anything from. When we first met, he wasn’t even on my radar. But after talking one-on-one, I was amazed to see what I had found. We began talking more regularly and, as I posted before, we kissed.

After that, we talked about what it meant and our intentions. This strongly goes against The Rules which state that you’re never supposed to ask a guy “what are we?” or other definitive questions. But I wanted to ask, because we work together, and I wanted to know if this was something worth getting out to others or if it was just a casual thing not worth mentioning. We figured out that we’re both just comfortable seeing where things take us.

We hooked up a few times. The first time was full of laughter and personality (which I thought was crazy awesome). Usually, people view sex as an act. You get into that bedroom and suddenly you’re just your body, not your personality. Then, after you’ve put your clothes back on, you can also turn your personality back on. I hated that. But with Chris, it was very much personality-driven, and that makes it even better. Now we’re in between friends with benefits and casually dating. The lines are blurred, but it’s comfortable. The focus isn’t on the physical. We honestly enjoy each other’s company and get along like really great friends. He’s hilarious and smart and compassionate. Our conversations are equal. We laugh a lot. Even if things don’t progress towards a relationship, I know (and this is going to sound naive) that we can still be friends. And that’s pretty nice.

I wrote a few posts and set them to queue so I wouldn’t overwhelm the dashboard but tumblr doesn’t like me so obviously they’re not in my queue anymore. Just wonderful.

I’ll try to summarize what’s been going on to the best of my memory, but if I leave stuff out or things don’t make sense, I’m sorry.

A boy is spending the night tonight.

This reminds me that I have a lot to tell you guys.

I’ll break it up into separate posts because lord knows I’m not much for brevity.

I lost my virginity when I was 18. I hadn’t planned to wait until a special moment or anything. I just didn’t want to have sex in high school because I never really had the desire and so many girls who did were obnoxious about it. Oh, you’re sixteen and you’ve had another person’s anatomy inside you so you’re automatically this great knower of all things? Oh wait, you still can’t vote or drink or do anything that adults can do. Settle down, kid. Those girls who flaunted everything they had in high school all calmed down and realized how ridiculous they had been.

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Back in July, I was dumped for the third time, from the only real relationship I had ever had. And it was terrible. He was abusive emotionally and physically. I didn’t know where to turn. My aunt came over to my house to try and console me and she brought with her The Rules. I sat down that entire night with tears in my eyes and read the whole book from beginning to end, even taking notes. My aunt made me realize that had I been following The Rules this would have not made my relationship any less painful or the break up any easier because I wouldn’t have had the relationship in the first place, so I shouldn’t blame myself. 

The next morning I joined match.com. I didn’t message anyone right away, but I waited for the messages to come to me. And as I would later find out in The Rules for Online Dating, that was exactly what I should of done. 

One of the first messages that I got was from a guy in Minnesota named Matt. His picture was cute and he made a funny joke about something on my profile that caught my eye. I waited and then responded. We messaged back and fourth for about 3 weeks before he was coming down here to Alabama to look at apartments before moving here. He would be down here for one week and we would meet then. 

My aunt and I added some “house rules” to the Rules. Such as, don’t sleep with a guy until you have been dating him for at least 2 months. And always be safe. We made safety rules about never drink more than one alcoholic beverage when on a date. And always make sure you get your drink yourself from your bartender. When you do get ready to have sex, make sure it is protected. Basic rules for safety and well being, that we both agreed to and added to our rules. 

Matt came down to Minnesota and we hit it off right away on the first date. He asked me out again immediately to see me before he left to go back to Minnesota. There were 5 days inbetween dates and because he was going out of state, my aunt and I agreed to break the rules one time and let me go back out on another date with him the last day before he went home since my first date was on the first night he got there. 

When he went back home our messages became more frequent, but I still kept an air of mystery about me. We messaged and began text messaging (after he asked for my number) for the next two weeks until he moved to Alabama. 

He moved to Alabama in August and we began to see each other twice or three times a week when he figured out how to ask correctly. We would usually hang out at his apartment and watch really bad B-rated horror movies and eat junk food, but we continued to date other people online. We both agreed to keep our profiles up and go on dates and tell each other about our dates. 

It was beginning to become very hard to take our hands off of each other, however. So to speed things up, I decided to make him get tested. And I told him when he showed me a negative result we could sleep together. And two months was almost up also. 

At first he was shocked but then he was excited to do it because he knew he would ultimately get what he wanted. So we continued to hang out, and the next week an envelope came in the mail. And he said he had a surprise for me. They had mailed him his test results.  Of course they were negative like I expected. So that night was our first time together. 

Afterwards we made an agreement. We would continue to keep our dating profiles up and maintain “single” status until December because then it would be officially 6 months since both of us had been out of a relationship and we felt like we could both get into one. 

So from September till December, Matt would call, we would go on dates, and sometimes we would just go over to his apartment and watch movies. Never more than 2 or 3 times a week. We became the best of friends and lovers, but we still remained open to other people. 

Then in December for Christmas he got me a diamond promise ring and officially asked me out before leaving on a business trip. I drove him to the airport and kissed him goodbye. I felt like I was in a movie. It was one of the most romantic things that has ever happened to me.

Then January came around and we made our relationship facebook official so that everyone in Minnesota as well as Alabama knows about it. 

Currently Matt and I are very much in love. I just spent the night at his apartment last night. I left this morning though, like a good Rules girl. And I hope that one day in the next two years he will pop the question. 

Yesterday, I texted Chris asking if he was available this weekend. He replied asking what I was doing that night. I told him I was going to meet some friends for drinks at around 11, said it was very casual, and asked if he’d like to join. He then asked if I’d like to come see a play he was going to earlier. There was enough time to do both and this was a play I had been wanting to see, so I said yes. It sounded like he had possibly invited a bunch of people to come, so I assumed it was casual and not to expect anything from it. Still, I did my makeup (even though I wore a tshirt and jeans) because I’d be driving from the play straight to the bar.

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It’s almost 5am and I’ve been stranded in a parking lot for about an hour.

More details tomorrow.

I had a sex dream last night! Unfortunately, as it goes with my “sex” dreams, no sex occurred. Let me explain.

I met a guy a few weeks ago who seems really great. The only problem is that he’s working on his Master’s degree and spends almost all of his free time studying or writing his paper. So, obviously, there’s little chance that he has the time or interest to make room in his life for another human being (me). When we do hang out, there’s definite chemistry, but the timing is fifty shades of bad. I feel like, if things were to progress, he’d end up talking to me to tell me that he just didn’t have time for a relationship (to which I would pout and think “Well, if you really liked me, you’d make time for me” but I’d never say that to him). We’d go our separate ways, me, pouting in a corner, and him, face embedded in a book.

This logic, of course, doesn’t change my body’s attraction. I once read somewhere that people need human contact - be it by handshakes, hugs, high-fives, or snuggles - every day. Without it, we begin to wilt like flowers deprived of sunlight. So, being that I’m so deprived of human contact, whenever my brain finds another brain worth connection with, my physical desires latch onto that person and every passing wish to hold someone’s hand or kiss someone turns into a desire to hold his hand and kiss him. Clearly, this will not end well.

Last night, I dreamt about him. We were hanging out and, I’m not sure how or why, there was a moment when we were looking at his penis (erect). Then that went away and it transitioned to just us hanging out again. Later, for whatever reason, we were looking at his penis (erect) again. It had grown an inch since we’d last looked at it. We attributed this to being caused by the fact that he’d grown to like me a lot more in the time we’d spent hanging out since last looking at his penis - so much so that his penis was bigger than it had ever been for anyone else. We didn’t do anything with it, in case you’re wondering. Because not even in my sex dreams do I have sex. It’s really a blast.

Anyway, I was thinking about it today because it’s such an absurd thing to dream about. I mean, I laugh thinking about it because when have I ever heard of that happening? Never. I realized, though, that his penis was a symbol. Of course. It always is, isn’t it? It symbolized my wish that, if we spent more time together, he’d develop feelings for me too strong to ignore. I had projected my hopes onto his penis. I want him to develop an affection erection for me bigger than he ever knew it could be and, in turn, actually decide to make time in his life for a relationship, regardless of the fact that he spends every waking moment occupied with much more important things.

I’ve never projected my hopes onto someone else’s penis before. This is pretty hilarious to me.

The convenience of not having posted for awhile and losing out on feedback is that it makes for going through my archives to find every question and comment in order to address them in the book very easy.

I still feel, however, that there is a very large segment of this experiment lacking. That segment is you. I would like very much if everyone could please take a moment to tell me a story about your love life. Even if it’s a nostalgic memory of an old high school flame and the foolishness surrounding it; a general pattern or fault in your dating life as a whole; or a current love, I want to know how your mind operates or operated in a relationship (or one that failed to come to fruition) that sticks out most strongly in your mind.

My inbox and submissions page are both open. If you’d like to share with me but prefer that it not be posted on here, please say so. Any stories shared will automatically be liable to be used in the book, but names will be changed for the sake of anonymity. Please help me.

I watched a movie the other night that had this scene where the main characters were kissing and their kisses were so intense that they seemed magnetized to one another. To contrast, when you see couples in real life kiss, one usually pulls away from the other (casually) or they’re gross with their makeout session. But these characters, rather than have one pull away before the other or just kiss lightly, separated at the same time, as though they were bouncing off of each other from the force of their passion.

When I saw it, this scene made me freeze. My entire body went numb. I felt a huge wave of sadness wash over me. It was a very new feeling. Usually when my mind is triggered into thinking about how alone I am, it’s a fleeting thought. More of a statement of fact than anything else. But this stuck, and it stuck hard.

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I’ve been talking with tumblr recently because it’s clear that for the past several months, my inability to heart and comment posts applies solely to this blog, regardless of if used via desktop or mobile and browser. I even tested this issue by temporarily creating another account using a different email address and was able to heart posts perfectly fine. The cause of this issue still unknown, but please know that I am reading your posts and I am actively trying to communicate with all of you. I am not simply following you and not interacting. I’m very anxious to have this problem remedied and hope that tumblr will soon provide some useful assistance.

Until then, my inbox is always open, for any need or desire.

Love,
Emily

psych-quotes:

Is your relationship all about them? Does everything revolve around them and their needs, or is it an equal partnership? Here are 10 signs that your boyfriend/girlfriend is selfish:

1. You never hang out with your friends. Are you always spending time with their friends or their family but never yours? If so, you need to wonder why they seem to think that their friends are more important than yours.

2. Your dates are always around their schedule. If everything needs to take place when it works for them and they never consider what your schedule is, then you might wonder if they think that their life takes priority over yours.

3. You’ve met their parents but they haven’t met yours. If you’re having Sunday dinners at their house every week and going to their Grandma’s birthday party but they haven’t even met your folks it could be a sign that they just don’t think that your family is that important.

4. They don’t ask questions about you. You know all about what’s going on in their life, what they’re doing at work, what their summer plans are and what book they’re currently reading. But if they never even ask about you, what you’re up to or what you’re thinking, chances are they don’t care as much about you as they do about themselves.

5. It’s all take and no give. Do you give, give, give but never receive? If you’re always doing things for them, treating them and surprising them with thoughtful gestures and you never receive any in return then it sounds like they want to reap all the rewards of your relationship without expecting to make any effort in return.

6. They act without considering others. When making decisions do they think about how other people will be affected? Do they act without considering others and their feelings? If yes, they are truly only thinking of themselves.

7. They make everything about themselves. Does every conversation wind up revolving around them? Do they turn every story into something about them? Chances are they aren’t even listening to you talk before trying to get the conversation back to themselves.

8. Nothing is their fault. Do they accept blame or is it always someone else’s fault? Selfish people think that they are never in the wrong and are constantly assigning blame to anyone other than themselves.

9. They are the expert on everything. They seem to know everything about every subject and are the authority on everything including you and what you feel, think and what’s best for you. If they don’t even bother to ask your opinion because they assume they already know then you have a selfish partner on your hands.

10. They can’t compromise. Does every argument or decision end with you giving in to what they want? That’s because selfish people aren’t interested in compromising. It’s their way or the highway.

I never reblog things, but this is something I strongly believe everyone should see.

While this is aimed solely at figuring out whether your partner is selfish, apply the questions to yourself. Sometimes, we aren’t the hero. Sometimes, we’re the ones at fault. And that’s an important thing to notice and remedy.

Even if you read this and only see one or a few points in your relationship, work on improving those. Do this not only for the sake of your relationship, but for the continuing development and refinement of your emotional intelligence.

Your relationship may not last forever, but what you’ve learned from it will be invaluable information for years to come.