The Unicorn of Unconditional Love

Unicorns are majestic beasts. Their appearance inspires awe. Magic runs through their very veins. Their horns, alicorns, are imbued with sorceries untold. They are never unnecessarily aggressive. We have every reason to revere them.

But they're not real, are they? So while it's fun to consider the possibility, it doesn't pay much to invest in the idea. Now comes my proposition: unconditional romantic love is a unicorn. Those three words are a paradox when juxtaposed. "Unconditional romantic love."

Let's take a look at what unconditional love is. Someone is ugly. You consider their needs at least as important as yours, if not more so. Someone is beautiful. You don't consider their needs any more important than the ugly person. Someone hurts you. Someone helps you. Someone wallows in their own laziness. Someone works as hard as they can. Someone hates you. Someone loves you. Regardless, you love them all equally. It doesn't matter what they can provide for you. It just matters that they exist. That's the only condition of unconditional love.

Now let's take a look at what romantic love is. Someone is ugly. You don't consider them a potential mate. Someone is beautiful. You put them in your sights. Someone hurts you. You distance yourself from them. Someone helps you. You grow more comfortable and grateful. Someone wallows in their own laziness. You disregard them. Someone earns their own. They gain clout in your eyes. Someone hates you. You couldn't imagine living with them. Someone loves you. You love them.

Romantic love only exists when a series of conditions are met. Only when you find someone capable of filling your needs. That may be money, attention, sex, badinage, emotional support, a nice thing to look at—numerous possibilities. A romantic interest only becomes interesting when they can fill a certain percentage of your needs. If that weren't the case, there would be no obsession with finding someone to love. You'd just walk up to somebody, ask them if they wanted to get with you, and they'd say yes. That's what romance would be like if romantic love was unconditional.

But now come the real questions: is all this bad? Are all men pigs? Are all women whores?

No.

Having standards is a good thing. It's okay to care about your own well-being and the well-being of your children (not to mention your partner). That's the entire premise of natural selection. Just keep in mind that you aren't going to find the perfect partner, and neither will your partner.

This post was inspired by the negative connotation for the word 'objectify'. We assess other people on various criteria by objectifying them. Everyone does it. Of course there's a level where you reach too much objectification, but if none existed then no one would ever mate and the species would die.

This is merely a funny image that I created.

Chronic Pain Pondering

Source

Once again, I'm going to reproduce a comment that I made in a forum. This time it was somebody lamenting about their chronic pain. If you've never dealt with pain slowly erasing all memories of what life used to be like and all hopes of what life could be, consider yourself extremely blessed. That being said, here are my thoughts that apply to a range of personal challenges.

"Hey, I know how you feel. I've dealt with my pain for 8 years (I'm 22). I'm just a piece in the medical machine that always gets pushed to the next specialist.

But check this out.

Humans can't fly. Sure, we were smart enough to build machines that will fly for us, but we can never fly. I think one needs to view chronic pain like the lack of flight. Is is sad? Yeah. We all wish we could fly. But is it the end of the world and all things joyous? No. The trick is to accept that you can't fly and instead focus on the things you can do.

You mentioned learning languages and instruments. That's awesome. I speak Danish and play over 5 instruments. Success breeds success. When you make small, achievable goals and accomplish them, it makes you realize you can accomplish more. So you do.

For example, I also write books. I can't work out or do sports or even just go on a simple hike. But I can read and write. I'm on my third book right now (at 76,000 words). I have a daily word count goal that feels great to accomplish, and it drives me to write more. When someone's getting to know you through prose you've created, they have no idea you can't fly. They don't know that you're black, that you're blind, that you're allergic to pineapple, that you never wear shoes. They know you because of your mind. It's a wonderful wall that I like to use. That's also why I like to produce my own music (not that I'm spectacularly good at it). But they know nothing about me except for my musical ability. It's beautiful.

So that's my advice. Don't focus on the fact that you can't fly. Focus on the fact that you can run. Never stop running just because the birds above you can fly."

It really takes an adjustment of worldview. I'd love to work out and be physically active like normal people. But in order to be happy, you have to calibrate yourself to your limitations. If you're judging yourself on unachievable criteria, you'll never be happy.