what i want

i am consistently asked what it is that i want. the simple answer is that i want to be happy and to have the people around me happy too. the complexity comes when in that collection, either with me or among the others around me, it’s clear that we want different things. people say that relationships require compromise, but what if that compromise requires changes which stand in the way of deeply held beliefs, expectations of others you care about or the life plan you are working against.

someone i care about just described to me the wheel of life, the idea is that life goes though cycle, changing from happiness, to pain, and back to happiness as life rolls around as a wheel. this cycle made me smile, and point out that i saw life more like the ying and yang concept of all good things containing a black spot of trouble and all bad things containing a light spot of hope. growing up thirty years ago in the US, this is what i thought asians were all about, zen buddhists who saw the world as a mixed bag of complexity which needed to be accepted and understood as such.

i now see that asians are just as much of a mixed bag as the rest of the world. there are devotedly religious people who feel they have been given all the answers and who feel badly if they are not strong enough to simply accept the words of their prophets. there are people who profess to be a follower of some doctrine, but have no desire to truly make it part of there lives and there are free thinking atheists who simply feel the world is a place of people, with little or no oversight and should be taken as such, intellect over faith is their stance. this is the same the world over; the proportions are just different as you move from place to place.

as i sit in a restaurant and see couples not talking to each other, bored with each other due to the time that has passed since those early days of hope and happiness that brought them together, or possibly holding a grudge from real or perceived slights which have thrown an emotional wall up between them. sometimes, i look over and smile at them, the woman is the normally the one who notices, almost always she will smile back. the shared smile is one of, “i know it is really sad, but what can you do.”

rather than what i want, i can clearly tell you what i do not want. i do not want to find myself in a relationship built on complacency. i do not want a person i love angry with me. i do not want to disappoint the person i am committed to, and have them feel that i was a mistake or that they could find happiness with someone else more than they can with me. i do not want to ever take someone i love for granted, i don’t want to ignore them in public or in private, and i don’t want to ever agree to disagree. all of these things are what people do when they do not care enough to fight for the person they are sitting next to.

i want to be that person’s complete partner in everything we do; equals who work together and compliment each other. i want to be their warrior when the time for battle comes or their consigliore when they plan to fight the battle directly but need the advice that helps them understand their own strengths so they can fight the most efficiently. i want to be the shoulder they cry on and the first person they run to when something wonderful happens in their life.

so here is the hard part, i thought i had this once. it has taken me a long time to come to terms with the fact that if i did have this, it has slipped away and will never return. how and why this happened comes down to lack of understanding and communication. days and events piled up, sadly i didn’t see it happening and long after still believed it could be fixed. this is central to never giving up, that you keep trying even when the times have become difficult. how can you live happily ever after if you are not willing to work though the days of storminess and come out the other side into the warm sunlight of the gentle days that follow?

i have simplified the answer of what i want in the past to say, “i want to wake up every day holding the hand of the person i love. i want to hold that hand and say thank you for a wonderful life when one of us dies.” that is what i want, and to get there i need to find the person who will help me see this through. i need a person who feels the same way, and who is willing to let go of the baggage of life or prior expectations to see that i am the person they also want to be with. until i find this person, and we can feel that click of recognition that we work and want to always work, i will have to wait and hope. working at the relationship, for yourself and each other, really is the key. but more important is finding the person who you know within yourself, and you have the faith within them, that together you will never stop working.

people change over time, events in life happen and different people react differently. we are not committing to the person we know today, we are committing to the person who they will become years from now, and the person that new person will become years after that. my daughter said with an accusing tone, “you don’t have a type, you don’t care what someone looks like”. i explained that is true. of course that is not completely true, i am shallow enough to want someone who i see as beautiful, but that beauty comes in many ways.

i have made a list of features i am looking for in a person, a few are physical. these are the elements i feel are important to finding a person who is right for me:

• smart, has a passion for learning
  
• radiance, a smile and personality that warms me
  
• humor, able to laugh and enjoy silliness together
  
• interested in the world larger than her immediate surroundings
  
• trusting, enough to try new things
  
• communicates, speak and listens with grace
  
• openness, willing to share stories about herself and her life
  
• confident, dresses and acts based on her inner strengths
  
• feminine feminist, knows women are equals but likes doors opened for her
  
• strong enough to stand up for her rights
  
• soft enough to ask for help when needed
  
• athletic, enough to be active together for life
  
• family oriented
  
• truthful, even when its hard to be
  
• caring, focused on those around her
  
• beautiful, as much inside as out
  
• warm, desires emotional ties
  
• motivated, works to succeed
  

when i find this person and they see that i am a fit for the things they need. when we feel that “click”, when we realize that we are friends and want to become best friends. when we know that we can make each other happy, not just today but for our entire lives. when we know that we will not come to a point that one day one of us hopes the other were dead. when we are brave enough to admit how good we are and strong enough to reach out to each other, that is when we will know we have found what we want and will never want to let go.

i have heard that there are 1,000 people who are a complete match for us; every person has that many soul-mates out there. the same source said there are 10,000 people who may not be soul-mates, but they can make us happy if we work together. if this holds the odds are 3,000,000 to one that the person you saw today for the first time is your soul-mate. it also means that in a city the size of kl there is roughly one people who are your soul-mate, and 27 who are a good enough match to make you happy. i am not sure if the numbers took other considerations into account, if you needed to back off all the people who are already married, committed or would never consider you based on some preconception of age, race or religion, given that 50% of adults are married, and 30% are racist to one degree or another and may not fall into your race, i would estimate this leaves 35% of the available pool, or 4 people who are almost right for you and only a fraction of a person who is your soul mate. when i first heard the stats, it was projected as a positive thing, its hard when you have math skills and do analysis isn’t it.

either way, given these numbers you may need to consider married people and racists, both scary. the two thoughts that have been rolling around in my head are churchill saying, “there is nothing to fear but fear itself” and my high school football couch saying, “winners never quit”. i have been ignoring the other quote from my other couch who told me “just fall down, maybe someone will trip over you”.

wait, maybe that one has merit too. maybe if i do fall down someone will trip over me, god knows staying on my feet and continuing to move has had limited success.