falling

Confessing your feelings to someone feels like jumping off a cliff. I think it's probably the way committing suicide must feel. Like you made a decision and you're scared as hell and you can't believe you're actually doing it, but it's too late now because you're already in the air.

Like jumping into a pool, the moment before you hit the cold water, it's too late to think about the consequences of your irreversible actions. The only thing that matters is going through with it.

I said it and my mouth went dry. I felt like I just punished somebody.

He laughed nervously.

We talked for a few charged minutes. It's like you could almost hear the high voltage snapping in the air.

And then -- nothing happened.

I realized I didn't think through until this point. Running the scenario through in my head pretty much ended here. Something epic was supposed to happen.

But, like any conversation where you're merely informing somebody about a fact, pretty quickly you run out of things you need to say. I packed my things at least three times and didn't really add anything new before I just got up and left. He seemed relieved.

Then I walked to my car and called my boyfriend.

sudden increase in volume and release of energy in an extreme manner, usually with the generation of high temperatures

Cognitive Dissonance

I was watching a documentary last night on Youtube about Louis Theroux meeting the Phelps family. In the case that you haven't yet heard their name all over the media, they're a sixty person cult/family who hate gay boys. And since they consider everyone who isn't part of their inbred mind-controlling camp a homosexual, they pretty much hate everyone.

Here's a link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westboro_Baptist_Church

What struck me is how easily things like this happen - I mean, the bubble of their altered reality is perpetuated by pushing away the truth - everything that they live by is based on the concept of an unwavering, unconditional, unquestioning faith. The more they denounce the truth, the more their "faith" is confirmed.

It got me thinking about how often and easily we are susceptible to a similar kind of mentality. The more we invest into something, the more likely we are to invest even more.

I wonder how many of our unfulfilling careers, destructive friendships, bad health habits, and relationships are the result of just that ...

Have you heard of the sea squirt? It spends it's life on the bottom of the ocean looking for a rock. When it finds a suitable boulder, it lands on it and permanently attaches itself. It eats its brain because it no longer needs it.

Oh man.

It's scary because it's relatable.

I overheard a conversation going on between a couple sitting near me at a coffee shop.

The girl was smoking a cigarette, so her companion chided her to stop.

"Be careful what you ask for," she advised, "cigarettes are a bad habit and so are you. Giving up my bad habits might not be in your best-interest."

True Love

New York Times(1/4/05) ran a series in which they asked scientists, "What do you believe is true even though you cannot prove it?"

David Buss
Psychologist, University of Texas; author, "The Evolution of Desire"
True love.

"I've spent two decades of my professional life studying human mating. In that time, I've documented phenomena ranging from what men and women desire in a mate to the most diabolical forms of sexual treachery. I've discovered the astonishingly creative ways in which men and women deceive and manipulate each other. I've studied mate poachers, obsessed stalkers, sexual predators and spouse murderers. But throughout this exploration of the dark dimensions of human mating, I've remained unwavering in my belief in true love.
While love is common, true love is rare, and I believe that few people are fortunate enough to experience it. The roads of regular love are well traveled and their markers are well understood by many - the mesmerizing attraction, the ideational obsession, the sexual afterglow, profound self-sacrifice and the desire to combine DNA. But true love takes its own course through uncharted territory. It knows no fences, has no barriers or boundaries. It's difficult to define, eludes modern measurement and seems scientifically woolly. But I know true love exists. I just can't prove it."

Gondry