In nearly every relationship I have ever been in at some point I have been chided about my lack of public affection. “Look at him. He is holding her hand walking down the street…skipping, feeding her strawberries, lying down across a puddle so that she can use his back as a bridge…Why can’t you be more like that?”
Admittedly, when it comes to public displays of affection (PDA) I am lacking. At first I could blame it on being a little shy. Then it transferred more to being fiercely guarded and private about showing any emotions whatsoever in public settings. The resistance eventually graduated to just feeling that PDA, unless displayed by teenagers, was BS and all just for show.
No matter the reason or excuse no one I was ever involved with was buying it. We can all admit that teenage lust is nauseating. We understand generally why they “don’t get a room” because they probably do not have a car, or money so the public domain is left to all our viewing (dis)pleasure. New adult love/lust is generally over the top, and that level of affection displayed publically often becomes the baseline standard for what reluctant people like myself should be striving to be more like.
In my mind I am as romantic as anyone. Luther Vandross (the ultimate romantic crooner) provides the soundtrack to all my ideas. What I lack in execution has to at least be balanced with intent, but that’s another piece for another time. What I have learned from overt PDA and people that try to gives timelines of their happiness via social media, is that almost nothing is ever as it seems.
How many of us know people that attempt to draft a narrative of happiness, love and success through what they share in social media or just in public generally, only to find out later on that their real lives were far different from the pictures of the harmony and stability displayed.
Social media is not the root of all evil. However, social media has made it easier to envy or want what we believe others have instead of really focusing on the reality of our own lives. When you see pictures of all of your “friends” on great trips and photographing every meal out, hugged up and cheesing with their significant other and families, it creates a utopian ideal of what should be. If those people are truly happy God bless them, but we know that those same people who live the most public lives and seem so happy are usually the ones with the most drama in their lives behind closed doors.
One of the most idyllic pictures I ever took was hugged up, smiling on a gondola in Venice, Italy. Those that know me, know I generally take horrible pictures mostly because I have not mastered the practiced picture smile. But this one, I was nearly on point and the picture captured one of those glorious moments in life. The reality is that we had gotten into the worst argument moments prior to taking that picture and only took it because we had paid for the gondola in advance and everyone has to have a gondola pic in Venice. I find it funny and ironic because we have taken over a thousand other pictures in our travels in which despite my mean mug, I was so happy with both where I was and who I was with in life despite what the pictures might have shown.
It is easy to get caught up in other people’s lives. Celebrity culture wants up to keep up with the Kardashians and we follow the lives of others through reality television or social media and wish and want what we believe other have. Yet we are shocked and even somehow hurt when the marriage of Brad and Angelina fails. Is it because we feel like we know them or because the fact that an idealized relationship in which money and fame are limitless, still has the ability to fail and is a shock to our system?
I do not know the answer. What I do know is that there is no ideal life or relationship. Perhaps the concept of ideal is real but no one in reality lives a life without issues. What is important is dealing with the life you can control. Your life may never be perfect, but it can be shaped into something substantive and fulfilling based on your expectations and wants. You can create a life that is ideal for you…despite what it may or may not look like to others.
If you enjoyed this article, please be sure to look at others within diaryofamadmind.com
#life #perception #reallife #ideals #kardashians #bradandangelina #celebrity #socialmedia #celebrities
👍🏽