The Elephant in the Barnyard with Syphilis

You're walking down the street minding your own business, enjoying the smell of the fresh air. Just stretching the ol' legs, you know. Then, as you turn the corner you're greeted with an even fresher vision. Now, this beautiful and miraculous vision just so happens to be two people slobbering all over each other's face. I'm pretty sure everyone has experienced something like this in their life at least once. Hell, it's a strange day in a high school if you DON'T see it at least once a week. I'm not talking about PDA, though it tends to bother me as well, I'm talking about an unhealthy attachment to another person.

I've heard so much crap about this topic, and I'm writing this with part of me speaking out of anger. I've heard all the excuses and I'm tired of it. Nobody wants to see you two cleaning each other's tonsils. I'm not a prude, I just don't find it necessary to be all over my boyfriend every second of every day, nevertheless in front of people. If you love each other, that's splendid, but you also don't have to put on a show for everyone else. It's just inconsiderate and rude. This is, in part, me ranting, however I think my position has validity. In my point of view, if you're all over your "significant other" in front of other people, even friends, you come off as having something to prove. You don't have to be glued at the hip to have a successful relationship, as a matter of fact, if you allow yourself some space, in the long run, you'll probably have a healthier relationship. I'm tired of people forgetting their friends because they have a girlfriend or a boyfriend or something more *cough* pussy *cough*.

Obsessive feelings are often mistaken for love because people rationalize that, "it must be love, if he's the only one I think about." Obsession is like lust, but it is more misleading and destructive. When your friends think of you as one person instead of two separate people, it's not "cute", it's sad. People in an obsessed state have a one track mind where the other person is concerned to the point that they often lose touch of who they really are as an individual. They often forget about their friends and their goals, and then become deeper consumed with the obsession because they feel as if they have nothing else. When it's just assumed that the two of you are arriving together somewhere or if there's a girl's night planned, and she brings him along, there are problems. There are multiple relationships I have seen in the past couple of months, just consume the people participating. There needs to be some type of distance for the relationship to blossom. Just because you spend every minute together or on the phone, that does not mean that you have a perfect relationship. Most times, that just means you're insecure or frightened that the relationship won't work unless you completely surround yourself with that other person. That completely sounds unhealthy to me, I don't know.

Now, I know that people will say things like, "I just love him so much." or things like "You're just jealous.", but denial is more common than people would like to admit. All I'm saying, is there is so much that we don't understand, but there is so much that we need to learn. I just wish that more people realized that they need to not only "think with their heart", but think logically. 

A healthy relationship takes work, and that is something I'm sure no one can deny. It's not effortless. Chances are, if it's effortless, it's not worth much. By all means, if there is a destructive or abusive problem that you can't fix, get out of that relationship, but if there's a problem such as distance, it's worth the fight. If there are no problems in your relationship, you never have opportunities to grow. When you're afraid of saying something because you don't want to hurt the other person, you're not helping the relationship, and you're bound to an unhealthy relationship for the rest of your life, or you're bound to have your unhealthy relationship to fall apart.

Regardless of how much you love somebody, they should not consume your life. There is a famous quote that says, "all you need is love", however that does not necessarily mean love towards your significant other. We need love from our friends, we need a life outside that person. We need a life outside that obsession. Remember who you are, not who you merely are together. Remember the people who were with you to make you who you are. Remember the people who helped you along during the difficult times who have sculpted  you to be with the person you are with in the first place.

"Friendship marks a life even more deeply than love. Love risks degenerating into obsession, friendship is never anything but sharing." - Elie Wiesel