Shooting rubberbands at the stars and other somewhat arbitrary conjectures. 


First things first, I must give credit to Edie Brickell for the blatant plagiarism of the words "shooting rubberbands at the stars." Or maybe I should be apologizing rather than thanking. Or actually, since I've effectively just cited what I stole from her, maybe I shouldn't say anything to her at all. But then this paragraph is useless. But if I delete it, I would once again be guilty of plagiarism. Conundrum. 


But on to the real content.


While I generally spend a considerable amount of time and effort in my writing trying to ensure that the material is organized and flows well, this is a much more jumbled mess because my method for this blog was simply taking a bunch of short notes periodically throughout a couple of long nights worth of house work. I was also in a different state of mind when I began writing this, so the underlying theme may seem to be a little bit erratic. There is, however, at least one advantage to this method; because I didn't extensively elaborate on any single topic, it will provide me with numerous ideas that I can expound on in the future.


Okay, once again, now on to the real content. But seriously this time. 


I've been a long believer in the theory that as we go through our lives our personalities and character are shaped by the sum of all the different experiences that we go through. We are a product of our mistakes—at least the ones that we we smart enough to learn a lesson from—and every adventure, exploit, and tragedies that we encounter on our journey from sperm cell to worm hotel ; from womb to tomb. 


By the same token, I believe that as we go through our lives in series of relationships gaining love and losing love, we leave pieces of our heart along the way. Sometimes people get so bitter and jaded from continual heartbreak that they eventually get to the point where they either give up on love, or they begin to treat their partners with less than everything they have. 


I've been at that point many times in my life where the pain and suffering made it seem like it wasn't worth it, and I began to build a wall around my heart. I've actually been there for extremely long periods a couple of time. I mean like a couple of years. But each time, I've learned that the over-used platitude about being better to lose love than to never have it at all. 


The human body is an amazing thing. Just think about when you cut yourself or when you have a really bad skinned knee. Depending on the severity, your body eventually heals itself. And it may not be exactly the same as before (i.e. there may be a scar), but it's usually pretty darn close.


 I think that in most circumstances, your heart works the same way. It may get broken repeatedly, and it likely hurts like hell. But your heart will ultimately heal—you just have to be willing to let it. 


If you believe in the adage that life isn't measure by the number of mistakes you make, but instead by the lessons you learn from your mistakes, then in a certain sense, you can apply that concept here as well. It's not about the heartbreak, but about what you learn from experience. It's all about bouncing back from the pain and trying to refrain from apathy and doing everything you can to be the best person you possibly can. 


When in a painful situation or when dealing with the pain of a breakup, just remember, things could always be worse. And I know we've all been told that when we were hurting and thought it was a load of BS because we don't understand how things could be any worse. But eventually, our heart begins to recover and our brains then realize the truth in that statement. 


The quality of our lives and every aspect of it has a tremendous amount to do with our perception. I actually have a ton of pages of material I could write on that subject, but for now I'll just make it brief. 


There really is something to the whole half glass full versus half glass empty debate. There is a unique power inherent to positive thought. Hell, there was a book, and then a movie called "The Secret" claiming to reveal the secret to being successful in life, and it had hundreds of famous people claiming that there success was a result of following the theme of the book. Well after reading the entire book in order to figure out the secret to success, there it was spelled out in the book's final chapter. The "secret" is simply believing in yourself. Visualize yourself being successful. As far as I'm concerned, that's pretty similar to being an optimistic person.


The moral of the story is to never give up on love regardless of how much pain and heartache relationships have caused you. And if you're already giving all of yourself to that other person and treating them as well as you POSSIBLY can, then there's no reason to change that either. 


Think about this: every person in the entire world who is single and is not a widow or widower has never had a relationship that didn't end in failure. By failure I mean a relationship that endured indefinitely. So even if you're hurting and you feel like you're going through the worst emotional pain you've ever been through, you are not alone.


I never want to lose the joy of feeling love like a teenager. Call it what you want—puppy love, infatuation, etc., but what I mean is the kind of love that makes everything in your life better. It makes you want to wake up in the morning. Hell, it makes me want to now only wake up, but to actually make the bed up as well. It puts a nearly constant smile on your face. For me, there is literally no aspect of my life that isn't enhanced at least a little by being in love. It significantly enhances and rejuvenates my mind, body, and soul. 


And if that's not something that's worth giving every ounce of your heart and soul into and not ever giving up on, then I don't know anything that is.


-Cornstock

Shooting rubberbands at the light and seeing where they'll land; that's what I would be doing if I wasn't instead jumping headfirst into the decade old revolution that is internet authorship. 


I've certainly spent more than my fair share of time writing extremely long-winded responses to other people's writings and blogs—especially about sports-related things. I've even written a respectable amount of sports articles and how-to articles for a couple of different websites. But as far as writing about random thoughts and things of a much more personal nature, this is my maiden voyage.

Actually, I never even considered the idea of beginning my own platform to prelect my opinions about anything other than select sports themes that I can support with miscellaneous statistics. However, after posting a ridiculously long comment in response to one of my most favorest people's blogs, a friend of hers made the suggestion that I should start my own. Ergo, here we are.

Because the rationale for this entire undertaking sprang from her blog about her opinions on love, that seems like a reasonable topic to start blogging about. And yes Ms. Grammar Nazi, I just ended a sentence with a preposition. Please don't fail me. But I digress.


The concept of love in general is entirely too complex to cover in a single blog or even in an entire volume of blogs, so I'll just focus on one simple concept—the nature of dominance by one person in a relationship.


In theory, a perfect relationship is one where both people feel the same way about one another. Each person loves their significant other with their entire body and mind, and they pour every ounce of their heart and soul into that relationship.


 To paraphrase 1 Corinthians 13, love is not selfish. Love does not keep score. I'm sure that there are people out there that have been fortunate enough to experience this type of love. However, I am of the opinion that this is exceedingly rare.


Maybe I'm bitter because I've never been fortunate enough to experience this for myself. But at this point in my life, I'm beginning to postulate that 99 percent of relationships are never blessed or fortuitous enough to experience this feeling.


It seems that in every relationship I've been a part of and just about every relationship I've ever even heard about someone always has the upper hand. And the unfortunate thing is that it's always the person that cares the least. Whoever cares the most is always willing to give more. Even if it's completely unintentional, that just seems to be inherent to the nature of relationships. And not just romantic relationships, but relationships in general ranging from business relationships to friendship. It's almost like it turns into a game like you're 16 all over again and dealing with immature bullshit. 


In business relationships, maybe it's not always bad to have the upper hand or to play part of "the game." But when it comes to romance, one should always look for love and peace and try to avoid playing any type of game. 


When you watch a football game there is always one team with the momentum. Whoever has the momentum the longest usually scores the most points and when the clock hits zero or the innings are finished, they win the game. In contrast, when it comes to love, the only way to win the game is to tie. Once someone takes the lead for a long enough period of time, the game is over. In other words, there is a breakup. 


It's definitely possible for the power in a relationship to switch back and forth between both people, but the bottom line is that someone is nearly always in control. Many people probably think it's good to be the one with the power in a relationship. I personally believe that if someone believes that they need to have control over their significant other, then they have the completely wrong idea about love to begin with.


When you love someone, I mean truly love someone, one of the characteristics of that love is wanting to do anything and everything in your power to make that other person happy or to do what's best for them. In my opinion, true love is about putting your personal wants aside anytime they conflict with the needs of the person you love. I'm not necessarily talking about giving up on yourself for the selfish wants of the other person, but if you have to give up something you want for something that benefits them, then you should want to do it with no questions asked. 


Unfortunately, I think that people are so in love with the idea of being in love that they either lose sight of what it means to be in love with someone, or they never even know what it means to begin with. I know it's trite to say that people use the "L" word entirely too loosely, but that's an absolute fact. Maybe sometimes when people say it, they really do mean it in the way that they understand love. But in my time on this planet, albeit a relatively short amount of time, I've never had the joy of being part of a relationship where my significant other has reciprocated the same type of love that I've given them. 


I'm sure that sounds so arrogant and presumptuous, but after long consideration, I honestly believe that to be  conclusively and utterly true. Maybe I spend too much time trying to do what I THINK is best for the other person that I end up getting mixed up and lose sight of what they actually want and might actually be best for them. But I guess that's part of growing up and gaining wisdom. I'm sure that eventually I will get it right. That doesn't necessarily mean that it will work out, but hopefully I can at least get my part correct.


I'm feel like I've written a lot of words but haven't gotten any coherent thoughts illustrated to whoever, if anyone, reads this. But I suppose it's at the very least a start. With more experience I'm sure I will be able to do a much better job of organizing my thoughts. But to borrow a word from the aforementioned "one of my most favorest people," it is currently just a clusterfuck. 


Until next time, may the road rise up to meet you and the wind always be at your back.


-Cornstock





I know that the formatting is very boring and simple, but I'll work on that later. As for right now, I was just focusing on content.