Where have all the butterflies gone?

Apparently my full blown quarter life crisis has engulfed every aspect of my life and is now spilling over to my blog.  As this is the case, I will continue my ‘quest for love’ theme with this blogticle[1].

Here is the thing, despite being a self-proclaimed cynic, I do very much believe in love.  I have been in love; I have felt it, seen it, been swallowed and blinded by it; I have given my all to someone and them to me.  Yet, like anything else, I think it is extremely hard (a part time job really) to keep in it’s truest form; and unless both parties are really committed to it, life sometimes gets in the way [2]and ruins it.  That is not to say I believe that all love is the same or that it is the same for everyone, just that the past love I have experienced, I have not felt in a long time.

That got me thinking, what happened to that ‘butterfly feeling’?  What is that, you ask?  Well basically that is a very fairytale girly way to define the undefinable term of love.  When you meet someone that you would like to pursue romantically, the hopeless romantics are usually like: ‘well, do they give you butterflies?’

I should take a brief moment to say I meet a lot of people on a weekly basis.  I am very friendly, personable, I make it a point to be the icebreaker in most situations; I pretty much have that ‘southern hospitality’ happiness that most New Yorkers are missing.  As much as I am a cynic about me finding love, I am absolutely in love with the world and the beauty in every day.  So I put myself out there and meet a lot of different people, but mainly [at least from my end] it is solely platonic.

Now that that’s out of the way, back to the point.  I have been in love where from the second I saw that person there were butterflies making me feel like I would float straight ahead until I smacked right into them and introduced myself.  Yes, I know how amorously silly and unlike me that sounds, but it is true.  While that feeling didn’t last, being as life and personalities get in the way, that is a feeling worth missing.  So when people ask me if I get butterflies, I mourn that time.  I miss feeling uncontrollably enamored by every little thing my love interest does. 

That’s where my nerves kick in.  Am I too old for butterflies? Does that feeling exist in your adulthood?  Are all my butterflies dead?

I like to think that many ‘mid to late twenty-somethings’ find themselves in the same predicament.  While these questions do make me nervous, it is solely because I would like to know that I do have that mysterious counterpart out there; made just for me and unfit for anyone else.  My idea on marriage is that you should have someone you want to travel on your journey through this life with; they shouldn’t be something you need.  There is a difference.  Too many people get married because, well, they’re (insert silly age limit here) and that’s what they should be doing; settling down.  But the thing with settling down is, you shouldn’t have to settle!  There should be butterflies and spark and a desperate necessity to want to talk to the same person all the time.  Not a dependency, but a happy confidence and feeling of being complete now that you have met them.

That’s what I think finding your spouse should be about.

I know several people that found this.  Some people may call them the lucky ones, but I like to think that they just refused to settle until the universe introduced them to the person they were meant for.  I think too many of us miss opportunities at the ‘real deal’ because we get nervous or scared about being alone and jump into the next relationship that presents itself.

 I am not that person. 

In this period of self-exploration and selfishness, I have realized that I love being alone and taking care of myself.  Don’t get me wrong, I love being a girlfriend and sharing my life with someone else, but all too often I have given my all to someone who just didn’t understand how to fully and healthily reciprocate.  For that, I am thankful.  I am thankful to have had this opportunity to get to know, find and love myself and really find out what I want in life.

I don’t need ‘butterfly love’, I don’t even necessarily want it, but I do deserve it.  That is what I will wait for.  The love that clouds your brain and stops all other thought processes, the kind that makes you stare at your phone waiting for them to call, the kind of love that makes you feel like you’re not yourself when they aren’t around, and the kind of love that despite always wanting that person around, you are both confident and respectful enough to explore life on your own. 

For this reason, I will have hope that my butterflies will be revived, one day, by someone who deserves it.  In the meantime, I will continue to post silly blogs dissecting the very allusive emotion of love, and I will enjoy taking care of myself.  Because really, this is the only time in our lives where we get to be utterly selfish . . . isn’t that something worth preserving and taking your sweet time to enjoy?

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[1] That’s a blog article

[2] How does life get in the way? Well, that is a rather naïve statement.  People get older and grow, and it sometimes two people grow to travel two different paths.

Progress, NOT Perfection.

About three months ago I started a 'Beach Body' program called Turbo Fire.  This is a 5 month intense cardio program, which I personally describe as similar to shadow boxing.  The program puts you on a 6 day, 5 month, workout program and specific healthy diet.  It is not so much of a diet as it is a clean eating routine.  As I have already practiced clean eating, I read the diet manual and recipes several times and use some of theirs but mainly stick to my own.

I have noticed, while I may not be losing as many pounds as I would like, my body looks different and most importantly I feel different.  I feel my stomach does not get upset or bloated after eating, I have more energy; yes, my muscles are sore, but I do feel more accomplished and energetic on a daily basis.  On the days I do not work out (I usually schedule my ‘rest day’ around whatever day I am busiest and won’t be home) I feel unaccomplished and lethargic. 

Doing intense workouts on a daily basis has drastically improved my life.  While I am not where I would like to be as an end result, I know I am gladly on my way.  Too many people don’t want to put the time in to get the results they want.  The problem with expectation is you get discouraged when you do not see the results you want in your [irrational] time constraint.  I know the results I want will take me the 5 months, and considering I have tailored the plan to fit my schedule/life style, it may even take me a little bit after that.  Yet, that is the thing with ‘working out’ and having a fit, clean routine; it is not just a phase or something you do sometimes, it is a lifestyle.  Once you make the commitment to work out and be fit, that is a lifestyle change, it is not something you do temporarily or periodically.  It is a life commitment. 

I am perfectly happy to make my life revolve around being fit, because I know, while I was not overweight before, there are more benefits to being fit than the scale can hold.  In my [almost] 3 months working out I lost about 10 pounds.  Some people may be discouraged by this, but I know how I’ve gained a lot of muscle, my body looks different, I feel different, and I am even in a better mental state.  There are so many benefits for working out if you drop your expectations of being ‘skinny’ and just aim to be healthy.  I don’t want to be skinny.  Skinny is dangerous, people get skinny by skipping meals and eating the wrong things.  I just want to be fit; I want to eat right and feel right and have muscles and released endorphins.  That is my expectation for working out, to have a well-deserved sense of pride for my accomplishments.  You just have to remember that your body, like everything else, is a constant work in progress, perfection is unattainable.

If anyone is looking for a good program to start an intense workout commitment, definitely check out Turbo Fire[1].  Chalene really knows how to make classes fun and even though you are watching a tv screen, she somehow manages to motivate; which I never thought was possible with a workout DVD.

And remember this KEY RULE about working out . . . Exercise releases endorphins, endorphins make you happy, and happy people don’t go around shooting their husbands.  They just don’t[2].

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[1]  Program can be found here: http://www.beachbody.com/product/fitness_programs/turbofire.do?code=SEMB_GOOGLE_TF&gclid=CKmS4YLPyLkCFUhk7AodzVcAXg

[2] If you haven’t yet guessed it, this is from the movie: Legally Blonde

The day the earth stood still

9/11/01 is a day that rings out in everyone’s memory; I remember where I was when I heard the news, what I was wearing, where I went, and all the calamity and the surreal fear that ensued. Even though, as a nation, we could not fully comprehend why these tragedies happened or where we would go from here, as a society, New Yorkers clung together and made the best out of this we could.

I watched my town, which lost 29 people alone [businessmen and women, firefighters, volunteer firefighters] breakdown in the chaos and mourn.  But I also saw this same town, now missing mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters and neighbors, band together and comfort each other the best way we all knew how.  There were vigils, ceremonies, bagpipes and sing-alongs, there were quickly executed fundraisers, and mass efforts to find our missing . . . ‘missing,’ we all knew they weren’t missing, they were stolen, ripped from our arms and taken from us.  Yet we still clung, clung to hope, clung to faith and then eventually, clung to their memory. 

While as an adolescent I visited these memorial sites often, sat in solidarity on the beach gazing at the empty hole where our Twin Towers used to rule the sky, I know more about that day now, 12 years later, than I did then.  I knew my neighbors were never coming home, I knew somewhere there were children who would never meet nor remember their parents, I knew there were brothers and sisters who would never see their siblings again; yet it wasn’t until years later when I moved out of my town and into a new, equally as tightknit one, that I met these ‘somewhere people.’  I was able to put a face and a name to the tragic lives I only knew existed out there.  I met girls and boys my age who lost their siblings and their uncles, and while this event changed all of our lives, their lives were dictated and shaped by it. 

This tragedy was something that affected all those who lived through it, who saw the events unfold.  No one was safe from it’s impact.  To this day whenever anyone says ‘September 11^th’ even just referencing the specific day of the year, not the 2001 events, chills run down my spine.  We are all different from seeing those events, but some people, many whom I call friends, have to live with the differences.  Their differences aren’t just emotional distress, but voids in their everyday activities.  Normal life milestones are bittersweet as they suddenly have loved ones missing from the festivities.  It is for these people and all those we lost, that my heart breaks.  I will never be the same after 9/11, but I know so many families who are altered forever. 

I wish my gift to them could be peace of mind, but that is a naive notion.  You never get peace of mind from something like this; you just go through the forward motion, because time stops for no one.  We should not just remember the 2,977 people that perished that day; the 343 firefighters, 23 police officers, 37 port authority officers, 2 paramedics, or the 1,000 ill stricken first responders that have since perished, but we should remember the families that were left behind to pick up the pieces.  We should not only save our remembrance for the anniversary of the attacks, we should always keep those people in our hearts and minds.  They should be a constant reminder that life is too short, we never know when our last day will come, so we should make every effort to let the people in our lives know how much we love them, know how much of an impact they have on our world and remember that no matter what, you are better for having one more day with them.

I know I wouldn’t be the same person I am today without the people in my life, and I am sure they know that.  I know I think about those 3 thousand people on more than one day a year and I know that many of their stories and the stories of strength of their resilient families have shaped my life in more ways than they may realize.  In times of extreme tragedy, the beauty of strength, hope and grace was found.  We find strength with every new day, we hope for better tomorrows, and we find grace in the behaviors of others while we stumble. 

I will leave this blog off with one of my favorite lyrics.

‘Wherever time may take you in your life, remember this was beautiful.’