The Gods will decide for us

(Picture: me in my stunning new Lamma Ladies dragon boat tshirt. I never thought I'd wear anything quite so... well... pink.)

In response to a PostSecret video on YouTube, an exceptionally large and generally physically unattractive man had recorded his 'secret' on film - saying that he wanted someone to love him, and didn't he deserve it, too? I bothered to read a few of the comments viewers had made, and they typically ran along the lines of, 'aww, dude, you'll find someone; just keep believing she is out there.' The overwhelming feeling was that the guy - whom presumably an exceptionally low percentage of his audience actually knew in person - deserved to be loved on the basis that he was a person.

I'm sorry, I have to take issue with this viewpoint. I could cite some obvious examples but then this thought would start wandering down a road I can't really be bothered to debate right now: I'm fairly certain that Hitler probably doesn't deserve to be 'loved', arguments being that he wasn't actually a 'person' at all, not someone with feelings, and on the other hand there is the thought that perhaps if he had been truly loved he'd have developed into a different person. Anyhow, if you want to argue about that, do so with your inner mind and not with me as I'm not particuarly interested.

Using myself as an example - appropriate given that I can at least claim to have some degree of knowledge of myself - I think it is fairly easy to demonstrate that nobody has a birthright as such to be loved. I personally think I have plenty to offer someone in a relationship, but I also know that I can be incredibly difficult to deal with on multiple occasions. My forthright manner and sometimes painful honesty to every emotion I have gets me into trouble regularly enough outside of a relationship; I can barely begin to imagine how unutterably frustrating I must be most of the time. Given that I can go from ecstasy to despair and back again in the space of thirty seconds, I guess I must be fairly exhausting to keep up with.

The only thing I think that I, and indeed anybody, deserves from this increasingly mad world of ours is the space and possibility of being who I want to be. Yes, I am frequently controversial and argumentative, stubborn and impatient, sullen and awkward, and I am the most judgemental person you are ever likely to come across, but I am also many other somewhat more positive things. Oh, and I have a low tolerance threshold for stupidity, I dislike people who incapable of being the individual they were born to be, and I am incapable of dealing with those who spend their time wallowing in the depths of self-pity.

Generally speaking, nine times out of ten people plunge headfirst into this self-pitying doomstruck mode when they focus on the idea that they deserve to be loved by someone. It is a ridiculous concept, like saying that someone deserves to be respected. It is fairly well accepted these days that respect is something which must be earned and is not an automatic right; saying that, I tend to respect everyone until they give me a reason not to. Why has love become something which everyone has a right to? I believe there is actually a fine balance to be achieved: I can't love someone who doesn't love themselves (borrowing a very corny philosophy from all American chat-show hosts there), and furthermore I can't love someone who loves themselves to the point of obsession and arrogance. For me, demonstrations that a person loves themselves are that they take some degree of effort over their physical appearance - they do their best to look like an acceptable specimen of humanity, without taking it to extremes. A guy who goes for a run a few times a week is viable; a guy who has ever even considered a manicure is not. Intelligence is a bonus; I don't think anyone is actually stupid as such, I think they just haven't learned how to make use of their brain effectively. No, everybody doesn't have the possibility of being an Einstein, but then not everybody has to be a George Bush either...

An unobservant reader may here conclude that I am saying attractive and intelligent people deserve to be loved. Not at all, I'm just saying that people who care about themselves are more likely to have the option of caring about someone else - they've had a bit of practise, after all. You are born alone and, as the expression goes, you damn sure die alone; there was never a promise made to us that the interim years would be passed with 'that special someone'. I used to be desperate to find someone to love me and to love in return, and this was especially true after I'd experienced that world. Now I am just thankful I was lucky enough to find those feelings, I will admit that there is barely anything comparable to knowing that just as someone is in your heart every minute of every hour of every day, you are held safely and tightly in theirs. I want everyone to know that same feeling, but I don't expect everyone to - I don't even think the majority of people in their so-called relationships even know or understand a quarter of what I ever felt. I was lucky, and that is all it was. It is not because I was a better person then than I am now, it is merely because the Gods decreed that I was to have a glimpse of the possible beauty of the world.

I owe it to myself to have the best life I can. I need to go to the places I want to visit, try out the lifestyles I want to, be every day the person I want to be. There are no certainties in this life beyond the fact that one day it will draw to its inevitable close, and I can't spend my brief years here yearning for something that may never happen for me. There is nothing I can do to improve my chances of having someone love me for who I am, and it is best to accept that philosophy and get on with the business of living.

Besides, as Shakespeare put it, 'Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.' (Twelfth Night)