(no subject)
Okay, let's start at the basic two assumptions: A, communication is important in a relationship, and B, "being in love" and "loving" is not the same thing. Now I'll say something that people might agree with but you'd be surprised how many don't internalise the message: Just being in love is not enough to hold a good healthy relationship.
"Well of course", I hear so many people say there in the background where we're all sane and logical.
So why do these Hollywood dreams and standards of the perfect OTP keep on living?
I'm not talking about fic, here. I'm talking about, if a normal person on my flist would tell me that they're in a relationship and "want to lose themselves in the other person" and that he believes he sort of owns them, tells them what to do and is angry when they don't do it - I would tell them to get help and leave that person. I would not under any circumstances, and no, I'm not talking about a 24/7 bdsm relationship, tell them to stay with that person and give up their sense of self because "love", or a "relationship", is about "true love wins it all in the end". Of course, there is counselling and help and people who try to change, but if the basis of a relationship is nothing but that OTPness, and there is nothing there but attraction and big dramatic gestures, then I'm sorry, this is *not* what a healthy 'ship should be.
Preserving the relationship at the cost of one of the pair's personality and character is just wrong. Letting go of your true self in order to please the value system of another is just wrong. A relationship is about love, yes, but also acceptance, mutual respect, and even, shock, gasp, horror, personal space. Of course there is room for compromise, but it shouldn’t be a complete change and surrender of the self. I'm sorry to burst someone's bubble. The stuff they sell you at the movies? It's not even plastic, it's just a picture of plastic.
And if people have been trying to work on said relationship for six months, and they still can barely communicate on basic levels and still try to control and "assimilate" the other, then something is seriously fucked up and maybe, just maybe, it's time to do serious therapy, or just break up. Again with the shock and the gasp, break the OTP and come into the adult sane world. It's actually rather nice here, even if we rarely get swept off our feet into a sunset on a white horse.
[this rant has not been betad, edited or anything]
"Well of course", I hear so many people say there in the background where we're all sane and logical.
So why do these Hollywood dreams and standards of the perfect OTP keep on living?
I'm not talking about fic, here. I'm talking about, if a normal person on my flist would tell me that they're in a relationship and "want to lose themselves in the other person" and that he believes he sort of owns them, tells them what to do and is angry when they don't do it - I would tell them to get help and leave that person. I would not under any circumstances, and no, I'm not talking about a 24/7 bdsm relationship, tell them to stay with that person and give up their sense of self because "love", or a "relationship", is about "true love wins it all in the end". Of course, there is counselling and help and people who try to change, but if the basis of a relationship is nothing but that OTPness, and there is nothing there but attraction and big dramatic gestures, then I'm sorry, this is *not* what a healthy 'ship should be.
Preserving the relationship at the cost of one of the pair's personality and character is just wrong. Letting go of your true self in order to please the value system of another is just wrong. A relationship is about love, yes, but also acceptance, mutual respect, and even, shock, gasp, horror, personal space. Of course there is room for compromise, but it shouldn’t be a complete change and surrender of the self. I'm sorry to burst someone's bubble. The stuff they sell you at the movies? It's not even plastic, it's just a picture of plastic.
And if people have been trying to work on said relationship for six months, and they still can barely communicate on basic levels and still try to control and "assimilate" the other, then something is seriously fucked up and maybe, just maybe, it's time to do serious therapy, or just break up. Again with the shock and the gasp, break the OTP and come into the adult sane world. It's actually rather nice here, even if we rarely get swept off our feet into a sunset on a white horse.
[this rant has not been betad, edited or anything]