Becoming Who We Really Are...

We all know the stereotypes about the personalities of men and women in the context of a relationship. We all know that men don't listen and women create such ridiculous double standards that piss men off. We get at each other. We drive each other crazy.

What if, we all just tried to learn how to lose our ridiculous habits? What if we learn to build each other up instead of lying to cover a sin? Example. In my last relationship, we lied to each other plenty. For instance, I wanted to cover the fact that I was extremely insecure. She wanted to cover the fact that she didn't 100% agree with how the relationship was going. This is on a pretty small scale, but what if we learned to help each other instead of lie? What if we learned to hold each other up instead of letting our lies stifle ourselves? What can be gained by being dishonest?

It's true that looking back and wondering what could have happened has never benefited anyone. What we don't usually consider is that if we do look back at first, we have a chance to let grace show us what we have done. Right or wrong. We often discover important things too late. I feel that that is because we try to avoid feeling pain, only to realize that we should have let our hearts hurt for a time.

But the differences in men and women are visible in so many ways. Men hunt, and women nest. Men fix cars, women cook. At least, that's the way it's been as long as most of us know.

There's a shift in the gender roles. Women are starting to get higher paying, more important jobs. Men are at home, taking care of the kids. From my experience, women in relationships are acting more like men and vice versa. Thanks to the recession, and maybe the removal of traditional roles, a complete and total role reversal is happening. We are standing at the edge of something none of us has seen before.

Wouldn't this be a perfect time to start working on who we are as people? Wouldn't this be the perfect time to become who we really are? And, just who are we? We are better than our mistakes. We are better than who we allow ourselves to become. We are better than what we know or don't know. And in relationships, it's the same. I've had conversations with friends who say that they play the same game that their significant other is playing with them. Why play that game? We're distracting ourselves. Why not just try to fix it?

After my last relationship ended, I started to change who I am, one little thing at a time. Think about it, isn't there something, or a few things, that you could stand to change? There always are. I started being more honest, speaking my mind, and treating people the way I know they should be treated. I started to value my friends more, and see the value that people had that I didn't know so well. I started to get into psychology and counseling people on their relationships and friendships. I'm not who I really am yet, but it's a few steps in the right direction.