Saviour

Saviour

1. One who delivers or rescues from peril

As I see it, life has always been a matter of focus and timing. Sure, maturity and experience have their obvious parts to play. The burning issues of our teenage years always seem laughably miniscule as we replay those hormone ridden incidents in a nostalgic review. Still, in my internal playback, I recall equally pitiful 'dilemmas' that, even at the time, I didn't give a shit about. Why? Focus and timing. Always, focus and timing.

And in one particular facet of life, focus and timing really do rule all. Relationships. Bloody relationships.

Focus:

If my furious googling has served me well, it was Shakespeare who first stated that 'love is blind'. Well, I'm going to put a slight swerve on that, if you don't mind Will. As I see it, love is blinkered. I'm talking about everything from sinful lust through puppy love all the way to being metaphorically impaled upon Cupid's bastard arrow. It all comes down to focus. Now, for as long as you can keep your focus solely upon the object of your affection, nothing will distract you. Nothing. Not food. Not work. Not your friends belligerently reminding you that it's the third weekend in a row that you've blown them out to watch another crap film with your girlfriend. And certainly not another member of the opposite sex. But woe betide you if you let that lovestruck stare quiver for a heartbeat. Because in that natural, treacherous moment, where your eyes remind you that there are a multitude of attractive possibilities, your focus imperceptibly shifts. Imperceptibly at first, that is. Before you know it, in a rush of libido and biological imperative, your focus has been shunted from your heart's desire to your loins' desire. And once your focus shifts from one specific woman to many potential women the blinkers are lost, never to be recovered. Focus is a bitch.

Timing:

I've previously declared that Love - and I've capitalised it to indicate that we're discussing the Disney variant of love here - is a question of timing. That when someone decides that they're ready to fall in love, lo and behold, miraculously the next vaguely suitable mate they find is elevated to the love of their life. Cynical, yes. But wrong? I remained convinced that my perception of love was unerring until recently. We'll deal with that heart-wrenching episode another time.

All in all, a remarkable insight you'll doubtlessly agree. But where does all of this nonsense fit into what's been playing on my mind in an infuriating loop? Let me fill you in.

I've always confidently preached that in order to be able to have a healthy relationship with a member of the opposite sex, you have to be happy in yourself. In previous years, I've delivered sermons to a choir of friends on the matter. "The problem with Rachel" I admonished "Is that the thing that makes her happy in her life is me; that's why I have to finish it with her". Finish it with her I did, confidently striding along my egotistical path in a state of blissful apathy. This was a few years back. The ensuing couple of years transpired to be a cluster-fuck of physical and mental destruction. We'll save those soul-raping events for another time.

Which leads me, in typically tangential fashion, to the tuneless melody reverberating its miserable notes down my spine. I'm not happy in myself. I have great friends. I have a wonderfully supportive, albeit slightly fragmented, family. I'm attractive enough. To the casual observer, I'm in a great place. Shit, a recent ex-girlfriend wrote a list of reasons why I'm so great (yet another backstory for another time) and there, sitting smugly at number one; he's a happy person. Am I fuck. I'm just another individual well-versed in creating whatever impression he chooses. And my main problem? Easy. I hate my job. Loathe it. Absolutely detest every minute of it.

"Shit.." you exclaim. "That's easy to change". And of course it is. The difficult part isn't knowing what you don't want to do. The real tough part is having a clue what you want to do. Now, I know exactly what I want to do. I want to work with dogs. I want to get up every morning looking forward to my day. 'Find a job you love and you'll never work a day in your life'. Beautiful, Confucius. Profound wisdom, no doubt. But what do you do if the job you'd love just doesn't touch the sides when it comes to paying your bills? How I envy the individuals who grow up wanting to be solicitors and accountants. So, I'm left endeavouring to sum up some enthusiasm for a search to find a job that I don't want to do.

I want to meet a girl. I want to have kids, settle down, start a beautiful family and live happily ever after. Of course, first I have to meet the right girl. And that's when the trouble starts. When the girl in your life is your only constant source of happiness, you're leaving the door to anguish wide open. Even the initial courtship is a rollercoaster of emotions, soaring high on first kisses and plummeting to wrenching depths when your phone doesn't beep within an hour of sending that text.

And that's when the nagging starts up again. How can I really have a healthy relationship when I'm not happy in myself? I mean, what am I looking for?

A fucking saviour?