19 YKK

We either idolize or we love.
This comes from my dad, who dishes out wry and bitter wisdom by the pitcher (cup? bowlful? there’s a real idiom there but my head is to muddled to figure it out). Relationships - of any sort - are built on love. Friends love each other, lovers love each other, parents love their children, and so on. But it’s easy for people to get attached to other people and then to define themselves by their relationships to these people. And that usually ends up with a feeling like what Prometheus must have experienced chained to the rock. Not good. People aren’t perfect and guess what? It’s not because they want to intentionally hurt us, but they will. After that a lot of people separate themselves from their connections and relationships because it seems hopeless. Do you like pain? I know I don’t. So it’s important to give your time, ears, consideration, smiles, laughter, love people, build relationships (because they’re one of few meaningful things) but never to define yourself by someone else, because you don't want to tie all your self worth on a flawed being. I guess it’s sort of related to peer pressure: if you idolize the people you hang out with, then you’ll define yourself by what they think of you. This piece of advice (I think) is super applicable and I wish I had the concept down, but I don’t.