How To Fall In Love
Love is one of those things that finds you when you least expect it. You can’t really go hunting for it and you can’t predict it. What you can do is help facilitate not-expecting it.
Start by telling yourself that you’ll never fall in love. Look in the mirror every morning at your stupid ugly face and make a mental note that nobody could ever love someone who looks like you. Take a shower and let water pour over you, down the length of your mediocre body. There’s no way another human being could ever find that attractive. Dry yourself off and repeat your mantra to yourself. “I can do anything.” That’s a stupid fucking mantra. You are a dumb fuck. You will never amount to anything and nobody could ever love such a sad waste of space. Get dressed in anything, it doesn’t matter because all your clothes aren’t cool enough.
With your expectations sufficiently lowered (“none”), you can now proceed through life. Go to class, go to work, see your friends, see your family. Have a coffee, have a sandwich, have a beer. Life is pretty awesome! You have a lot of good stuff, and since you’ll never fall in love, that’s just one less thing to worry about. Enjoy each day the way you would regularly, watching your friends couple up and strangers embrace. That’s so nice for them! Go home and watch your favorite TV show, update your blog, go to bed, repeat.
Proceed like this for as long as necessary. It might be forever, but chances are it won’t be. Love will slowly creep up on you in the form of a new friend, a stranger, a one night stand that you can’t get out of your head, whatever. This is where your training comes in. Don’t be fooled by this new feeling! You are worthless, you are ugly, you are stupid and nobody will ever care about you. Ignore any advances. Perpetuate your worst traits to further solidify your unloveable persona. Love might be real, but not for you.
Eventually someone will figure you out. They’ll see through your exterior and decide you are wonderful. They’ll love the things you don’t like about yourself and they’ll inspire confidence. They’ll
resuscitate feelings you forgot you had, or maybe never considered before. Don’t fall for this. They can’t possibly love you. The feelings are false. This person is probably delusional. They have been mislead. It’s those new shoes you wore, it’s that funny joke you told, that honesty you showed, the way you looked at them that night. Fuck fuck fuck.
A person is starting to really care about you. You’ve tried to rationalize it away but you can’t anymore. You can literally feel them loving you. They might be crazy but they’re really convinced! Consider this instead of sleeping. Write it down in your private journal. Realize that love might actually be real for you too, against all odds. Try to fight this feeling because it goes against everything you’ve worked so hard for. “My mantra sucks and so do I.” Say it three times. Look in the mirror and try to hate your reflection. Stop smiling. Stop fucking smiling.
Turn on the radio. Pop songs are starting to make sense. Every song is real. Fuck! Turn off the radio. Go outside. The sun is shining and there’s a breeze. Something smells wonderful. Everything reminds you of the new feelings. Your brain starts making new connections between things and ideas. Snap, snap, snap snap snap. Everything leads back to them. New socks, scrambled eggs, polka dots, anything. This is too real. You are not built for this.
Wonder what else is real. Question everything. Predict several potential futures. Predict every potential future. Worry that this feeling might end somehow. Imagine yourself dying too soon. Wonder if you will ever feel like this again. Imagine your heart breaking. Imagine their heart breaking and feel like your heart is actually breaking as a result. Wonder if “soulmates” are a real thing. Worry that you will never sufficiently be able to thank them for everything. Wonder if they can tell you’re freaking out. Don’t say anything. Say literally everything. Fuck.
Look at yourself in the mirror. You’re still a little ugly but it doesn’t matter anymore. You’re still an idiot but it’s different now. Sit on the floor of the shower and let the water pour over your mediocre body and laugh. Everything is hilarious. Life is your mantra now. Everything is reaffirming. Love is real. Love is real even for you.
