TLDR: It comes with conditions, it’s inorganic, in many ways lazy and a massive red flag depending on who you ask.
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(And because this is a personal post I don’t believe I need to answer questions like:
“What about people who’re waiting for the other person to make the first move?”
I don’t care. This post is about me.)
If we’re going to connect, we’re going to connect. No need to shower me with compliments and all other associated embellishments.
I would rather hear about the things you enjoy, even if they’re things I don’t find particularly interesting. Who knows, I might actually learn something and begin to have a newfound appreciation for your niche interests.
See that’s what often happens when people are authentic. People are introduced to new and interesting realities. That’s the best-case scenario.
There’s no worst-case scenario. Because authenticity will be at the centre of everything. If two authentic people are incompatible, they part respectfully.
I respect authenticity. I say this all the time.
Authenticity comes with consistency.
You will grow to resent me if you take this proactive bonding approach to relationship building. If you think offering to help me every single time will instil in me a desire/obligation to help you just as much you’re living in a world of illusion. (And the world just so happens to be a loving habitat to the rarely seen elephant of the entitlement variety)
You can’t, for example, buy me a rose that I never requested and expect me to buy you one in return.
That behaviour is synonymous with “mirroring” and I find it particularly annoying, to be honest.
If I told you the number of times I’ve had to explain to people that I don’t remember birthdays and they insisted on saying “Happy Birthday” anyway expecting me to say it back you’d be surprised. I understand the sentiment of telling people you care about “Happy Birthday”. But I don’t believe that sentiment is a fact or a moral imperative I have to live by.
Why not just act authentically without expecting anything in return? Why is that so hard? Pro-active bonders would rather subject themselves to a sprint from which they’ll eventually burn out (and make no mistake, they will). At which point they’ll show their real selves and we get to say “Nice to finally meet you”
To proactively bond (to me) is to take charge of how the relationship flows. It means you know (for certain) how it’s supposed to go.
It means being impatient to see a bond evolve organically over time and choosing to add a bit of your grow-grow juice. Tasteless reasoning in my opinion.
This can be done in a friendship or otherwise. And in some cases, they (the proactive bonder) will be expecting some kind of return for their efforts — or at least some kind of result. A result that signifies compatibility.
The absence of “expected” results is somehow considered self-evident. It somehow signifies the lack of compatibility.
<<Make that irrationality make sense>>
The lack of results is because the recipient of all this proactive bonding is a bad person. It’s definitely not because of this cornucopia of potential reasons:
“Maybe I creeped this person out by being so smothering, that’s why they distanced themselves”
“Maybe telling them I’ve planned a surprise trip without letting them know didn’t translate over to them as a sweet gesture”
“Maybe I need to start putting in the effort to get to know someone before assuming I know what they want”
“Maybe a relationship not growing in the exact way I want isn’t always a bad thing”
I mean, these are just some of the things I would hope these individuals think of before trekking their self-actualised Mt Sinai.
But I’m just one idiot behind a keyboard, what do I know.
Please, educate me. Show me how wrong I am.
– O.D. ©2022
Art by: nathanaeI
O.D. 
Yes. Yes! YES!! Allllll of this. Oh man and the mirroring. One of my pet peeves, I guess you should say. Personally, I’m one who remembers birthdays (I’m not a holiday person and rarely know which is up-coming… but birthdays are sort of like a special day to at least acknowledge the person, though I don’t want/require such acknowledgment for myself, go figure) BUT I don’t think it’s a requirement for others to remember. In fact I rarely share my birthdate because of everything that seems to be tied with it (oh so you’re a Leo! Ad Nauseam). Then there’s the “I love you”s said expecting a parrot to repeat it. Listen, I say I love you when I mean it. Or a special bit of love has welled up and bursts out… but I hate repeating it just to satisfy someone’s need to be petted. Get a dog for that.
Like you, I’m all about the authenticity. Oh the things I’ve learned about and found quite interesting (or boring) because some I cared about shared their passions. THAT’s what -insert relationship here- are about! Parts intersect and intermingle. Parts are separate. That’s okay! I don’t want a clone. Or an opposite. I want authenticity! And yeah, sometimes that means the relationship doesn’t “blossom” into forever-love. Maybe it just simmers as friend-love, or brotherly-love. That’s okay too! It’s what makes the world groovy.
I’d say we might be spirit-twins but that might come off too clingy (haha!) so I’ll settle for saying, I think I get [a lot about] you, OD. And that’s quite alright in my book.
I don’t find it clingy at all Tara. I’ve been calling you a fellow Spirit guide ever since that other collaboration of ours. The more we talk, the more I see the parts of our value systems that intersect.
The “I love you” bit sounds all too familiar. It’s crazy how often people want it said back — or keep count of who has said it first on numerous occasions haha. It’s like there’s a script no one told us about that we must adhere to; pure madness.
You conceptualized it well when you talked about all of us carrying different parts, some of them don’t go well together but some do. All of it should be celebrated and we should value our differences.