Somewhere during the past week or so, I can’t really remember where I saw it, but it has stuck to me for a while now. I’m most probably paraphrasing it here, it goes thus
You can meet someone in a month who will have more goodwill towards you than someone you have known for 10 years.
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a post about marrying a stranger, my thoughts on this were clear because your best friend knows you well enough and you guys probably have survived fights and arguments and are still friends. There was a discovery sometime ago that says if you’ve been friends with someone for over 5 years, there is a high possibility that the friendship will last forever, doesn’t that sound like marriage?
From what we all know, you need to be friends with someone consistently for more than 5 years before they can become your best friend, but that’s not why we are here. (My rule!)
These days, we have heard stories of a lady or guy getting dumped after they dated someone for significant time (3 years +). Not only getting dumped, after the dump, the other person settles down with new person in record time, sometimes 3 months or shorter.
While I was in school, this happened to a friend, distant friend. She had a bobo that she used to yap about a lot, then we heard she was getting married. Quite naturally, we thought it was the guy, only for us to find out it was someone else, someone she met like 4 months ago and guess what, she wasn’t pregnant.
If she was pregnant, it would have been another case but she wasn’t, so she more or less married the guy “clear-eyed”. To an extent, knocking someone up these days might mean marrying the person especially if both of them are up to age.
Another one that happened more recently was about 2 years ago, a male friend who we knew was dating a lady since they were both in school, cut it off. That relationship was at least 5-6 years old, they were together through school, NYSC and job hunt, what we were all expecting was their wedding bells. The wedding bells did ring but it only rang for another lady the guy had just met, it took them all of 3 months to decide to spend the rest of their lives together.
I think one key ingredient in all of us might be chemistry/soulmate angle. The chemistry here might be diverse, some people are cooler than others, no doubt. Are you aware that some ladies do not nag?
I have found some as well. I’m not saying there isn’t any reason for the ladies to nag, not like the guys aren’t totally undeserving of the nag but finding someone who doesn’t nag you to do things, someone that finds a creative way of telling you to do what you need to do is priceless and I think that’s why the guy tries his absolute best to tie down such babe.
I was talking to an elderly friend, and we were talking about women, he narrated how his wife stylishly made him dress better. He is a creative guy and you know some creative guys like to get with their T-shirts, he said he would wear crazy shirts like “I’m with stupid”, “The man (with an arrow pointing to his face), The legend (with an arrow pointing to his crotch)” and several others like that.
He said he didn’t even realize that he had stopped wearing those shirts, and he began wearing button down shirts with proper pant trousers tucked in, and at times with a jacket, something he could never be caught wearing at any point in time due to his “personal brand” which involves been crazy about outfits.
The lesson I learnt from this is how she used patience and nice words to suggest to him. At first, the laundry guy would hold up these shirts then after a while she would buy him corporate shirts in the colors he liked then she would tease “How about wearing these nice shirt, you know today is Monday, you can go ahead with the crazy tees on Tuesday.”
Being a gentleman, he would oblige then she would take pictures and tease, call him awesome names, told him how cool he looked in corporate, and stylishly over a long period of time, he stopped wearing the crazy tees all together.
I know there is a saying that you can never change a man, but you can try to a large extent with patience and the wonderful power of suggestion. You don’t have to demand, suggestions can be powerful too.
I have a boss who instead of telling you what to do would suggest it, say for instance, instead of saying “Call the vendors to be here by 2pm” which sounds like an order, he would instead say “Would you mind calling the vendors to meet us, lets see if we can have them meet us by 2pm if their schedule isn’t occupied”. In doing so, you feel like its entirely your decision or your call to make, and we both know it isn’t.
Back to where we started from, someone new can have better intentions for you than someone you’ve known for a long time because different people have their purposes in our lives, some people have shorter lifespan than others.
Some of these people are exceptions to the rule, they’re called soul mates. You meet them and it feels like you’ve known them all your life, it feel heart warming even when they call your name, and you can still tolerate them after sex, also having countless of it.
Sadly, the downside to all of this is that you have wasted someone’s time, how do you deal with that if you’re a decent human being, how do you break up with someone you’ve been dating for over 3 years so you can marry someone you met 3 months ago. It can never be easy to deal with, you’ve found your own joy while someone else has lost theirs, and that’s life. The Yorubas have a saying that, someone else’s mischief is another person’s chance to succeed.
I cannot underestimate how difficult it will be for the people been jilted, I only hope that they as well find joy in their lives soon. There is a popular saying by John Lennon “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans”. The wasted years of their life can never be gotten back, if this has happened to you, you need to get closure, closure helps you move on.
Life is what happens in between you and trying to achieve your goals and objectives, and someone’s life has been within your crosshairs. If you’re in this situation right now, you’ve met someone who actually completes you more than the person you’ve been dating, the Lord is your strength as you try to resolve this.
If you have experiences of this, feel free to share so that others can learn from you and all better our lives.
Enjoy the rest of your week.
‘Deolu
