i.d

Someone once told me that relationships or friendships, like all things in this world, are best described as a business transaction. What one puts into a relationship is expected in return. Therefore, a relationship can be illustrated as a pure monetary equation, where costs (what we put into a relationship) should equate assets (what we gain in return from the relationship). Though simplistic and possibly barbaric as this definition may be, this was always expected for me, and it always seemed rational, agreeable but mostly it seemed fair. In this sense I always thought that it was always right, because both parties get what they want and more so, they get what they deserve. Another analogy describing relationships can again be suited to an ideal based on the need of supply and demand. What I have, you need, and what you have, I need, and through this relationship, it will allow for both parties to be completed in their personal exchanges.

For a long time, this is what I honestly believed a relationship or a friendship should be like and consequently if the other party was unable to hold up their end of their agreement, then in every sense the relationship was deemed useless and a waste of my time. Kind of cold isn’t it? But I think a lot of people would agree with me on this, because it isn’t necessarily selfish to think this way. Both people strive toward something that is achieved through the completion of each other lives through each others ability and influence. This ideal of you completing me, isn’t selfish at all, it is actually kind of romantic and beautiful. It doesn’t seem wrong, yet it also doesn’t seem perfectly right as well, it seems normal and expected.
However, one must question of how long a relationship can stay if it is purely give and take. I mean, if we were to live our life according this philosophy of a relationship, then how long can it truly last. If this transaction were to take place the initial individual to stop being a helper, to stop having anything more to give would basically end the relationship. Also, if the other person is unable to allow that individual to make him or her happy anymore, then the transaction is incomplete and should end. Furthermore, I believe the more important question is how this ideal of a relationship reflects the nature of who we are. In this light we see ourselves as incomplete, empty in a desperate search, sifting through countless people we meet in the purest intent of having them fill us with their influence, with their presence. Is there more to this? More to us? If there isn’t, than we truly are weak and empty people.

Yet, what if relationships aren’t about accepting each others’ influence? What if instead of desiring to receive, we desire on giving and offering? If we believe that we are in fact filled with greatness and that it is our expectation is to offer what we have, not in the hopes of its return, but purely based on a passion of giving, then what does that mean for us? What does that say about us, and our relationships? Is it even possible to live such a way? To these questions I have no such answer. However, if we offer what we have, even the little that we may posses with no desire for exchange, can we possibly be greater than who we actually are or who we think we are, and maybe could relationships be better and stronger too. A relationship that isn’t based on completing oneself, but is based on pouring out ones self, sacrificing themselves and offering a piece of who we are to others in the hopes of completing their lives, of making them happy. This just seems more meaningful, more honest and pure.

There is more to us than we think, and by offering what we have, by opening ourselves up to others with a passion to share, it allows us to truly grow and understand what life may be or what might be possible… even for us.