THE SOLITARY PANDA

All the Single Ladies

Why am I single? Well, there’s the fact that I live in a monastery which is kind of inappropriate for macking (not that I know how to appropriately “mack”). And there’s also the fact that I left a five year long relationship that defined my early 20s and I’m maybe too tired, afraid, or unable to see how going through all that bullshit is worth it again. It’s been almost two years since I broke up with my last boyfriend. He had just flown back to the US after a work trip to Romania and had been awake for 36 hours straight. Imagine the exhaustion and finally coming home to your girlfriend who gives you the cold shoulder when talking about his experiences to his immediate family gathered in the kitchen table; girlfriend silently walking out of the room. Imagine finally getting time alone together when girlfriend suddenly yells “I can’t take this anymore! I want out! I want to BREAK UP!!!” and starts crying in an uncontrollable mess. How would you handle that?

While that probably wasn’t the most compassionate way to break-up, that’s what I did. Whoops. Better luck next time. I tried to take it back. I tried to explain I was only crying wolf, that I just wanted to fix our relationship and make it better. But how do you fix something after an emotional trauma like that? I should have known better than to interrogate his deprived senses and yell at him like I did. Looking back, I see how completely immature and selfish I was.

I didn’t like my life and I knew it had to change. I didn’t like myself. I wasn’t strong. I was self-depreciating. Self-destructive. And ultimately self-centered. I was in a rut; spiritually, emotionally and mentally and knew that there has to be something more than this. I was operating out of the basis of fear and I knew that I wanted to operate on the basis of love. So, I changed.

We both wanted change, but I was convinced that change had to happen on our own separate paths. It’s too hard balancing a relationship, participating, when your goals transcend the relationship. Nearly two years later, I am still trying to transcend. It’s been a spiritual journey from the moment I “cried wolf”. It’s lead me half-way across the world, from North America, to Asia (when I asked myself “What the hell should I do next!?” in a crying stupor, intuition told me to move to the Philippines, where I was born). And through an unplanned form of events, its lead me to a four-month long Zen monastery retreat.

One of my friends at the retreat has a shirt with nuns standing side by side and “All the Single Ladies” captioned underneath. It’s funny. And it’s maybe not entirely untrue with my life at the moment. When I say “transcend” I mean transcending the life of impermanence and illusion that we are all living. Suddenly, relationships aren’t even on my plane of existence and I could seemingly care less, except that I do. I still do. Something in me still wants to believe in that healthy communion between man and woman, or woman and woman, or even man to man. Something in me still wants to believe that life, suffering and men are worth it. I don’t want to become a nun, I’m ready for another round. I want to face my fears and be vulnerable again. I want to bring my walls down, my fucking fortresses. But see. I don’t exactly need sex or love to break them down, I just need to interact more with people. Learn how to love fully and break out of my shell.

I’m telling myself I’m having an Eat, Pray, Love adventure, but I’m still at “pray”. I’m a monogamous girl. I’m either in a relationship, or I’m not. There’s no stage of in between with me because I hate dating, and flings, ultimately aren’t fulfilling. Emotionally, I know I’m ready for another relationship but I may not be in the right location for one. A life of impermanence, made obvious by a travel lifestyle, isn’t exactly the best way to start relationships, but ex-pats, and fellow travelers seem tempting… At this point, I’m still commitmentphobic, but I think I can revise my idea of “friends with benefits” as OK and even healthy. How’s that for transcendence?