Unsolicited Relationship Advice

Relationships… What was it that Chris Rock said? Oh yeah.

“You can be married and bored, or single and lonely.”

Oh Chris, you rascal! You’re a true romantic!

In month of March, sixteen years ago, I met the boy, joshtronic.

I won’t bore you with all the details, but it’s pretty amazing that we’re
celebrating our sweet sixteen this year.

That’s 16 years we’ve been together, 12 of those married.

We’ve grown a lot as individuals, and together as a couple. We’ve created a
family during this time. Been through some truly great times, have made some
good memories, had eye opening experiences and navigated some rough patches
along our journey.

TOGETHER

Through it all, the one thing that we’ve strived to maintain is a good
friendship, based on communication. With that, having mutual respect for each
other, and appreciation for our roles in this relationship has strengthened our
bond.

It may sound simple, especially when I just mentioned that we have “roles” in
our relationship. We are equally important, but we each serve a different
purpose and function to make it all work. And those roles are ever evolving,
depending on what we need as individuals and what is needed in our relationship.

I have an acquaintance online that was recently describing the woes of being
single, and unable to find his “other half”. He said girls aren’t looking for a
good guy- that many are wanting the bad guy. So yeah, he’s single and lonely.

Got me to thinking about a few things:

  • Wants versus needs.
  • Good guy versus bad boy.

Then I started thinking about what does the other half want from a relationship?

  • What is it that guys REALLY want?

Ludacris really makes a valid point:

“We want a lady in the streets, but a freak in the sheets.”

Yeah, Okay!

Preach it to us Luda!

I think what we all are looking for is someone who appreciates us. A
relationship shouldn’t validate you as a person, but to help shape the person
you want to be. It doesn’t give you your “life’s purpose”, it does however give
you something to nurture,cherish and cultivate.

I wouldn’t want to be dating in this day and age. Makes me sound kinda old. But
generally speaking, too many games, and fake people. Everyone is so overly
concerned and obsessed with outward appearance, and wanting to be “liked” and
accepted on a grander social media platform… that the humanity of people, a
person- is just a second thought.

One of the things that Josh and I do, is an impromptu night of hanging out. We
pour a glass (or two, or three of wine) sometimes there’s bourbon. Then we sit
up late, really really late, listening to music. We connect and talk about life.
What’s going on, plans for the future, goals.

It may seem simple, and kinda boring as “my friend” Chris Rock would say. But I
think when you find someone that you want to genuinely settle down with, it’s
not boring.
It’s living every-day life together.

So happy anniversary to the boy… thatgirljen thinks you’re a keeper!
<3

Josh Sherman - The Man, The Myth, The Avatar

About Josh

Husband. Father. Pug dad. Musician. Founder of Holiday API, Head of Engineering and Emoji Specialist at Mailshake, and author of the best damn Lorem Ipsum Library for PHP.


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