My Birthday Gift to Myself: To Stop Intellectualizing

In a couple of days, i'll be spending my 28th year here on earth. Woohoot! I'll be 20-10 then 2 years after. I really dont know why things have been reminding me today that "hey, you're not getting any younger." I am not alarmed though. Really. The panic buttons are still cool and way too far from my reach.

Shucks! I really dont know why im feeling this way. People have been threatening me: should i choose isolation or generativity? As one of my friends emailed me. Yet, i feel no fear. I feel no cause of alarm. One of my sisters even teased me during dinner tonight that by the time my child finishes college, i'll be a 3-legged freak. In short, i'll be having a walking cane already. They even asked me how many children i wanted to have. Hell, i dont even have a plan of having a boyfriend for now and they're asking for the number of kids i would want to have?

My contemporaries and even those younger than i am are mostly married and are already raising kids. Some who are single are even worried, way too worried that they'll end up single for life. What's the big deal with being single? I on the other hand as one of my bestfriends would say didnt even for once tried to enter a relationship. And they're thinking that it was that easy? For some maybe, not for me. A colleague even asked me once why it was hard for us to submit to a guy. The kind that you entertain suitors even if you dont like him. She was wondering why other girls who have just broken up with their boyfriends would be entertaining new guys a few weeks or months after. Is it because they have stopped intellectualizing and just started feeling? Just a wild guess on my part.

Fact is, my brain's quite more powerful than my heart that everytime i feel for someone, this brain of mine processes information faster than normal. It's like an alarm was triggered in my hypothalamus that instead of feeling love, it's functioning on the contrary. It doesnt just receive information, it analyzes it and even projects it 10-years after. Questions like, Is he really the one? Is he a hubby material? What will my children look like when the other genes came from him? Will i have security with him? What will he look like when we grow old? Can i imagine myself growing old with him? Well, i really couldnt stop my brain from functioning such. It might be programmed to scrutinize men and not to fall for them.

Thinking further, another friend of mine was right. This is just one of the defense mechanisms that we project. Truth is, we are more of scared people. Afraid to fail, afraid to commit mistakes even in the relationships that we're going to enter, afraid to get broken hearted, afraid to show our vulnerability. See? My brain even analyzes my own self. The real score actually is that we are afraid that we'll be stupefied. Once our hearts get to overcome our brains, we sometimes become beings we didnt expect ourselves to become. Love makes us stupid that's why.

As a birthday gift to myself, and by giving in to most people's request, i'll try, even for once not to intellectualize. It will be hard alright. Intellectualization is more of a reflex for me. I'll be myself's guinea pig. I just have to shut all switches in my brain and prevent my neurotransmitters from functioning. How? This i have yet to discover. This is not however my way of saying that i would want to have a boyfriend. I just would like to make it clear. As for now in terms of plans for having a relationship, things are as clear to me as mud. It isnt just in my priority list. Wait till i get 20-10. Might be pushing on the panic button dead hard.=)