Shadows

Sometimes in the healthiest of relationships, it could feel like you are living in a shadow, the shadow of the ex. I dated many guys and went into a few relationships knowing that I was walking into the shadow of the ex. It is not a pleasant feeling. You are told horror stories of things you know you could never do, and you hear about how good the good times were. You then get to see photos and shown many of the things that were bought during the relationship, many times pleasant memories attached.

No matter how much reassuring you receive from the shadow keeper, one bad experience can ruin it all. Now as you all know when I dated Mr. M I was heavily under a shadow and it ultimately was the end of our relationship, that being my one bad experience. Now while I trust Mr. MeTo, I can't help but feel that showdown every now and then. Nothing that he dose but sometimes the stories I hear and the photos I see really get me to wondering, am I just a replacement?

In this modern world of social networking sites, a lot of meaning is put on the placement of your top friends, your comments and the titles you give your photos. While MySpace had a good run, it really looks like Facebook is becoming the new MySpace in my circle. No one bats an eyelash at what was once considered social law and conduct on MySpace. Yet, through Facebook, social laws and conduct are once again changing with emphasis being put on status messages, profile pictures, wall comments and relationship status.

When the chill of the shadow is felt by the new person, we try hard to subtly mark territory by encouraging the changing and removal of many sighs that "the ex was here." Many times, there is a plethora of photos where they look truly happy and in some cases, sexy. But despite all the evidence that there were happy times, you hold fast to the stories that made it end and the word of your significant other that you two are doing great.

You do your best to remind yourself and him that you are great together. You try not to do anything directly related to your insecurity; for fear that, you may ruin things. But as time marches on and that shadow gets bigger you feel one of two things will happen. He will leave you because he still has strong feelings for his ex or you will become so consumed with the fear he may leave you that you ultimately do something so detrimental that everything goes south.

Now while you may think that holding fast will work and in many cases it dose, there will comes those times where you fell you need to speed things along. Here is my word of advice. Don’t invest touch to fast. I know this may seem like general advice for all kinds of relationships but let's look at this for just a moment.

In every scenario that you have gotten your heart broken or simply let down by the person you thought would be the one there is a common thread, we invested more than the other did. We put our hearts into it and we give of ourselves. We buy them gifts, we go to the places they want to go, we work around their schedules and constantly sacrifice without thinking, "am I getting a return on investment?" the result becomes an one sided relationship with one taking more than the other,

The solution is simple and will help you in not just relationships where there is a shadow of an ex but also all relationships. Set yourself standard and don’t adjust until you are sure the person you are with is willing to do the same for you. Only give as much as you receive and take as much as you give. This all seems like a complicated dance but if the person you are with is truly worth it, it will come easy. After you have seen that he is really about trying to make things work with you is the only time you can stop analyzing and start give yourself completely.

Even after you, start giving of yourself completely is sure not to allow yourself to get blinded by love or infatuation. Becoming blinded will keep you from seeing when things are going bad weather it is that your needs are not being met or that you are not meeting the needs of the other. It may seem like an odd thing but it happens. You think things are great but you don’t see how when you roll your eyes at his stupid jokes annoys the hell out of him, or the way you get all lovey dove in public turns him off.

But in the case of that darn shadow, you typical have nothing to worry about. There is one great thing to do to ease your mind about the great yet horrid ex. Get you guy to talk about it. If you find there was significant time to grieve, go through the emotion process then you know chances of getting back together are slim. If you then find that they are still friends and have see n each other several times since the break up then you know they are even slimmer. In the case that you find there was, no time to grieve and no contact since the break up proceed with caution.

Matters of the heart are not easy and living in someone else's shadow only makes them harder. The key to any happy relationship is to be happy with being yourself and loving the person your with because he is happy with the real you and showing you the real him.