Although I pay no mind to advertising messages (which attempt to control us), I do pay attention to food packaging (because it’s designed to protect us). Best if used by 04/02/08. Refrigerate after opening. Processed in a factory that also handles nuts, wheat and dairy. Like that. So I’m always on the lookout for useful advice on product labels.
Just the other day, on the way to the checkout with my blueberry smoothie, I looked at the bottle and saw three words that have now set me free. Right between SHAKE WELL and Perishable it said:
Settling is Natural! I knew it! It’s not that I’m single because my standards are too high, I’m single because I’ve been fighting nature. You can’t spell settle down without settle, right? Why would a blueberry smoothie lie?
I see us as being like the blueberries in that smoothie. All of them started off expecting to be loved as they were–complete and unaltered. Some of them were, consumed as-is from the field, the container, or on atop some other food. Enjoyed for all that they were, just as we hope to be.
Some others had to endure hardship to become part of something greater. Whether subjected to the heat of an oven or a drowning in batter, they emerged changed at the end–as part of a pie, pastry, or muffin–with their essence intact and their flavor now concentrated due to their trials. What did not kill (or, in this case, destroy) them made them stronger. Stronger in taste, anyway.
But what of the other blueberries, the ones passed over for perceived defects in size, shape, or color? They faced a choice: they could resist change, stay true to themselves and risk being discarded, or undergo a transformation that would allow them to be part of something larger–in essence, to be loved. The berries who chose change entered the blender, to be stripped of their uniqueness–surrendering themselves to become but a single note in the symphony of the smoothie. Or something.
Are we really that different from the blueberries? We hope to be part of something special, but as time passes — and we see friends get married and have children — we wonder if holding out is the right thing. Maybe our standards are too high. Maybe we’re not as pretty or perfect as we think, and that’s why we can’t seem to get what we want. Rather than running the risk of going it alone indefinitely, some of us sacrifice part of who we are — putting ourselves through the emotional blender. That’s settling.
Before you think I take advice from blueberries, I don’t. I’m not a fan of settling. There’s a big difference between revising your expectations to account for changes in yourself (or lessons you’ve learned) and settling. Settling means that you want more but you make a deal with yourself to take less.
Anytime you start a relationship with the thought, “I know this isn’t exactly what I want,” you’re stepping into the blender. If you change to accommodate the relationship, you lose yourself. What’s the point of being loved if not to be loved for who you are? If you decide not to change but give a relationship like that a go anyway, you’ll almost always find that the fit isn’t there — as you suspected.
Compromise may be part of a healthy relationship, but settling is more than that. It’s admitting defeat. Starting a relationship defeated doesn’t bode well for things. But what do I know, I’m suspicious of blueberries.
Originally appeared at Crew.OneSharpBroad.com on May 10, 2008
