Relationship Thesis: Respect [Archived]

I have been trying to work on a lot of my relationship theses over the past few months and one of my friends over the past couple of weeks pretty much smashed all of them. So this blog entry will be pretty much centered around more of my opinions and experiences rather than trying to set a standard for people to adhere to, because apparently that does not work. Anyway, I do not consider myself to have fairly strict standards when it comes to having meaningful relationships with other people. Well, I take that back, other people consider me to be unnecessarily strict with what attracts me, and I don't understand. But anyway, people who have liked me in the past have encompassed many different social classes, if you will. But I seem to miss the message because apparently I never understood they liked me. Probably arising from one central standpoint: I was not attracted to them. I was not attracted to them because they didn't seem to respect me. I would talk and talk and they just were the of people who never listened and just replied with "nice" or "cool". Now I find those words to be insulting, and I RARELY ever use them by themselves unless I am very angry. I would say "That's pretty nice/cool! I [insert whatever input I have that's meaningful to the conversation]." I value honesty and sincerity. I'd honestly rather have someone tell me straight up they do not care what I am saying rather than act like they give a damn. I find that to be more attractive.* *(See below) Now, my definition of attractiveness may vary from the common interpretation of attractive. In fact, it is rare nowadays when I say that a woman is attractive or beautiful. The thing that attracts me to someone, more than personality, looks, or even common interests is respect. If there is mutual respect between a girl and a guy that likes each other, that is going to bring itself much farther than looks (which disappear with age) or personality (which tends to bore the people involved after a time.) I have a staunch belief that a relationship of two people who may have the best looks and the best personality will not last long if they don't have a sense of decency and respect for one another. Now, I'm not downplaying that looks and personality aren't important, and they are. (Not necessarily in that order) You can be the nicest person in the universe, but if you are nice in the sense of acting like you're listening instead of actually taking time to listen and understand your partner, there's a loss of a connection. A sense of respect is gone because you only are self-centered and egotistical. Looks can be nice too, but if you're a guy with a million abs and supreme muscles or a woman with gigantic breasts to the point where your back is about to break, how fickle are you that you feel you show off these "assets" if you will and throw away your personality and be a complete asshole to people you consider to be "beneath you". In turn people like that tend to lose my respect as well. I just wish people can have a sense of being themselves. I'm not a believer in saying "he/she is out of your league". Personally, if you like someone, and you want their attention, the best thing you can do is just be yourself. With all of the fake people in the world today trying to be someone they aren't, it's always refreshing to find someone who is themselves, and it shows they have a degree of creativity and originality rather than some boring mindless person that just follows everyone's trends. I probably come off conceited posting all of this. But lately it has been seriously bothering me watching people throw away their dignity and sense of pride in order to get a girl's or guy's attention. Harassing a guy or girl you like until the wee hours of the morning because he or she will not go on a date with you is seriously a form of disrespect. If you can't even respect the privacy and reasons the guy or girl who explained to you why they are not interested is enough, how are you going to respect them in a full blown relationship. Anyway, I just needed to vent. /end blog entry.