How 'bout I think inside the box...

Everyone is always telling you to ‘think outside the box.’ Go outside your comfort zone.  Challenge yourself.  Do something new and exciting.  Take a risk.  Take a chance.  Take a leap of faith.  But has anyone ever thought that maybe once in a while you just want to stay in?  Sometimes the box is perfectly nice, warm and inviting.

Going beyond the pale is great.  If you never challenge yourself then you can never reach your full potential.  Taking risks and having new adventures is essential in life.  You learn about yourself, you meet and interact with new and interesting people.  Going outside the box is an important and necessary part of life.  

But let’s face it, always thinking outside the box can be quite exhausting. Take 'Blind Dates' for example.  Now Blind dates tend to get a bad reputation and here's why.  Essentially, blind dates are a leap of faith.  You are agreeing to meet said person, typically knowing no more than their name, rank and serial number.  Throw in a few hobbies and general commonalities and you have got yourself a date.  You have absolutely no idea whether or not you will like this person or what the future could possibly hold but for girls, at least, a blind date holds the possibility of happily ever after. 

Generally speaking most girls can determine in about four seconds whether or not this person is worth an hour of their time.  If I am sitting there engaging in the first date chatter while thinking that painting my nails would be a more effective use of my time, this isn’t going to end well.

If you have a wonderful blind date experience and life happily ever after, fantastic.  For those of us in the real world, blind dates leave you exhausted.  Following the date you not only have to deal with the words ‘giant letdown’ hanging over your head, you also have to deal with the emotional exhaustion brought on by the pre-date worrying and preparation.  “What should I say?  Should I talk about this?  What if he doesn’t like me? Even worse, what if I don’t like him?  That’s awkward” 

Then after a series of not so fabulous rendezvous, or even just one, you start to question whether it's all worth it, the whole dating thing in general.  A few days later you realize that in fact you ARE an eternal optimist and faith in love is once again restored.  

At times, constantly going outside the box, in dating or any other aspect of life,  can be exhausting.  Yes, you have to challenge yourself and have new adventures but the old comfortable adventures are pretty cool too.

Yesterday I went into my closet to grab a sweatshirt and instead of pulling out my pretty new Adidas one; I pulled out my thoroughly worn/five sizes too big college sweatshirt.  Just for old times sake I threw it on and instantly a wave of comfort came over me. 

Sometimes you need to take a break from the wonderful/fabulous things you are doing and do what you've always done.  For me that was grabbing my EC sweatshirt and spending the Sunday afternoon on the couch watching an endless string of B movies.  In my opinion, it’s just as good for the soul as taking a leap of faith. 

And who knows…I hear good things come when you least expect it.  Yesterday I won a water spritzer bottle! Now that doesn’t happen every day, I never win anything!

Till next time

~E