Wild horses...we'll ride them someday?

I have always been a keen people-watcher. You learn a lot by watching others' behavior, and none more so than watching yourself. It's a good skill to have and the great thing is, it's never too late to start developing it, to start paying closer attention to who you are and why you behave like you do, why you react in certain ways at certain times. It might give you a better understanding of the mystery that is you. And the world beyond that, certainly.

_{Photo by Larm Rmah on Unsplash}

Anyway, one of the things I've noticed, both in myself and many others around me, is that we tend to blow things out of proportion. Like a lot, a long way out of proportion, till the actual size of things is nowhere to be seen. We exaggerate issues in life, we make problems out of hindrances and the truth is, they can only affect us as much as we let them. This doesn't apply to all problems in life, naturally, but to many moments in life that we make into something huge and totally upsetting.
A mere flight of fancy can easily turn into heartbreak, especially in today's sensitive world, though I doubt it's unique to today. After all, many older people do the same thing, they blow things out of proportion, they...
Well, in Romanian, we say they make a horse out of a mosquito and it's quite a good phrase, I believe. Often, your problem is really just a pesky mosquito. Annoying, sure, but overall not that bad, not that important even. And yet, we become upset, we choose to suffer over silly things, things that aren't worth suffering over.
Why?
Well, rather simple really. We, as a species, tend to believe we're the center of the world. Naturally, we're not, but we really like to think that and so, whenever something happens in our lives, we give it a major role, we make a big deal out of it, even though it is not. Because otherwise, it would be a boring episode. See, screenwriters understand this – you can't have an episode where nothing happens and the characters just go about their lives. It would be dull and the viewers would turn away. And even though there are no viewers to our little dramas, we try to keep them entertained anyway. So, we can't let some passing character be just a passing character or a simple issue get resolved. They grow large and big and frightening.
We make the main character – ourselves – shed lakes of tears over the issue, pull hairs, complain, have fits. Anything really not to be ordinary. Or worse, not to be dull.

An example that comes to mind is love. I was thinking earlier about all the songs we listen to. Now, love is rather a big emotion and it sneaks into any genre. There's a lot of love in rock music. Take 'Wild Horses' by The Rolling Stones. Classic heartbreak song. And when we listen to it, we always like to imagine the lyrics apply to us. But mostly, they don't.

Wild horses couldn't drag me away

Really?

Do you mean that?

Shall I send in the horses?

Can you honestly imagine yourself being dragged, fighting, skin tearing, holding on, bones breaking, death imminent, all for the one you currently love? Somehow, I doubt it. Don't get me wrong, it's a lovely image, truly (well, lovely in a poetic sense). But it's not that common. It can't be, because then it wouldn't be lovely. You see what I mean?
You can't really say you'd actually literally fight wild horses and let them pull at you and tear your limbs off just to not let go of your boyfriend or girlfriend. It's just not practical because chances are in a year or two, or maybe even just a month, you won't be with that same person so all the dragging would've been for nothing. Really fighting wild horses every time you get into a relationship seems like quite a hassle.

The feeling wouldn't be unique and worth singing about if it happened every other week. But we like to imagine that. Again, horses and mosquitoes. Or in this case, knights in shining armor and ordinary joes.
Every time you listen to someone talking about their beloved, it's this big thing, this larger than life, perfect for each other outlook. But that's just them prettying it up. Not for you, either, but for themselves.
I like watching couples at concerts. All of them holding hands and kissing and snuggling during the romantic songs (because most concerts have at least one)...and it's mostly not real. They don't actually feel that strongly. They lie to themselves because who wants to admit they've tied up their life to some ordinary joe?
Where's the story there?

Sure, you fucked me up so bad I wrote a song about you is a terribly romantic line. We want that. We don't want the heartbreak that comes along with that, though. And let's face it, most of us are average. Most of us won't ever get to meet that long lost soulmate, the perfect match or the love of our life. And maybe that's not our fault in particular, but lying to ourselves about it sure ain't helping.
We get in relationships because let's face it, we're bored, lonely or whatever and we then convince ourselves that Joe/Jane is everything from them great love songs and more. But it's usually just a Joe/Jane. And you could be out there searching for the person in the song, for your wild-horses person. But you're not.
You found something sorta nice along the way and you stopped going. You figured you could lie them into it, but you can't. Because when the wild horses come, you're just gonna let go.

But then, if you were to admit that, you'd have to also recognize this is not really an interesting episode. Nothing much is happening, really. And you can't possibly admit that because it would dismantle your whole opinion of yourself.

_{Photo by Marc-Olivier Jodoin on Unsplash}
See, I was listening to a Romanian song I like and the lyrics go something along the lines 'Schubert could not describe what you did to me'.
Now I don't know why Schubert in particular. But I do know that the way he sings it, it's heartwrenching. And you imagine it's about you. You attribute it to whoever is in your life at the moment. And while sometimes that may be true, often it's just you being delusional. And you shouldn't be. Because special is not common, usual will never be rare.
If the song was applicable to each joe or jane you met, then Schubert could describe it, surely. I mean come on, he's not an idiot.

Stop imagining special in everything that is ordinary. Because that's how problems are created. Maybe Joe/Jane isn't worth suffering over, but they're your wild-horses person, at least in your head, and for them, surely you have to have some heartache.

But the thing is, life throws you enough curve-balls as it is. It fucks you up in all sorts of ways and there are plenty of times for real suffering, real problems to be solved. Save your energy and your tears for those. Learn to sort through your life between the extraordinary and the commonplace, the sinking moments and the slight swerves. They're very different.

This song just came on. Listen to it, if you will, or at least read the lyrics. In Corey's own words, it's about someone who betrayed him and hurt him terribly. And look at him, he seems pretty fucked up about it. That's not commonplace. Most people are not going to screw you up like that. And that's good because you probably wouldn't be able to survive. Stop finding problems where there are none.

Thank you for reading,