The Business of Love

Full disclosure. This is not Valentine’s post. It’s been posted today, yes. But we (me & all the other me’s that inhabit me) don’t love Valentine’s. This day is nothing but a regular day, highjacked by dudes with no game thinking they have some.

I do want to post it today for two reasons. One, this week has been exceptionally charged with relationship despair. Everywhere I go people are mauled by someone. I don’t necessarily think it's because of today, but because it just caught up on all of us. Second reason, because this week is important to me. Because I’m the most aware as I ever been, and because I achieved such level of zen in the midst of being massacred; that I want to share this state with you, and maybe get you there, too.

Do me a favor right now. Imagine a scene: there’s a war, there’s blood everywhere around you, everyone and everything is been teared apart, things are flying above and around and under you. But you, somehow, are sitting still in the midst of it. You are there. In one piece. While everything’s been pulled apart. You see despair, yet strangely, you are at peace.

That’s where I am.

But I wasn’t there for the longest time. Until recently, I was mauled and pulled apart myself.

The other night I was sitting in one of the coolest hotels in Los Angeles, at the table, with 6-7 people, celebrities all around us, one of the nicest views in front of us, great food, beautiful women around, the hottest guys you can find; everything looking like a movie scene; yet every single person at the table (except me, not because I’m cooler than the rest but because I was already mauled and pass my mauled stage) was talking about a significant other and the problems in love.

It was mindblowing. The guy who likes the girl but he cheated and she got pissed but they are not exclusive but he’s mad she’s mad. The girl who likes a guy who’s clearly flirting with someone else. The girl who likes a guy but she’s to shy to say it. A guy who is sick and tired of hot but dumb LA women that want to use him. A girl with the guy who likes her but won’t commit. But won’t leave ether.

Souls shattered. Everywhere.

At some point I thought about the Chuck Palahniuk’s - “The one you love and the one who loves you are never, ever the same person.” - thinking should we just quit right now and don’t even try anymore? I mean there must be a reason all these smart people said all these things 10, 20, 30, 40, 100 years ago? They knew. They did. They knew.

Is the process more important than the results? Agh, the famous results. Isn’t that what it’s all about? The end goal? You want to be with that person, you want to have them, you want them to be yours, you want everyone to know you have someone, you want everyone to know you have that exact person, you want to post your pictures on Instagram and show everyone, show the world, you want to travel with that person and have pics from the Caribbean together, so everyone can see, the end goal, right?

But is that love?

Are we even capable of love today? Is it possible that our lives are so screwed up, we might not even understand the business of love?

I haven’t been talking much about my love life publicly, I never posted a pic of anyone I was with, I didn’t give any interview in 5 years, somehow I thought once was enough, and I came to the level in my life where I want to hide everything that might be important to me. I just finally understood the value of privacy and anonymity, and how much more you can build, away from noise.

I’ll break my rule today to share few things; I feel we both need it. You and me.

If you know me, you know I struggle with people in this town. I love the city of Los Angeles, but my personality severely clashes with characters and what people are all about here. I like class, I like education, I like humbleness, I hate ego. All that’s opposite up in here.

I also hate men that are like small dogs humping your leg. Everywhere you turn, its about sex, in the lamest, most douche, loser way possible. There’s no seduction, no banter, mind-games (positive ones that seduce you, not the games that play you), and those who are most vocal about sex are the worst in bed.

While all my friends ran around dealing with those zombies, I chilled. I didn’t engage, I didn’t talk, I didn’t look their way. You can’t engage with morons and expect results. Why do women always do that? Don’t you see? Anyone not seducing you with words but with physicality, why are you there? Even if you’re just looking for sex, be seduced with words. Everything else is a waste of time.

Lesson one.

I waited for words for a while. And then I got the words. I got so many words, 5 months of words before he even touched me. Yes, I know. (Too many words?) Nah! Never. Tell me what do you most remember about that guy you like? I bet its the things he TOLD you.

Lesson two.

Words. Always. And not just any words. Banter! Dynamic. Wait for the banter.

And I got what I wanted, all right. That has to be the most epic set of conversations I will ever have in my life.

I don’t know about you, but I came to this level in my life where I can’t take much of anything. And most of all, I can’t deal with people with a sort of a pointless existence. I’m an actor. Its my favorite one. What was your last role? I didn’t actually have any role yet, but I’m scouting locations for this one movie that me and my friend …….. Next. I’m a martial artist and I want to be an actor too, I’m special because …… Next. I’m a real-estate agent ….. Next. (Sorry, I just can not take people who only want to make money and are not moved by creating anything, helping anyone). What do I want? I want creation. Contributing to the world. Invent a Reddit or something. (insert that laughing, crying emoji, but not really).

And how did I find someone that has a way with words in Los Angeles, among these pointless men? Simple. I didn’t. He’s not here, or from here. But close to here. By where he placed himself. And far far east where he formed himself. Strangely (is anything really random?) from a place that gives me an unreasonable amount of joy.

Lesson three.

Insist on what you want. Push it until the cows go home. If you think something is right for you, you can be specific, to the dot. Don’t budge. Insist exactly that, and don’t get sidetracked with temporary satisfactions.

And what did he create? Me. This me that you see, hear right now, that is his creation. It’s not Reddit, but a creation nonetheless.

I wish I can tell you this is a beautiful love story. It is. But not the one you're expecting. It’s a love story. But it’s only mine.

The equation I’m trying to break all my life is a correlation between interesting and content. Dumb people are usually content. Simple people are usually content. And not interesting. And smart, striking, great people, men, are usually supremely troubled. How do you find a man that is as great but also content with himself, and the one that doesn’t need to manipulate to be loved?

Lesson four.

You know how people always say - “Find someone who believes the ocean is trapped in your eyes, find someone that loves you like (Kanye loves Kanye….) just kidding, YOU KNOW those lines. I always hated those lines. Why is everyone pretending we’re in a supermarket and we just need to pull someone of off the shelf? There are many people that see the ocean in my fucking eyes, but I don’t want them. As I’m sure you have too.

When are we going to stop pretending and realize there are two things going on here.

1. The type of man he is.

2. The way he treats you.

The point is to find a man YOU WANT, the man you ADMIRE, the man you can’t stop listening to - that loves you right back the same way. I met many men in my life that treated me right and loved me more than 16 oceans, I just didn’t admire them or liked the way they are, or live.

You can’t became great if you didn’t have any vulnerability prior to greatness. You wouldn’t have greatness if you didn’t suffer. Vulnerability makes them worthwhile. Those assholes you see in your gym, there’s no vulnerability there. They are not troubled. But they want to hump your leg and possess no greatness.

Lesson five.

Vulnerability is great. But it’s also gravely. Because they suffered. And you will pay for all the hurt they ever experienced. You will pay for that hurt in elementary school, you will pay for that break-up in college, you will pay for an ex-wife or ex-girlfriend (or both) that ever cheated on them. You will pay for all their beef they ever had with any women, anywhere.

Then you’ll start hurting. Because you’ll try to make the sense out of something you, still, at that point don’t have enough material to figure out, you will overthink yourself to sleep. Then you’ll talk to everyone with an ear, willing to listen. Then people will enjoy seeing someone else suffer, not because they are bad people, but because we are all so mauled and massacred with our own relationships and the ones that never become ones, that we can’t help but feel a little drop of - thank fucking god I’m not the only one - even though we actually do feel bad for our friends that suffer.

Lesson six.

DO NOT TALK TO PEOPLE. About your love problems. No one knows the depth of your relationship with someone, they are not intimate with them, you are. They can not know the depth of something they are not a part of, all they can advise you is defaults.

Default 1. He’s an asshole.

Default 2. He doesn’t deserve you!

Default 3. He’s a dick and you should forget about him right this instant!

Let me press the button one sec and click - forget. Done. What did we talk about again?

Bitch, this is not the Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind.

The more you talk, the more you dig a grave for yourself. Things in your relationship are going to change and you can’t come back from statements you already gave your friends. Talk to a therapist if you absolutely must. They for sure wish you well, contrary to some of your friends.

Lesson seven.

I don’t know how it's possible to hide anything in this day and age, but you need to literally try to hide who you like and who you’re seeing. People are animals. No one wants to see anyone happy, thanks social media! Until you’re solid, stay indoors. Stay away. I was not careful. And I met him within a large group of people who all had fucking opinions about why I like him, why I visit him, and wtf we’re doing. We all think we should go out, party and then when we get closer to someone we should hang out indoors. Wrong. Hang out indoors more at the beginning. Alone. Talk.

What happened to me? Stories started to circulate. Insecurities rose. People put shit in my ear. People put shit into his ear. I let people detour me from my path of understanding who he is and the pace he’s on, and I shifted my eyes from our understanding to expectations of others that I started to implement in our dynamic.

Lesson eight.

It's easy thinking all guys are bad. He’s a dick! It must be him. But sometimes, think if you might be the dick. We tend to see the shit they do as horrible, but we skip the shit we do as, oh that didn’t mean anything. It does. Everything means something. Try to really be brutally honest with your own self. What are your motives? Guys are not dumb. They can see through your motives, if you had them. Even if it’s a misunderstanding.

Lesson nine.

I got too close in my relationship, too soon. Too familiar, too comfortable. Two people on the same mental level, on the same - I can do any shit you can do - level, it got ugly for a second. And while getting ugly, and being ugly - I have never felt more real with someone.

Everyone I have ever met in my life I have helped them achieve more, do more, be more. I have never ever been in any kind of relationship or situationship where someone made me better. Where someone helped me. I helped people get huge movie roles, win US Open, change continents, make millions, create careers, yet no one ever asked me what I wanted? What do I need? And I had no time to ask, taking care of everyone around me.

This is the only person that ever asked me if I need help. "What do YOU need?" I couldn’t spit it out of my mouth. My "career" of taking care of everyone is so long, I didn't know how to break it anymore. I got used to it. I even had to take care of my parents that got married way too young and were too insane to figure out how to co-exist with such different characters. I have never ever asked anyone anything, I couldn’t say it. And then he took it into his own hands and did something for me. He got the ball rolling, on his own. Every issue I had, he fixed. He made me talk to my dad, after a 3-year long fight. He made me see myself in a way I almost forgot anymore. You are a woman. It's ok if people take care of YOU. He changed my life in so many ways I can’t even explain.

Or I was great all along, just busy dealing with everyone but myself and he just took it out of me? He hurt me and reinvented me at the same time. He massacred me and saved me, at the same time.

And then I realized something. Everyone's always telling me I don’t know what I want. I don’t know who I want. All my friends, and people that read about me in media “upset” I left people they saw me with for the rest of our lives, wondering - what the fuck do you want woman - if you don’t want that? And no disrespect, I was so lucky to be in a relationship with some of the most amazing people on this planet, most of all whom I still talk to today. But it was never exactly what I wanted, I only know what THAT is.

Knowing I actually did find what I wanted, and that it does exist, regardless of the outcome - isn’t that the most we can do in this life, and isn’t that the highest form of being? Finding something that you think you can't live without but just let it live there?

Lesson ten.

Why do you love? To get something? Why are you thinking if he loves you or even just likes you? Why do you think about the women he dated before? Do you love because it gets you something? And is that really love?

Going through life knowing he might never get there, meeting people that only make your scar deeper with not having an ounce of air around them that he has, talking to people whose faces you want to rip open because they don't say the words he says; being in so many wrongs, having experienced the right - and being ok with it, just knowing it's there. Somewhere. 45 min flight away.

Final lesson.

I told you this is not a regular love story. But it's my love story. With myself. Overcoming possessions. Opinions. Statuses. Instagram pictures.

The biggest love story of all times, if you ask me.