Kung-Fu Catfights in Search of Compatibility

Over the weekend, it’s estimated that 10,000 people between the ages of 22 and 35 showed up single and ready to mingle at a matchmaking event organized by the Chinese government in Shanghai. 

With the belief that you stick to your own, a two-day event, open exclusively to Chinese nationals became the city’s largest ever love fest.

It was estimated that 6,000 tickets were sold to single ladies and if the 4000 men that bought tickets liked it,  they could heed the wise words of Beyonce and put a ring on it. The ratio of women to men was three to two, so you could imagine the Kung-Fu cat fighting that might have unfolded on the day.

Comically, around 3000 parents tagged along to the event to help filter through the germy men to each find their respective daughter’s a gentleman. Long queues of singles waited for a chance at a five minute chat with participants of the opposite sex. 

The event was organized as a reaction to the rising numbers of single women in China who waited longer to marry and refused to settle for men of lower socioeconomic status. 

It got me thinking about marrying your equal.  While at the gym this morning, my personal trainer quizzed me on my criteria for a future partner. While I wasn’t particular on profession, I knew that as I got older, I’d want to end up with an intellectual equal (or have him be intellectually superior to me). 

I needed a challenge. I needed to be mentally and emotionally stimulated and since I worked hard, I wanted someone who shared the same values and sought success through honest, hard work (like I do). 

While I’m a champion for love, I don’t think it’s always enough to sustain a relationship so I sought high intellectual and emotional intelligence, this is what I typically found in my friendship group. My besties were all dynamic women with plenty of depth and while we were all in different occupations, I respect each and every one of them as equals so I popped friendship on my list too. You need to be friends so that you’re equals so when fights unfold, you both have boxing gloves and both have protective pads – guaranteeing you fight fair and that no one is left alone in the ring. 

Friendship canceled out snobbery and if any of us were social snobs within our group, I’d say, I was probably most guilty of it. 

I do wonder if snobbery is a sensible or superficial argument however. For example, if every guy wanted to marry a mental equal, then they’d enter into increasingly competitive relationships (on the plus side affairs with secretaries might end) and a plethora of other problems might arise. If snobbery was standard among men then neither Princess Mary nor Duchess Catherine Middleton would have had a chance at marrying their loves. My girlfriends might also not be in their relationships if they had looked at their partner’s careers over their compatibility. After considering this, I confused myself and lost all direction for this blog. 

I hate fence sitting, so I did it till sitting hurt my backside and bounced off with a bit of clarity. 

 At the aforementioned Shanghai match-making event, 6000 women showed up in hope of finding the one went with the naked admission that what they had tried so far hadn’t worked. 4,000 men concurred and just like that 10,000 people had something in common. 

United in cause but not necessarily status, the quest among all of them was for compatibility. There was no formula but their was a search for chemistry. 

The equation was 1+1, the science combined biology with chemistry and failed history would inspire an exchange of language; the language of love – that would speak more profoundly than any degree could, it would work harder and sweat more than a bricklayer in forty degree heat and would lay down the foundations to make the partner their home and in the eyes of the law, their union would be recognized. Love was about bringing together many specialties to create a special tie. 

No psychic could foresee it, no singular specialty could sustain it and no level of education could inform it. Compatibility was key and every individual had the right to search for it and deserved to find it.

For love of rhyme and love of love, I wrote a poem to summarize the above:

The terms and conditions are yours to make,

Strictness and refinement are fine when your heart’s at stake,

The greatest lesson that can be learned,

Is that your love and affection should be earned,

The one that fights for your affection,

is the one worth your attention and your reflection,

While he or she may be flawed in one way or two,

Only you can decide what is perfect for you.

  

Would love to hear your thoughts on this one….

Core shakers, rattling romance and searching for a soul-mate.

From birth we are attracted to things that shake us – we are given rattle toys and we are bemused by the ease with which they shake and the noises they produce – the novelty wears out and then we transition to music shaking our hips rather than our rattle toys, we may thrive off the adrenalin rush of roller-coasters or allow ourselves to be shaken and stirred by dodgem cars or go carts - we sometimes leave with battle scars, but we almost always come back to be shaken again. As we grow up, we allow ourselves to be shaken in many forms, sometimes by worldly tragedies, sometimes because we’re premenstrual and other times (and our favourite kind) we are simply shaken by love. We’re always searching for the next big thing to move us because we are addicted to the feeling.

This week, I’m surrounded by love, observant of lust and curious about soul-mates. Are we capable of falling in love at first sight or seeing past the lust to feel core-shakingly connected to someone or is love a one-off occurrence that can only be known through shared experience and the growth that comes from that? 

I was at my friend’s engagement party last week and both saw love and in a separate instance reflected on the absence of it with old friends who had new things in common with me. My friend who got engaged looked radiant and you could both see and feel the love shared between both fiancées. My friend, in love was angelic, after meeting the man that moved her heart, she was inspired to become her greatest self.  She stepped up and brought heaven down to earth for her new love. Without divulging too much of their private life, I can say that qualities I knew existed in her were never put to the test until love knocked at her heart’s door and toed the doorframe  and saw her selflessly, unreservedly allow love in. She became more loving in the process of giving it. She had found her soul-mate.  Others in her situation may have run away for fear of being hurt.  Some may have tested the waters but found it too bitter to digest. She however dived headfirst into cinematic romance, with the full knowledge that this love would shake her. It struck me that this was what finding a soul-mate was about, accepting a love that not only connects to your soul but moves it, after which you can never be the same as you once were. You can only be better. 

A dilemma amongst the rest of us was how one rids of misconceptions of love to be sure of taking the risk with ‘The One.’  I’m told it’s an overwhelming feeling. I’m told that when he comes you ‘just know’ and until then you just know that everyone else is not-the-one; that answer for someone who has not experienced it is the most infuriatingly vague and unfathomable response possible.  Such a response is even worse for friends who have once been burned and are now too fragile in their rehabilitation to grasp the idea of playing with fire without a rulebook and a fail proof plan. In hope of encouraging risk-taking, I’m going to attempt to explain what every woman is searching for so we stop wasting time with those who fall short.

For most of us, it begins with a smile. It intrigues us as it is the first seeming act of sincerity and unashamed display of weakness to us. It is complimented with kindness, best seen through his stare. The way he gazes at you is very telling of where his mind is and when his eyes distractedly look away, you have permission to disgustedly lose heart. A dialogue begins and while his words are important his actions are the most telling of his ‘manhood.’ 

Many can speak. 

Few can deliver. 

We love-longing females learn this lesson time and time again. The clock ticks and it’s as if no time has passed at all. He feels the same. We’re shaken and stirred– and that’s just infatuation!

Dates continue, secrets are shared and his loyalty is tested. Then the drama begins as you jump through hoops to please each other, as you fight for your love and prove it is worth fighting for and that is when you really know. 

He may be kind, he may be giving, he may be honest even when it hurts but amidst the fighting and throughout the tears do you always believe that to him you are exceptional and supreme?

Oscar Wilde said “never love anyone who treats you like you’re ordinary.” He knew a thing or two about life and love. Finding your soul-mate is extraordinary, miraculous even, so while it may mean you know from a feeling, you also know from experience. 

You’ll experience a new rattling that you celebrate with child-like exaltation – it is innocent yet mature, trusting and responsible yet freeing at the same time. It is a heavy load that somehow makes you feel light and it is more honest and kind than you’ve ever been to yourself. It is liberating yet protective and almost effortlessly puts a smile on your face, even when it stirs you.  When you are in it and feeling tidal movements of your heart, ultimately, it is that feeling that will extraordinarily shape you. Then you’ll know you found your soul-mate and your search for the next distracting rattle toy will be over.