February 11, 2011 | 8:30 am

High School Reunion 101

Posted by  Merissa Nathan Gerson

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Dear Yenta,

I am also 28 and go to my reunion this weekend from high school.  I feel fat and ugly and unaccomplished, even nervous and excited.  I feel a million things and like I could burst at the seams.  Do you have any ideas on keeping my cool come Saturday night?

Sincerely,

Ten Years and Still Eighteen

Dear TYSE,

Some people have their lives figured out, some people don’t.  Some people got fat, some people got hot, some people got sick, some people got svelte.  Some people drink too much, some people became yogis and so on and so forth.  In the end, who cares?  Remember that your body, your heart, your career and all other elements of your being were formed by a real life full of real experiences, same with everyone else.  Anyone judging you is denying their own complexity.

If I were to go to my reunion all over again I would have gone with a beer taped to my hand and no expectation of any depth.  This is a HIGH SCHOOL reunion.  Expect hugs and expect smiles and just ride the party wave, go home, and resume living as you did before.  Placing any clout on the scenario is useless. They aren’t really judging you.  And the ones that are suddenly fall off like barnacles because we aren’t in high school anymore.  We are old now, like 28-years-old, and we have dreams.  Dreams and high school drama don’t mix.  So drink up, hug hard, and remember this is one night of your long and amazing life, a night all about remembering a yesterday that has already passed.

For inspiration, watch this clip from Oprah, “The High School Quarterback Who Became a Lesbian,” about Kimberly Reed, who twenty years ago was Paul McKerrow, the star of the local football team, returning with a new body, a new name, and a new life.

“All these places have their moments, with lovers and friends, I still can recall, some are dead and some are living, in my life, I’ve loved them all.”

Ask Yenta!  E-mail a question to merissag[at]gmail[dot]com directly, or using www.send-email.org to ask anonymously.

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February 8, 2011 | 8:31 am

“He Eats Like A Pig!”

Posted by  Merissa Nathan Gerson

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Dear Yenta,

I just started dating someone about a month ago.  I really like him, we make a great match in a lot of ways.  But there’s one way in which we really don’t match up: food.  I’m a vegetarian, who loves good healthy food.  Food isn’t just sustenance to me, it’s culture, its experimentation, it’s nurturance.  Michael Pollen’s Omnivore’s Dilemma is one of my favorite books.  There isn’t a vegetable out there that I don’t love.  Cooking is a very important thing to me, and in other relationships it’s been an important part of my connection to the other person.

This guy is exactly the opposite.  Not only does he absolutely hate vegetables, he doesn’t even know how to identify some of the very basic ones.  He’s in his 30’s, but when we go out to dinner, he might as well order off the kids menu—he eats pizza, grilled cheese, hamburgers (no tomato, lettuce, pickles, or onions, of course) and cheese omelettes.  The only color other than white and yellow on his plate is the occasional ketchup to go with his french fries.  Even with beer we don’t match up—I’m always looking for a fun new microbrew or craft beer, and he rarely strays from Miller Light.

I know it sounds like a trivial thing, but this mismatch has actually been pretty challenging for me in our burgeoning relationship.  It’s obviously not just about the food itself, it’s an ideological thing.  Am I overreacting?  Should I try to convince him to start eating like an adult?  Sneak veggies into his food like you do with little kids?  Help, Yenta!

-Foodie

Dear Foodie,

There are a few key points here.  1) You have been dating a month and he already annoys you.  That is not fly.  Month one should be easy and blissful.  2) He eats like a child.  You are what you eat.  There is nothing burgeoning about this relationship.  Get out, and get out now.

I strongly believe that you can decode a great deal about a man based on how he tackles his plate.  Go to a quick-paced eatery and watch one day with a notebook in hand.  Look at how some men gobble, others slice and chew slowly, others eat in small piles or leave flung chunks of food across the plate or the table.  In the way a man approaches what he consumes, you can detect a great deal about his interior choices.

Ie, does he waste food?  Does he care where it comes from?  Is he connected to the world beyond himself, or is food a frenzy, a moment of need rather than a moment of gratitude, consciousness and connection? Also, remember that what we eat affects our temperament.  If he is eating Ramen noodles, his nutrition is low which means his emotional stability is not being fed.  This translates across the board.

This sounds judgemental and absurd, but it is just judgemental.  What are your values?  List them.  Figure out what you need your man to understand, appreciate, be connected to.  He might not have to be a vegetarian to be your lover, but perhaps a conscious eater?  And consciousness can come in a million forms.  This bozo sounds like he is stuck in a fourth grade mentality and it shows in his choice to eat Wonderbread instead of spelt.

I don’t understand why women think it is too much to want someone to be evolved.  That is your god-given right, and really your obligation for the sake of humanity and generations to come.  You must hold high standards and seek a man who has progressed beyond fourth grade because fourth graders cannot rise up and grow to the potential you have inside of you.

Leave him, maybe send him a cookbook, and seek a better man elsewhere.  There may be nothing seriously wrong with this particular guy, but there is plenty wrong with this particular guy when it comes to dating YOU.  You HAVE to be picky because you CAN be picky because you owe it to yourself and to your community to find a man who raises you up, or at the very least, meets you where you are.  Why on earth would you want to spend your good energy educating a child-man on how to eat vegetables when you could be exploring life eye to eye with a man of your caliber, discovering new things and expanding daily.

You didn’t learn to eat well for nothing.  You are an evolved woman.  Onwards and upwards!

Other books to send him off with:

Food Matters: A Guide to Conscious Eating by Mark Bittman

Mindful Eating: A Guide to Rediscovering a Healthy and Joyful Relationship With Food by Jan Chozen Bays

In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto by Michael Pollan

Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal by Eric Schlosser

Ask Yenta!  E-mail a question to merissag[at]gmail[dot]com directly, or using www.send-email.org to ask anonymously.

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February 4, 2011 | 8:26 am

When To Say “I LOVE YOU”

Posted by  Merissa Nathan Gerson

Want more Yenta? Visit AskYourYenta.com

Dear Yenta,

When is too soon to say “I Love You?”

Sincerely,

Mr. Lover Man

Dear Mr. L,

First, a disclaimer.  Only you know yourself and your lover.  No Yenta can tell you what’s best.  But here are some ways to derive a system of gauging love and its profession.

As one woman once said, recoiling at the words “I Love You,” “That’s the nicest thing you can say to anyone, isn’t it?  Thank you.”  This coupled with a severe look in the eyes and rigid body language is the reaction, I am guessing, you are seeking to avoid.  The question is less about when, and moreso, about how, to whom, where, etc.

Say it too soon, some people run.  Why?  For a number of reasons.  Here are some rational explanations as to why those three words can be terrifying, followed by a list of ways to safely profess your undying love to anyone, anywhere, anyhow.

1)  Commitment Phobia

Early declaration forces decision into the relationship.  Ie, commitment.  It is an ultimatum in some ways, like saying, “this is where I am, up here on the love platform, and if you can’t join me here yet then we are through.”

2) Self-Hatred

Saying “I Love You” is also a big witnessing of another.  To be seen in our entirety and then loved, as sweet as it sounds, is hard.  We are programmed to doubt ourselves, so when someone says, “I don’t doubt you, I adore you,” our fears come shooting out.  Ie, “Am I worthy?”  “Will you still like me in a week?”  “You don’t know that I killed my cat when I was five, when that comes out you will regret those three words.”  Things like that.

3) Falsity

The Sakyong , Jamgon Mipham Rinpoche once spoke of how the act of declaring your love is a moment once-removed.  “I Love You” is really a redundant expression.  When love is real and alive and vibrant it lives between two people in their eyes, their touch and in their actions.  To then state it is an afterthought to the reality of the love that was already alive between you to begin with.

One way to cope with the fear that it is too soon, is to express your love rather than declare it.  A declaration without the backup actions will scare anyone away.  That, and the human heart and mind can only handle so much adoration in one dose.

4) Vulnerability

Saying “I Love You” is making yourself extremely vulnerable, exposing all of yourself.  We build trust and intimacy so it is strong enough to hold the intensity of really loving and seeing each other.  If the web isn’t strong enough, we lose that foundation and find a closed-door in our face.

I once fell in love and professed my feelings so emphatically and intensely that the boy ran away for weeks before secretly admitting his mutual adoration.  It was too much, like love vomited all over him, like a basket overflowing and his arms couldn’t hold it.  Give the person you love enough love that they can hold it, see it, feel it, touch it and know it.  If love is somehow palpable, held, breathing and doled out in digestible doses then your loved one will better be able to meet you.

Ways to Gauge the Moment and Properly Profess

1)  Evaluate Intention

The questions you want to ask yourself before surrendering your heart in the name of a four letter word include: What do you lose if you say I love you?  Would it compromise anything, the sex, the honesty?  Do I love this person, or lust and hunger for them?  Am I professing to pin them down, or lift them up?  Can your relationship stomach this admission, even if it is true? Make sure this is love, not just hunger for sex and security, etc.

2) Actions Speak Louder Than Words

So say I love you when you feel like it, but be sure your actions back up your words, and that your words aren’t some way of cornering someone into commitment.  That isn’t love, that is ownership.  Because you want it to be true, that simple truth needs to resonate with your behavior.  If you give your partner a cold shoulder most of the time and suddenly spout loving words, they might coil in fear.  Don’t just say it, do it.  Saying I love you without action, is a lie.

For help, click here for 60 ways to say I love you.

3)  Time Will Tell

When in doubt, wait.  Generally if it is torture to hold it in, you need to start expressing yourself, stat.  But it is a hard and thin line between doubt and fear.  Doubt can be guided by intelligence and intuition, whereas fear is laced with cowardice.

According to some secret sources, before the two month mark is too soon, at the four-month mark is perfect.  According to a sage, wise at the art of love and poker, “It’s never too soon to say I love you, Merissa.  I’m not one for rules and regulations when it comes to these things.”  Advance day by day, step by step, with your own heart thumping loudly and leading the way.

Click here for a list of 100 languages in which to say “I Love You.”

Click here for a CNN article on why women should wait to say it.

Click here for an article on The Different Ways Men Say “I Love You.”

Ask Yenta!  E-mail a question to merissag[at]gmail[dot]com directly, or using www.send-email.org to ask anonymously.

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February 1, 2011 | 8:00 am

Is It a Date?

Posted by  Merissa Nathan Gerson

Want more Yenta? Visit AskYourYenta.com

Dear Yenta,

How can I tell if my next meeting is a date?  We got drinks to talk business and then we got dinner again to talk business.  And then, we got dinner again to talk business and I paid.  Then in an e-mail we talked a little business, she said, “Going out of town, when I get back, let’s hang out.”  Which is different from business, but our business is kindof a business of hanging out. Is it, or is it not, a date?

-Cornelius

Dear Confused Cornelius,

A few things…

1) It is not a formal date. A date is obvious, and not veiled in business.  A better question, Is it romantic?  This only you and this woman know, and to test these waters all you need to do is dip a toe in and check the temperature.  If it is freezing, retreat and continue business chatter, if it is warm, proceed.  You know this.

2) When you paid for a meal you tilted the power dynamic which is often, oddly, a tilt towards romance.  Whenever it is not split evenly, you are making a statement about something, somehow.

3) Don’t mix business with pleasure.  This is simple and sane wisdom of the sages and is a good rule of thumb to follow…depending on the type of business.  If advancing sexually towards this person could potentially complicate your job and threaten your professional relationship, then heel, boy, heel.  If your business is one that can handle a bending of boundaries, OR, if you really think this is for real, then proceed.

The semantics of dating are irrelevant.  All that matters is whether you really want this person, and if so, then fearlessly pursue them and deal with the consequences, for good or for evil.

Or, when it doubt, said a rogue therapist of mine, do without.

Ask Yenta!  E-mail a question to merissag[at]gmail[dot]com directly, or using www.send-email.org to ask anonymously.

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