What's "consumption vs. destruction" got to do with it?

It's Friday! It's also the first day of October! What better way would there be to start off a beautiful Autumn day than a fight with Ryan?!

Oh yes, I'm being serious about that. That's how our Friday morning started.

Lately, (when we actually do spend time together), our time has been littered with countless awkward gaps of silence or bouts of fighting. The silence cuts into us gradually. Since it's not evident to Ryan, I imagine he won't notice until it starts adding up and he can see the empty space silence has filled,  separating us.

When we do talk, we're fighting, and our words become switchblades we use to purposefully cut into each others' flesh, recklessly. I can't help but feel we're trying to prove to ourselves that we're still alive through this grotesque form of blood letting. So what if one of us dies?! At least we'll know we were alive before we destroyed our relationship and each other, right?! This metaphorical comparison is just that, metaphorical, but it rings true, literally, more than you'll ever know. Especially if you've ever been brave enough to enter into a committed, romantic relationship with someone.

I have this theory about relationships. Not just romantic ones but relationships in general. 

The Consumption vs. Destruction Theory in Human Relationships

People are driven by two types of needs. One idea is a natural survival need; consumption. The other is a man-made, material need; destruction. The needs we choose to be driven by are based on our psyche, environment, and physical age.

Consumption, by definition, is the act of consuming. Consuming is thought to be a form of destroying, but that isn't the case at all. Consumption is necessary as a means to survive. Animals consume other animals and plants to live. From death, life is sustained. Once the animals consume, their waste fertilizes plant life so that plants can grow again. Upon the death of an animal, scavenger animals consume what's left and clear space on the planet for the next generation of plant and animal life to be born.

The cycle of consumption is a never-ending circle of life; the infinite; life feeds on life...

Destruction is to annihilate, to vanquish; to kill for the sake of killing; to do something simply for the sake of doing it. Examples of this need exhibiting itself in humanity are best seen through wars, manifest destinies, and imperialism. Humans destroy other humans and plants to gain power. Power is not a survival need. Power is an idea used to mask a fear of being unable to compete and survive in the circle of life through consumption. Destruction, fueled by power, warrants wiping out entire ethnic groups of people, (ie, Native Americans during the age of colonialism and Jewish people during the Holocaust). It is also seen through killing plant life by the masses, (ie, deforestation in South America due to commercial logging and global warming caused by the overuse of burning fossil fuels and deforestation).

When the natural circle of life is disrupted by destruction, everything dies and nothing survives.

Individually, humans approach each other and form one-on-one relationships that are driven by consumption and/or destruction. Again, they way we choose to approach this smaller scale interaction is based on psyche, environment, and physical age.

When a human relationship is formed with the need to consume, the relationship maintains a healthy, organic balance of naturally giving and taking; such as talking and listening, loving and being loved, making allowances and being allowed (AKA patience); all of these actions done to help each other survive.

A relationship that starts or becomes driven by the need to destroy, results in person-to-person battles from trying to force a relationship. The forcing comes from a fear of loss; an idea that says, It's better to have something than nothing. I consider that idea similar to another idea I'm not too keen on,; Doing something simply for the sake of doing it. It's random, pointless, and lacks meaning. When daily fighting starts and equally maintaining the balance in a relationship becomes obsolete, the relationship is eventually destroyed. And for the extremely unfortunate, lovers quarrels have been known to kill and end lives, literally and metaphoriclly speaking, because for some humans, the need for destruction and power goes beyond solely dictating a relationship. 

As of this Friday, first day of October, regarding the consumption vs destruction theory and my relationship with Ryan; I survived another battle. I'm growing tired of fighting because it's unnecessary.

"Love shouldn't be hard." --Anonymous

Meanwhile, we're using the only ten minutes we have in the morning to see each other, tearing each other down, avidly; doing something simply for the sake of doing it.

I can't swallow the idea of spending the rest of my Friday, first day of October, like that.

I can't swallow the idea of spending the rest of the days that follow, like that either.


A warm bed,
well that's something.
But that alone,
just ain't enough.
-- Roll On / DNTEL ft. JENNY LEWIS