Debt

In Chinese culture, there is a belief that parents owed their children in their past lives, and current life is repayment of such debt.  Hence parenthood is so tough - you can only focus on giving and not expect any returns.

I am not a believer or non-believer of reincarnation, but sometimes I feel that relationships can be like a repayment of debt as well.  Some friends have pondered why I had repeatedly met and nurtured guys who, after breakup, still remained very close friends with me but somehow still ended up disappearing from my life altogether.  They asked me why I had been so blind to date such ungrateful people.  In the guys' defense, and mine, I said that they were supposed to be good-natured people.  They had cared for me for a while.  Yet, I really had no idea how they could just disappear like that.  Cutting all strings and ties, like we had had no history together.

I rarely dwell on that anymore.  I just accept that I made a mistake about someone.  Disappointing mistake - yes - but perhaps I need to make so many mistakes about people before I make the right choice.

I have a new perspective on this today - I suggest that we try to think of bad relationships as a form of debt repayment from past lives or past relationships.  Yep.  Let's think of it as a debt repayment, not an investment.  The time, patience, perseverance, love, care, understanding, support.....everything was a repayment of whatever you owed the person in past life, or what you owed another person in current life (like how I had broken some other guys' hearts very very brutally).  If we think of it like that, we won't have to dwell on why the person is no longer in our lives.  The answer will be simple - we have finished paying back our debts so we are now set free.  We won't have to dwell on why they didn't treat us better.  The answer will again be simple - we were meant to repay our debts not to accumulate new debts!

I hope that now I am officially debt-free and when I do meet the next person who comes along, we will be on equal terms.