Social Media Stalking Sadness

Here’s why stalking your ex on social media after a break up is always a bad idea:

It’s going to make you sad.

If you check your ex’s social media accounts following a break up, then you will be sad. This control flow statement will be the end of you. You will never in your life visit your ex’s social media accounts and feel one millionth of a degree of anything besides utter unhappiness and insecurity unless they write something along the lines of “I’m a fucking fool for ruining my one chance at happiness by being with the most incredible woman in the entire universe who loved me unconditionally and loyally despite how flawed I was as a human being. Her name is (fill in your name followed by a gut-wrenching declaration of love for you).” Considering the chances of this ever happening are one in never in your fucking life, it’s definitely a better idea for you not to bother cyber-stalking your ex.

Mostly because you’re going to be really fucking sad that they are doing everyday activities and never stopped living their life the way you thought they would. “How dare he go and spend time with his friends and go watch a movie!” “Watching movies was ‘our thing’!” “I can’t believe he went to a restaurant and ate food without me,” you’ll cry out in disbelief. “We both loved food.” Yeah — you, him, and seven billion other people in the world. You will find yourself thinking and saying borderline delusional statements. You will feel distraught, depressed, and disillusioned that this person you once shared your life with is perfectly capable of living without you.

The thing is, as easy as it is to remember the great times you had, it’s equally easy to remember why the two of you are no longer together. Obsessing over what it is they are doing with their life inhibits you from focusing on a life volumes greater and far more important — yours — and it pulls you back into fixating on what once was rather than what currently is. Furthermore, if there’s anything we’ve come to learn about Facebook and Instagram, it’s that people are simply showing you carefully edited and filtered versions of their life they’ve chosen to share. People’s social media accounts are not accurate representations of their actual life. Obsessing over and stalking your ex’s social media accounts is as productive as plotting to break up Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie’s marriage or planning ways you’re going to become a vampire and marry Edward Cullen.

So do yourself a favor and get off his Facebook page and/or Instagram account. Stop analyzing and breaking down every comment, like, and person tagged for deeper meanings and subtexts. There are none. Except that you're crazy. Just kidding. But seriously, acknowledge you are feeding yourself poison and engaging in unhealthy, self-destructive behavior. You have been given an opportunity and the new found time to do extraordinary things with your life. Seize it. Call a friend, go for a run, check out an art exhibit, and bask in the delight and excitement of an entirely new life this break up has afforded you. 

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#005: Character > Personality

“Character is how you treat those who can do nothing for you,” they say, and truer words couldn’t have been spoken. 

It’s only when you have the opportunity to take a step back to assess your past relationships you’re able to notice all of the errors, tendencies, and patterns in the way you deal with your partners. Besides my chronic propensity to invest more of my time into guys than I should (and far more than they deserve), I’ve learned I always gravitate towards personality than character. It’s from distance and a place of deep self-exploration that I’m able to admit that each and every one of my exes were broken, inherently selfish, and irreparably damaged human beings.

Personality: What they do
Character: Who they are

I became attracted to most of my exes because I felt they “got it.” Except, the only thing they “got” were things along the lines of my favorite artists, love for bubble tea, favorite genre of movies, attraction to horror, love for partying, love for drinking, a fondness for fantasy, etc. All of the above, including their humor, energy, and intelligence were all parts of their personality. Yet when it came to their character, including their virtues, honesty, and kindliness, they were all self-absorbed, self-involved people who cared about one thing, and one thing only, in their lives — themselves.

Don’t get me wrong. There is nothing wrong with being selfish. I believe everyone in the world acts from a place of selfishness. The only difference is, amongst the selfish , amongst those who not only want the best for themselves, there are those who care only for themselves. They refuse to take anyone else’s life, feelings, or time into consideration. It’s not enough that they, themselves, are of utmost importance — they will also make it abundantly clear they do not care how their actions influence anyone else’s life, and what is that, if not, the greatest indicator of one’s character. These types of guys are time stealers — they will drag out days, months, and years of the relationship, taking as much time as they deem necessary to figure out what they want and how they feel about the relationship. These are the guys who will say they “don’t know” how they feel but will insist on making sure you are still in the picture because they can’t be man enough to admit that they are incapable of giving you what you want or need, because they "don't want to lose you." And in a bizarre manifestation of Stockholm Syndrome, you will continue to make excuses for and validate their behavior. These are my exes.

My family is like the Kardashians, in that we are incredibly close and possibly too involved in one another’s lives. We know where the other is at all times and know what’s going on in each other’s lives, including major milestones, current stresses, and any near and future plans. If any one of our family members went missing for 12 hours, there would be genuine alarm and concern for the person’s safety and a police report would be filed not a second after the requisite 24-hour window. And while that may seem co-dependent, overbearing, over-involved, and too needy for some people, this is how our family dynamic has grown and evolved, and we wouldn’t want it any other way. I love my family and it’s an absolute priority I am always involved in their lives and vice versa.

Which is why it would be strange that none of the guys I have ever dated had great relationships with their parents. In fact, it went beyond “not great,” to something more along the lines of strained, troubled, difficult, indifferent, and not really caring. Furthermore, none of my exes had strong personal relationships in their lives. Sure, they had “friends” who they spent time with or occasionally kept updated on their lives but each and every one of them lacked strong and healthy, personal relationships.

So really, it’s no surprise these guys, who have been surrounded by unhealthy relationships their entire lives, wouldn’t have a remote idea as to what it means to function in a healthy relationship. How could they? When you’ve never seen or experienced honest, loving, and selfless relationships, how would you know how to function in one? How would you even recognize what it means to healthily, happily, and honestly love another when you've never done so before? These weren’t bad people. I can honestly say all of the guys in my life had redeeming qualities and at certain periods, they made me really happy. They often did incredibly shitty and awful things but they were never terrible human beings. They were just really, really, really selfish and were incapable of taking into consideration anyone else’s feelings, needs, wants, potential, or capabilities. Although, perhaps, stating that they were incapable only further excuses their shitty behavior. Because they were capable. They are capable. Everyone is capable of being candid, considerate, and caring towards another human being.

Remember that when any man tells you “this is who I am,” they are being completely honest about who they are — selfish individuals who choose to live lives that suit only themselves. It’s easy to be blinded by someone’s personality and all of the common interests you share. Except, when it comes to looking for a mate or life partner, you’re not just looking for someone who you share hobbies and similar interests with  — they have Meetup groups for that. Character is only revealed through time but take that time to see how this person reacts in difficult situations, how they handle stress and disappointment, and how they interact with you. Observe their relationships with their friends and family, and the way they treat those who truly can do nothing for them, and in time, their true nature, their true colors, will shine through.

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'Wall-E': A Robot Love Story

I have a number of favorite love stories — a few being Forrest and Jenny, Noah and Allie, Joker and Harley Quinn. While most people don’t immediately associate WALL-E as being a classic romantic film, I always adored and admired the love story between WALL-E and Eve. Here we have a friendship turned relationship that plays out through mutual acts of kindness, simple gestures, and self-sacrifice — where both robots take turns being rescued and being the rescuer. There was nothing that could stop WALL-E from being with Eve — not hundreds of billions of miles of space travel, evil robots, or a captain who lost all concept of what life on Earth was like. WALL-E and Eve show us that despite all adversity, love will always come through in the end.

And in my favorite scene in the movie, after sharing an electrifying kiss, WALL-E and Eve dance in zero gravity, spinning around each other in a space-dance that leaves twinkling trails of stardust in their wake.
 

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A Dream Within A Dream

“I fell in love the way you fall asleep: slowly, and then all at once,” John Green wrote in The Fault in Our Stars, and those words resonated with me as it had with countless others because I knew the enthralling intoxication of gently and then rapidly slipping into a world where barriers and boundaries ceased to exist. And there are few things harsher than being jolted awake — the feeling of falling and being jerked into consciousness — and the peculiar sense of shock and confusion that follows.

I wasn’t trying to change our trajectory but was, in fact, trying to delay it. I didn’t want to stop thinking of him because I knew how quickly I would forget him. I wanted to hold onto the final moments of our relationship the same way you cling to those blissful fragments of your dreams you know aren’t real. When you’re teetering precariously between a state of euphoria and the cold reality of existence and each extra second of sleep — of being able to exist in this alternate dimension — is ineffably exquisite. You grasp onto the dream for each remaining, precious second because you know when you awake, those once vivid details will become hazy. And before you can even attempt to recall the specifics, that haze will quickly dissipate, lost forever in the roaring currents of your unconsciousness; and you will go about your day and the rest of your life forgetting it had even occurred.

I didn’t want to sleep forever — I just didn’t want to wake up just yet. Touching him, seeing him, and continuing to miss him was my way of trying to memorize him because I knew once I woke up, I would only be able to remember how I had felt abstractly — I would be unable to evoke those once palpable feelings in their entirety. But then I awoke, as slowly and quickly as I had fallen asleep; and when I did, try as I might, I could no longer remember what I had dreamt. I could no longer remember him. 

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#004: They're Called An Ex Because They No Longer Ex-ist

Growing up, my thoughts on the matter of dealing with exes generally went something like this:

HBO/iheartsexandthecity.tumblr

A year or so ago, my approach to the matter changed when I figured it didn’t hurt to be friendly with my exes. We didn't have to be friends but we could be friendly, right? Why not? After all, this was someone I often spent a significant amount of time with; someone who existed during periods of my life where I grew into the person I am now; someone I truly cared about at one point. I didn’t care to become best friends with them but considering I had long since moved on from the time in my life when we were together and literally had the same emotional attachment to them as I had to an insect, I had no qualms with catching up, seeing how the other was doing, exchanging pleasantries, and wishing each other the best. Life is hard. At the end of the day, we should be adults and do our best to help and support those who are and have been in our life, right?

Wrong.

They’re called ex-es because you’ve ex-ited their life. They’re called ex-es because they no longer ex-ist in your life. They’re called ex-es because they’re ex-actly what you didn’t need. They’re called ex-es because it was ex-hausted. They’re called ex-es because... you get the point.  

I had one such ex in my life. I cut him out of my life because he was a cancerous tumor, growing and metastasizing; a parasite that latched on and sucked me dry, robbing me of emotional strength, time, and everything else that was valuable to me. But despite how things ended, I continued rooting for his success and happiness. My girlfriends rooted for him. I continued to validate and excuse his incredibly shitty behavior because I genuinely felt bad for him and he already had so much going against him without me wishing a wrath of unhappiness and destruction to rain down upon him. I felt a need to protect him in a way, because I knew he was deeply troubled — a broken person who suffered from post traumatic stress disorder, self-confidence issues, substance abuse, and depression. Except he wasn’t depressed; he was selfish. These two are often mistaken and confused for the other. He was selfish when we were together, he was selfish when he refused to let me go to live my life, and his selfishness manifested itself, again, when he drunk dialed and texted me despite having a girlfriend; when he tried to once again involve me in his fucked up world of excuses and twisted rationalizations, years later, when all I tried to do was be a friend.

CW

Despite my cynicism in humanity, I’m always trying to find the good in people; always searching for redeeming qualities to prove me otherwise. I suppose the same way an artist picks up pieces of trash and tries to find the beauty in it.

American Beauty/DreamWorks

While I recognize and understand the desire to be a better person, a good person — someone who wants to revive, reclaim, and redeem people — you are allowed to walk away from people who do not respect you. You don't owe anyone an explanation for taking care of yourself. Respect yourself to know you made the right decision in deciding who was not worthy of remaining in your life. Because sometimes, a piece of trash will always be just that — a piece of trash.

someecards.com

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#003: Winning The Breakup: You Can't Win What You've Already Won

“You know how when you break up, it’s not about who’s winning the breakup, but it’s kind of about who’s winning the breakup? And by 'kind of' I mean it is?” my 18-year-old brother asked me the other day. “Yeah, I’m winning.”

What is it about winning breakups that we are all so fixated on? Why is it that we feel the need to feel triumphant and victorious of living a better life than a person we once genuinely liked, possibly loved, and conceivably imagined our future with? Why do so many of our imaginary, triumphant moments revolve around us running into our sad, disheveled exes who are living a pathetic existence alone while we're 10 pounds thinner, look the best we ever have, and have an incredible, gorgeous partner by our side? And it's always a race, isn't it? Who moves on quicker, who dates first, who gets married sooner, who becomes more successful faster. 

Perhaps it stems from our desire to show our exes how smashingly successful we are without them while reveling in our joy and their dismay of seeing how miserable their lives ended up without us. A perfect, eat-your-heart-out, movie moment we can gleefully play over and over in our head. After all, if those single word "hey" texts we receive months and years later are so richly satisfying to screenshot and laugh about with our girlfriends, imagine the incredible high we'll derive from a face-to-face encounter. “Have you met my husband? He’s an English prince and was just featured on Forbes’ Top Five Richest And Most Beautiful And Brilliant Men In The World spread and he’s absolutely crazy about me. We first met at the finish line at the Tel Aviv Marathon and then again on Zuckerberg’s yacht on New Years Eve in Dubai. Oh, you saw my picture on the cover of Time from when I won two Nobel Peace Prizes for simultaneously bringing peace to the Middle East while curing cancer? You live here? On the street? In this box?”

Except, trying to win a breakup is pointless. I’m not saying this because I feel that kind of pettiness is beneath me or because I’m some sort of super human who transcends negativity and wishes peace and happiness upon all. I fucking love winning. In fact, if I came across a magic lamp, one of my three wishes would be to always win — at everything. And winning alone is not good enough for me; everyone else needs to fail, miserably. It’s just that the moment I break up with someone, whether it’s of my own volition or theirs, I’ve already immediately won. I don’t need to do anything better or different to prove otherwise because the scores have been tallied, the verdict is in, and the champion has been chosen: me. The fact that each and every one one of these men will continue to live a life that no longer includes me means they have already lost, permanently. They may meet someone better for them but they will never meet anyone better than me. So I could run into them with greasy hair, no make up on, in my rattiest sweats, unemployed without a boyfriend, and they could be married to a supermodel while running their own successful, multibillion-dollar companies, and I will still have won.

You can’t win what you've already won. Don’t focus on chasing empty moments, despite how great they may feel at the time. They're superficial, serve no purpose, and you have a countless number of ways to better live your life than spend your precious time focusing on “showing him.” You already did that while you were together, remember? Believe me, at some point in their lives, whether it’s weeks, years, or decades later — absent you having treated them like shit or having gone Fatal Attraction on them, and assuming you were sincerely honest and unapologetically you — they will undoubtedly, at least once, think about what it would have been like to live a life with someone who cared so deeply, loved so unconditionally, supported them so fiercely, who pushed, challenged, and propelled them towards greatness while being asked for nothing in return. Each and every time they experience betrayal, disloyalty, or disappointment in their lives they will remember that they willingly decided to bet on the possibility of something and someone better, that they readily discarded someone extraordinary and incredible, and in the greatest gamble of their lives, subsequently lost.

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At The End Of It All

In the end you start thinking of the beginning. You’re left thinking of all of the great times you experienced together; the memories you created, the laughter you shared, and the early days of the relationship when you were both crazy and stupid about each other replaying in your mind like a movie reel on loop. You’re left to mourn and grieve the loss of the relationship — along with the hopes and wishes you had for it and the chances and possibilities of what it could have been — and you’re left to bury it in that unidentified space within your soul that exists somewhere between the darkest depths of your heart and the deepest spaces of your memories.

Everywhere you look you’ll be reminded of him. Something will always pull you back into his gravity. But most often it won’t be when you’re out and about during the normal course of your day, when you can surround yourself with people and distractions, that you’ll miss him. It’ll be when you’re lying alone in your large bed at night, remembering how your face fit perfectly between his shoulder blades, the way you liked to tangle your legs between his, the way his hair felt between your fingers, recalling the stories you told one another, that you’ll miss him the most. When anything and everything seemed possible — when a future together seemed to stretch endlessly before you.

But then you'll remember the unhappiness. It had come in like a mist, slowly seeping in at first but over time it became steadier, thicker, and towards the end, you had been drowning in it, surviving only through short gasps of air. He had long since stopped being the person he had been in the beginning, and one by one he was turning off the lights in the building while you were desperately running up and down staircases between floors trying to turn them back on. He was pushing further and further away and settling into a life that no longer involved you while you were fighting relentlessly to fix what you knew was permanently broken, wanting to hold it all together despite knowing how deeply unhappy you had become.

You're left struggling to understand why, despite the unhappiness, the overwhelming loneliness, you felt the need to show him you cared so deeply for him. Why, when he had showed you otherwise, you were delusional to believe things could go back to the way they once had been. And why we, as human beings, have a bottomless capacity for believing our partners will change. Perhaps because, despite the world and people proving otherwise, you believe, as someone once said, that people, even more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; that you should never throw out anyone. And you realize that it hadn’t been delusion but rather hope. Hope that you could bring light to a life that had been filled with sadness and darkness. Hope that you could show this person who had people walk out of his life what it felt to have someone work tirelessly to remain by their side. Hope that you could bring happiness and laughter into a man who had become increasingly serious, hardened, and isolated.  

There is something innocent and honest and earnest about hope. And having hope in someone, for someone — for that person to be the best version of themselves, to be the extraordinary man you know they are capable of becoming — and for them to experience a profound, powerful, pulsating love that shames the greatest love stories, one that spans eons of conscious existence and ripples at the speed of light throughout the cosmos, stretching boundlessly through galaxies and universes throughout the infinite reaches of space and time — a love that most people couldn’t come close to dream of experiencing let alone comprehending.

What is that if not love. 

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10 Best Viral Marriage Proposals of All Time

Believe it or not, men are capable of romance. I think the majority of women choose to believe otherwise because it’s easier to convince yourself your man is physically and emotionally incapable of over-the-top (or often even the simplest) gestures of romance than admit that they simply choose not to and don’t want to perform said acts. It's definitely easier to believe that he is "just not that type of person" as opposed to be accepting he's just not that type of person... with you. 

I once dated a guy who told me from day one that he didn’t “do” Valentine’s Day because of a bad Valentine's Day experience he had with an ex-girlfriend. Makes sense. If you're smoking crack. What he was basically telling me was that his ex-girlfriend had been worth creating a special, unique experience for but he didn't feel I was worth the same effort so he was going to punish me for the actions of a person I did not know nor have any influence over. I made it clear that I do "do" (hehe, doodoo) Valentine's Day so that wasn't going to fly with me. Valentine's Day came around and guess what? He delivered. But we broke up a few days later so this could possibly be a bad example.

Warner Bros.

My point is, if the following men can put in their time, energy, and love to create a memorable, one-of-a-kind moment for the women they love, absent a debilitating disease or disorder, so can every other man in the world. Men used to ride off into battle, sail months on ships and cross continents, and risk their lives to prove their love or win their lady's hand in marriage. I think the modern man can manage the arduous task of contacting your friends and family (all whom are easily accessible on social media!) and spend some time thinking of ideas (Welcome to 2015! We have something called the Internet! And a Pinterest board specifically dedicated to our dream proposals and weddings which is pretty much just a public blue print!) to create a special experience for you. It doesn't have to be public, it doesn't have to be over the top, and it doesn't have to go viral, but it most definitely should be thoughtful and genuine. That, ladies, is not asking for too much. You are worthy of all of that and more and you deserve to be with someone who will wow you, surprise you, and exceed your greatest expectations.

On that note, here are a few noteworthy marriage proposals, most of which, let's all admit, we've all seen. More than once. Maybe twice. Okay, fine, a lot.

1. Downtown Disney Flash Mob

2. Movie Trailer

3. Marry Me Mural

4. Live Lip-Dub

5. Skyscraper Proposal

6. Pinterest Proposal/Wedding

7. Luvabull Proposal

8. 365 Day Engagement

9. This beautiful couple who... I... I just can't... even. 

10. But ladies and gentlemen, the winner goes to THIS GUY, who surprised his girlfriend with a trip to PARIS and proposed in front of the Eiffel Tower. That's so cliche, said NO WOMAN EVER.

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The Greatest Show On Earth

Being broken up with is one of life’s more challenging experiences. It’s opening night, it’s a full house, and you’re being recited a well-rehearsed script that you never got a chance to look over. Stammering and stuttering, you try to find the right words to say, painstakingly making it up as you go. Then, in the blink of an eye, you’re thrown into the center ring of the circus and tonight, you’re the star attraction.

“Ladies and gentlemen, children of all ages!” the ringmaster calls out. “Step right up and take a seat in the stands and behold the incredible Woman Who Was Just Dumped! Watch as she juggles the Urgency of needing answers this very instant, the Panic of not being able to accept that it's over, the Pride in maintaining her dignity, and the Inadequacy of not having been enough, all while she delicately balances on Not Fucking Losing It! Watch as we then proceed to tie her to this spinning wheel while the knife thrower expertly hurls daggers through her heart! Then we’ll roll her into a ball, stuff her in a cannon, and blast her off to You’re On Your Fucking Own!”

Except it doesn't end there. Once you recover from having been violently catapulted back to a reality you weren't prepared for, you better regain your strength and pick up that shovel because it's time to start digging. Put your back into it and don't stop until you've dug a pit deep enough to bury the Emotions and Memories because these ruthless bitches are still very much alive and they aren't aren't going down without a fight. Let's hope you win because these guys aren't fucking around, and if you give them the opportunity, they will hold you hostage and torture and torment you until you're reduced to something that barely resembles a shadow of your former self. If you do manage to subdue them, don't try to take the easy way out and bury them in a shallow grave because the slightest of winds and lightest of rains will bring it all right back to the surface, and you'll have to repeat the entire process, however many times it takes.

But once it's all said and done, despite how physically and emotionally depleted you are—standing there cut and bruised, drenched in your blood, sweat, and tears—how shell shocked you may be as you gaze upon the broken fragments of a life that once was scattered about you, you take a good look around because you know it's the last time you'll be standing there, at least, in that very spot. You know you will move on and away from this, stronger from having endured it, and in time, the bleak and desolate, barren wasteland in your heart—once ridden with a number of unmarked graves—will blazingly transform into rolling hills, emerald pastures, and endless miles of dazzling lavender fields of vibrant purples with the rise of the most resplendent and illuminating sunrise that will set the sky and your heart afire.

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#002: Be Unapologetically You

10 Dating Rules to Follow! 20 Dos and Don’ts When Dating! How to Find (and Keep) Your Dream Guy! As single women we are constantly bombarded with tips and advice on how to find a significant other. Whether we’re standing in line at the supermarket or scrolling through websites we frequent, or perhaps even seeking it out on our own, “experts” tell us what to wear, what hobbies to take up, when to call back, how to respond to a text, what to say, what not to say, and a million other tidbits. And when you’re in a relationship, it’s the same ordeal except now the advice and opinions are catered to how to get him to stay, 100 Hottest Cosmo Sex Tips!, how to keep the spark alive, how to get him to propose, etc.

This guide isn’t about rules and etiquette to follow when you’re dating. It’s about being unapologetically you. Because you, exactly as you are, are what makes you, you. And you deserve to be with a man who loves you exactly as you are. Don’t ever let anyone tell you otherwise. Trying to be someone you’re not, acting a way you don’t want, trying to follow “rules” written by someone who knows nothing about who you are will only exhaust and deplete you. You can pretend to be whoever you want to be but ultimately, you can fool others and yourself for so long before you grow tired of the charade and just want to be you.

As Joey Mcintyre taught me in seventh grade, don't you ever wish you were someone else. You were meant to be the way you are exactly. Stay the same. That’s not to say that you should expect a guy, or anyone for that matter, accept shitty behavior on your part. Be polite, be kind to animals, recycle, say please and thank you, call your parents and tell them you love them, give back, pay it forward — be a decent human being. But don’t lose that sparkle that sets you apart from the rest of the world. Be weird, be different, be you. Honestly, openly, unapologetically. The rest will fall into place.

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16 Kanye West Quotes About Kim Kardashian's Awesomeness

Say what you will about Kimye, Kanye West has never been shy about professing his undying love for his wife Kim Kardashian. From radio interviews to TV appearances to songs, time and time again, the “Yeezus” rapper has shouted his love for the reality starlet from multiple rooftops. As bizarre and eccentric as the things he says can be, it's refreshing to see a man who is so bold and unapologetic about declaring his admiration for his woman. For a couple that is so averse to smiling, these two are always laughing when they're together, and it's apparent how much he adores her. #RelationshipGoals

Here are a few of Kanye West’s over-the-top displays of affection for Kim Kardashian, showing the world he loves Kim just as much as he loves himself — a lot.

Vogue

1. The most beautiful woman of all time!

“Okay, ladies and gentlemen,” he announced during a radio interview with Hot 97′s Angie Martinez. “All barber shops, fashion designers, architects, corner stores, Wall Street, all over the world: Y’all acting like this ain’t the most beautiful woman of all time! I’m talkin’, like, arguably of human existence — the top 10 of human existence.”

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2. A love story for the ages 

“I felt like our love story is like, a love story for the ages,” West told Hot 97′s Angie Martinez. “I felt like when we first got together, it was like a Romeo and Juliet kind of thing, where it’s like … she’s a reality star, and I’m a rapper.”

Getty Images

3. The most intriguing woman

“There’s no way Kim Kardashian shouldn’t be on the cover of Vogue,” West told Ryan Seacrest shortly after Kardashian shared a swimsuit seflie via Instagram. “She’s like the most intriguing woman right now. She’s got Barbara Walters calling her like every day… Michelle Obama cannot Instagram a pic like what my girl Instagrammed the other day.”

Getty Images

4. What he was willing to do to be with her

"There's times when I wasn't with [Kim], I wanted to be with her so bad I thought about taking up sports," he confessed to Kris Jenner on her short-lived talk show Kris.  

Kim Kardashian/Instagram

5. She’s worth it

"I can have people saying this is going to damage your credibility as an artist or a designer, and I say I don't care, I love this woman," West told Kris Jenner on Kris. "When the paparazzi surround you, people know you don't like paparazzi, and they say, 'Why would you be with this person?' I’m being with this person because I love this person, and she's worth it to me."

BET Honors

6. Discussing Kim's fashion choices

"Nobody can tell my girl what to do,” West told W magazine. “She just needed to be given some platforms of information to work from. One beautiful thing is that as she discovers it, the world discovers it. For her to take that risk in front of the world, it just shows you how much she loves me. And how much she actually loves the opportunity to learn. You got, like, a million companies saying, 'This is impacting your brand! This is impacting your fans! And blah blah blah.' But she still sees this light of beauty." 

Balmain

7. Giving her time to do her thing

"And I fell in love with Kim/ Around the same time she fell in love with him/ Well, that's cool baby girl, do your thing/ Lucky I ain't had Jay drop him from the team," Kanye famously proclaimed in “Way Too Cold” about Kim’s relationship with ex-husband Kris Humphries. 

E!

8. A fellow superhero

"What I feel like — 'cause I wanna be married, of course — I feel like the type of girl I would be with is a fellow superhero,” West told Details magazine in 2009. "So we get that 'already flying and now we're just flying together' thing." 

10. The real Marilyn Monroe 

“Kate Upton ain’t Marilyn Monroe,” West said in an interview with New York’s Power 105.1, referencing the model’s recent cover with Vanity Fair. “Kim is Marilyn Monroe, you know that. She was controversial. She is controversial.”

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11. Talented at being beautiful

“In my industry, beauty is a talent,” West said during a radio interview with Power 106 in Los Angeles.  ”You know, ‘What is she talented at?’ She’s talented at being beautiful.” 

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12. Should have a star on the Walk of Fame

“People are so, so dated and not modern. It’s like, there’s no way Kim Kardashian shouldn’t have a star on the Walk of Fame,” West told late night host Jimmy Kimmel.  ”It’s ridiculous, old concepts.”

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13. Kim’s unfair level of awesomeness

“It’s an unfair level of awesomeness in one person to be that smart, to be that nice to be . . . blatantly fine as hell. Like, one of the most beautiful people of all time,” West proclaimed during a visit to “On Air With Ryan Seacrest.”

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14. A dream girl

“Kim is like a fantasy, period. She's like a dream girl and I think a dream girl should live in a dream world,” West said in an interview with Vogue magazine.

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15. Because you’re awesome

“Stop everything you’re doing now/ Because baby, you’re awesome,” West sang to Kardashian during a performance at the 2013 Met Gala. “Don’t let nobody get you down/ Because you’re awesome/ You don’t need to listen to your manager/ You must be tired of running through my mind/ Can I come inside? … I’m also awesome …/ I’d rather do nothing with you/ than something with somebody new/ Because baby you’re awesome.”

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16. Love at first sight

“I loved her from the first day I saw her, which I said on ‘Bound’ ... I remember seeing pictures of her and Paris Hilton in Australia, and I came to Don C., and I was like, ‘Man, have you ever seen Kim Kardishawn? What’s up with Kim Kardishawn?’” West shared with Hot 97.

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#001: Fuck The Rules

The worst part of modern dating is all of the rules people are trying to shove down your throat. From books to columns to podcasts to unsolicited advice from friends and family — do this, do that, say this, don’t say that, don’t do this, don’t do that — everybody wants to give you their two cents and more. The way I see it, dating advice is like a personal hangover cure. Everyone swears by what works for them but it doesn’t necessarily mean it will work for you.

My first guideline to dating? Fuck the rules. Throw out everything you’ve heard or read. Love is a battlefield, and when it comes to war, there are no rules. 

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Love Has No Labels

Despite our best intentions, many of us have engrained preconceptions about what love is supposed to look like. Just a reminder that love exists in all shapes, sizes, colors, and forms.
 

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This Incredible Photo Of A Baby Weasel Riding A Woodpecker Is a Rollercoaster Of Emotions

This is a picture of a baby weasel riding a woodpecker. Unbelievable! Two animals defying odds (and gravity!) in an amazing public display of their friendship. ‘This woodpecker is giving his bestie baby weasel a ride on his back!’ we think immediately. ‘They’re going on an amazing, magical adventure together! ‘Hold on’, the woodpecker tells his nervous best friend who is apprehensive of flying for the first time. BFFs for life! Hooray!’

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Except the baby weasel is trying to eat the woodpecker.

And we’re like:

Martin Le-May spoke to BuzzFeed News about capturing the moment in Essex, England in what he described as “the struggle for life.” In an email to BuzzFeed News he wrote,

“As we walked we heard a distressed squawking and I saw that flash of green. So hurriedly I pointed out to Ann the bird and it settled into the grass behind a couple of small silver birch trees. Both of us trained our binoculars and it occurred that the woodpecker was unnaturally hopping about like it was treading on a hot surface.

Lots of wing flapping showing that gloriously yellow/white colour interspersed with the flash of red head feathers. Just after I switched from my binoculars to my camera the bird flew across us and slightly in our direction; suddenly it was obvious it had a small mammal on its back and this was a struggle for life.

The woodpecker landed in front of us and I feared the worst. I guess though our presence, maybe 25 meters away, momentarily distracted the weasel. The woodpecker seized the opportunity and flew up and away into some bushes away to our left. Quickly the bird gathered its self respect and flew up into the trees and away from our sight.

The woodpecker left with its life. The weasel just disappeared into the long grass, hungry.”

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3 Steps To Getting Through Any Breakup Like A Boss

Breakups are love hangovers, and like their counterparts, they can leave you lying in a collapsed pile on your bathroom floor from agonizing pain and sheer exhaustion. Just as your liver needs a sufficient amount of time to break down the alcohol and purge your body of the toxins you poisoned it with, your heart needs an appropriate amount of time to expel the maelstrom of emotions you may be feeling. The following steps are my BOSSY GALS method of getting through any breakup like a boss. Learn it, love it, live it.

1. Be sad. 

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Fuck the people who tell you not to be alone; to go out and surround yourself with friends and act as if you’re perfectly fine when you’re obviously not. “That’s the thing about pain.” Augustus teaches us in The Fault In Our Stars. “It demands to be felt.” Pain demands to be felt. It is yours and yours alone. So feel it. Embrace your sadness, wallow in it, and let it consume every fiber of your being. Do whatever it is you need to do to truly feel the agony churning and spiraling inside of you, whether it’s by stuffing your face with ten pounds of junk food, playing violent video games, binge-watching Netflix for 15 hours straight, or drinking yourself into a stupor. Lose your shit, film your own version of Tove Lo’s ‘Habits’ music video, scream, cry, and punch things if you want. Throw it up. 

2. Stop being sad.

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Spending any more time being sad than you need to is synonymous to paying to stay in college for an extra year after you’ve graduated. It’s equivalent to paying more for a pair of shoes than they actually cost, or staying by yourself at the club when everyone has already left. It serves no purpose and is an inefficient use of your time and resources. Don’t drag on anything or give something more attention and energy than it deserves. It’s done. Let it go. ​

3. Be awesome instead.

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My last breakup I drank a bottle of wine, cried, passed out watching Parks and Recreation, and woke up feeling like a fucking boss. True story. Everyone has their own timeline for how long it’ll take them to get through these steps but don’t get caught up in any one of them longer than you need. Don’t do a disservice to yourself because Future You is going to be pretty pissed off that Past You took so long to start being your awesome self again. And always remember:

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10 Love And Life Lessons We Learned From Marilyn Monroe

We know we deserve to be with someone who treats us like a goddess; someone who makes us feel extraordinary every day. We know the types of men we should be with and the types of relationships we should aspire to have — and our friends try to tell us the same — but sometimes you just need to hear it from a celebrity for it to truly resonate. Specifically, the beautiful, alluring, and forever iconic Marilyn Monroe who taught us that it's better to be ridiculous than boring, that fear and regrets are stupid, that if a man can't handle you at your worst, he sure as hell doesn't deserve you at your best, and that sometimes good things fall apart so better things can fall together.

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#CancerBlows

Last September, my kind, gracious, and beautiful best friend Theresa was diagnosed with breast cancer at just 27 years old. The worst part of having someone you love be ill, after the illness itself, of course, is the feeling of helplessness that undoubtedly follows; your inability to do anything but stand and watch as their health is robbed from them. Theresa has shown me the meaning of strength, resilience, and faith these past few months and I can’t express how elated I am her sixth and final session of chemo is this Thursday.

Unable to dull her pain, or feel it on her behalf, I felt the only thing I could do at the time was create a fundraiser to attempt to minimally ease the burden of overwhelming medical bills. Theresa and I have been truly humbled with everyone’s magnanimous generosity. In just five months, friends, families, and strangers have come together to raise nearly $15,000 for her medical bills. Moments like this have truly restored my faith in humanity. I thank everyone from the bottom of my heart for their donations, support, prayers, and love. Theresa and I both feel the depth of your kindness and love on a daily basis.

Please continue to support and help Theresa get the treatment she needs so she can beat cancer, and help her focus on her full recovery without the stress of mounting medical bills. Show her and the rest of the world how big cancer blows by snapping a picture of yourself blowing a bubble with gum and sharing it on social media with the hashtag #CancerBlows, followed by a donation equal in size. Of course, any amount is significant and truly appreciated.

Read more about Theresa’s medical journey on her blog.

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10 Cheesetastic Pick Up Lines

My younger sister Kyu (pronounced Q) loves corny jokes (the cornier, the better) so one of her friend’s, Allacyn, intermittently sends her cheesy pick up lines. I have to say guys (or the girls creating them) are getting a lot more creative these days. As cheesy as they may be, I prefer these pick up lines any day to guys who think it’s okay to come up to me and simply stare or say things like, “Let me guess what kind of Asian you are.”

1. Do you generate electricity with water through the process of hydropower? Because dam.
2. Is your father a terrorist? Because you’re the bomb.
3. Are you sitting on the F5 key? Because that ass is refreshing.
4. Is your name Google? Because you’re everything I’m searching for.
5. Do you have 11 protons? Because you’re sodium fine.
6. Are you wearing space pants? Because your ass is out of this world.
7. Is that a keg in your pants? Because I wanna tap dat ass.
8. Are you from Iraq? Because I wanna see you Baghdad ass up.
9. Are you from Korea? Because I think you’re my Seoulmate.
10. Did you sit in a pile of sugar? Because you have a pretty sweet ass.

I'm realizing now that the majority of these are centered around ass observations.

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Casual Sex Kit For The Casual Sexer

Courtesy of Chloe, our favorite party girl, from Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23.

“Get out of here, you little slut! I love you! I got you something. It’s a casual sex kit. There is makeup remover, cab fare, energy bar, instant coffee, tweezers, tampons, pepper spray, a short article, and pictures of me. For the casual sexer!”

1. Neutrogena make up-remover wipes are an easy way to remove last night’s make up.

2. Cab fare — Every girl should keep at least $20 of emergency cash on them at all times.

3. Luna energy bars in lemon zest are my go to energy bar because I love all things lemon, they don’t taste like cardboard, and they’re also vegan.

4. Maxim instant coffee, a Korean favorite, is the king of instant coffee. It’s most likely 95% sugar and 5% coffee but it tastes delicious and will wake you right up.

5. Tweezerman tweezers have been one of Allure’s “Best of Beauty” winners for 12 years.

6. Tampax Pearl Compak tampons won’t take up much room in your bag.

7. Pepper spray comes in compact sizes these days so you can easily attach one to your keychain.

8. A short article will keep you entertained. Grab a copy of USA Today, or download the USA Today or WUSA9 (Google Play, App Store) apps for local and breaking news.

9. Pictures of Chloe to remind you to always be fabulous and fierce.

And while it didn't make Chloe's list, keep condoms in your kit.

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Chances are you aren't going to have sex with Ryan Gosling, but because chances are you aren't going to have sex with Ryan Gosling, always carry a condom.

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