Defining failure

I’m facing a conundrum: I am 23 years old, I have never been in a serious relationship, I may probably remain that way at least throughout most of my adulthood. I enjoy my life, I don’t want to change it. I don’t think anyone is a failure, for as long as they’re happy with the decisions that they’ve made; I’m happy with my own decisions, I’m glad with what I’ve accomplished so far: yet I can’t help but feel like a failure.

I’m left home alone for a couple of days, so I did what any sane person would do in that situation: introspect. I have a chance to think about myself, not that I haven’t done that all my life. I went to the store and I made sure I got the bucket of white wine that I wrote in my list, then bought a ticket to go see the new Ghibli film. The film itself was marvelous as always, but I couldn’t stop thinking about going there alone. It surely wasn’t my first time going out alone. And everytime I do, I prepare as if I’m going to meet someone or something along the way, and I never think about it romantically. I went home after the film, I poured myself a glass of white wine, I laid on the couch and put on something in the background, then sank in thoughts.

A failure, because I’m able to reach my goals and live my dreams, but I’m unsuccessful when it comes to socialization and romance. I am not completely ruling out the possibility of ever falling in love, but it seems that it’s currently off the table – I am not meeting anyone new, my friend circle is all the same.

It feels that I’m the most unsuccessful in romance, as I am currently in a commitment, but not a relationship – it’s weird, distant, not intimate anymore, we don’t share or speak: we just are. My “partner” recently moved to another city, about a four hour drive to the seaside from where I live. I am unsure if I want to end it all between us, because it would mean that I retrieve back to starting point, which is worse. But I can’t keep going like this, because it feels like I’m not in a relationship, yet if I stray away and try to meet other people, I’d feel like cheating. There is another part of me that wants to be free; that doesn’t want to be committed at all. My inner Voice tells me to break up, but my sanity says otherwise. Then again, my friends do not agree with me.

My new friend, who is a quite popular and respecting local film director and who I’m currently shooting a documentary with, told me that my issue might be that I keep the barrier for too long, when meeting someone new, or at least that’s what her first impression was of me. We met on a short seminar, we didn’t have that much interactions, but that was her first answer when I asked her.

Do I truly keep the barrier up for too long? It comes naturally to me, because I don’t want to invite a stranger into my personal life for no reason. I’m very protective of my person and that’s why I prefer to keep the barrier for as long as needed. But how much is too much? I think I could experiment the other way around and try becoming an open book for strangers. After all my life is perfect, it doesn’t come with any frightening details; I share about it on the internet to strangers. It’s time to become a complete extrovert.