.SOMETIMES RAW.

“I’LL CHECK THAT OUT!”

I’m not going to check that out. (e.g. super expensive makeup). Yes, I’m sure you like it, and I’m sure you recommended it to me in good faith. To you, the 80 uninterrupted hours you spent gushing over its merits was time well spent. You believed that the dozens of billboards and online advertisements I’ve seen promoting it were somehow not enough. You thought that what I needed was a personalized recommendation from a casual workplace acquaintance. Ultimately, you hoped makeup that moves you — that ignites your soul and kindles your sense of wonder — would do the same for me. But I cannot bring myself to find out. One thing is certain, though: I will not check that out.

“NO WORRIES.”

I am paralyzed with worry.

“I’M GOOD EITHER WAY.”

For some people, this is not true. I actually have very deep preferences about the course of action you choose to take at work, but I’m keeping those preferences private because I want peace and to go home.

“GREAT! HOW WAS YOURS?”

There are two lies here. First, my weekend was not great. While I enjoyed sleeping in and not being at work, “great” is a ludicrous stretch. I did watch Stephen King Horror movies and had chocolate Saturday (every) night, which was excellent, but Sunday was mostly spent doing laundry, helping my son with homework, cleaning and all those good things. Two days is just too short to unwind after a five-day workweek. Why don’t we have a 3-day weekend? I bet people would be a lot more productive and happy. The second lie is that I care how your weekend was.

“SORRY.”

I didn’t do anything wrong here, OK? After you entered the break room, it was you who picked up my book and breakfast, mistaking it for your own, and so the fault rests entirely with you. I’m not sorry. In fact, I only said “sorry” before informing you of your error because I know virtually no other way to begin a potentially awkward exchange. Also, the world doesn’t evolve around you and all your bullshit. There are other humans in it who all have needs and desires that you need to respect, too. You are not alone on this planet. Simple as that. Now go and complain.

“7:30 WORKS!”

It would be much less stressful for me if we did 8:00.

“CONGRATULATIONS!”

The fact that you and your spouse are buying a 900.000 Euro house fills me with unease. How can you possibly afford this? Either you’ve built a solid financial foundation on which you can buy such a mansion (and even what for?), or you’ve cultivated a happy, carefree attitude that permits you to take risks. Teach me. Please.

“LET ME KNOW IF THERE’S ANYTHING I CAN DO.”

Don’t.

“HEY.”

OK, so there’s no real, affirmative proposition being put forth here, so it’s hard to see how this can qualify as a lie. But the fact is I didn’t want to say it.

“I’M FLEXIBLE.”

I am not flexible at all.

“NOT BAD.”

This kind of depends on how you define “bad.” Nothing is physically wrong with me, and I make enough money to be comfortable. I haven’t had any big falling-out with my family or anything. I have friends. I am feeling really happy since I bought this house but I wish I could spend more time in it, but I have to work to finance it, which makes me spend more time at work than at home. It probably doesn’t make sense. I’m so stupid. It’s not that I never feel good, is the thing — it’s more that I should feel better. Yeah. There’s no reason for me to be feeling this way, and that makes me feel guilty, which makes everything worse. That thing about there being nothing physically wrong with me isn’t quite true. My back has been hurting a bit lately. Remedying this feels utterly beyond my power. If I don’t get enough sleep, it makes me irritable and sad. So, yeah, not bad, I guess. I don’t know. I need a vacation!

“SOUNDS GOOD!”

That depends on how you define “good.” If I detect you have no clue, experience or expertise in a field and try to sound smart, that would be my diplomatic answer of choice if I want peace. There are also ways to challenge and outsmart the “expert” obviously. Just be quiet if you have no clue what is going on. Silence is golden.

Ladies, are you ready for your man to commit to you with the same diligence and enthusiasm he pours into his War Movies binge-watching? Then optimize your relationship this Valentine’s Day with this date guide.

This list has something for everybody—long-term lovers, a new fling, and everybody else.

Morning coffee date.
Why wait till dark to get the romantic juices flowing? Gaze deep into your lover’s eyes as he gazes over your shoulder at the low-angle morning sun. For the absolute best result: make sure the coffee machine is broken, the dog took a nice shit in the house and you are both late for work. The photons flooding his retinas at this point may help regulate his circadian rhythm. If you add one or two requests at this point you might have sweet conversations all day AND night.

Kitchen kisses.
First, you kiss him and then you watch if his enzymes have trouble breaking down the macronutrients in those meat-free turkey soy balls and the matcha soy latte you serve him for breakfast. Let the chaos unfold.

Hit the dance floor.
Start dancing early in the morning. Involve him. Then tell him about a research that shows dancing promotes activity in the neural circuit connecting your motor cortex to your adrenal glands, activating receptors on your vagus nerve that in turn excite brain areas that release norepinephrine, creating a brain-to-body-to-brain “arousal loop” that can improve energy and alertness. If the Tango you perform in front of him doesn’t turn him on, nothing will.

Lavish him with gifts.
Move over, Godiva Chocolate. This year, ditch the chocolates and spoil your sweetheart with a six-month supply of omega-3 fatty acids. Don’t forget the heart-shaped pill case.

Visit a cozy cocktail bar.
Go ahead, pick your poison. Hand him his cocktail of choice, then whip out your notepad because you will spend the next 90 minutes explaining how alcohol increases cortisol in the adrenal glands, negatively impacts gut health, and is, technically speaking, a poison.

Sweat it out.
Maximize your longevity and love connection with a steamy hot yoga session or spin class. Feeling strong? Level up with kickboxing. It’s a perfect way to let out some pent-up frustration—just shut your eyes and imagine him whispering in your ear, “Actually, today at work….” Boom, knockout!

Ask him many questions.
The quickest way to your man’s heart is through the right ventricle by way of his tricuspid valve, as he explained (with diagrams) on your first date. The second quickest? Ask him whether microplastics disrupt the body’s fragile hormonal balance. Ask him if he wants children. Even on the first date.

Deliberate cold exposure.
Picture this: You two in an oversized tin trough filled with enough ice to sink an early twentieth-century sea vessel. Can you imagine anything hotter? And yes, your body might go numb. But you’ll still feel all sorts of butterflies.

Couples therapy.
Are you and your partner struggling to connect? A couples therapy session might help facilitate better communication, deepen your relationship, and SAVE. That’s right, visit sometimesraw.com for 15 percent off your first counselling session if you buy all of Daniela’s books. That’s S-O-M-E-T-I-M-E-S-R-A-W. dot com! Don’t wait!

Leave him alone.
Who are you kidding? Give your man what he really wants: a quiet night alone. Get him a beer, a steak, and turn on Black Hawk Down. Light yourself a candle, get a cup of tea, some chocolate, and a good book. The best part? You get a night to yourself too.

Happy Valentine’s Day to all the Lovebirds out there. Enjoy the day. And buy yourself some roses. You deserve it!

Move across the country and hope the Sadness won’t find you, won’t follow you like a stray dog from country to country. Hope the Sadness isn’t just a dog on a leash, shadowing you always. Hope the Sadness can’t be as exaggerated as you are, hope the Sadness is more rooted. Perhaps the Sadness has friends, and a family, and can’t just pick up and go. Look at all this stuff the Sadness has accumulated wherever you are currently living. How’s the Sadnessd going to survive without all this stuff? Hope this isn’t one of those any-place-I-hang-my-hat-is-home-type situations where the Sadness hangs its hat on you. Hope that you are not the Sadness’s home, anywhere you go, no matter how far, no matter how quickly – the Sadness lives in you.

Move across the country, to another country and start a new adventure. Always big adventures. Create a brand-new life, buy a new set of furniture, a fresh autumn coat. Fill your day with distraction. Take a class, learn an instrument, visit your local library and crack open one of those books you always meant to get acquainted with, anything to make the days pass faster, to accumulate distance, to get you as far away as possible from the place that you left. Move across the country and watch the road signs shoot past you along the street. See the city recede in the distance behind the taped-up boxes obstructing your rearview. Settle somewhere fertile, plant a new you and watch you blossom. You can barely remember that old you now, the you who lived in that other place and was Sad. The old you wasn’t you; this is you. This is the you! The new you! The you always wanted to be.

You have friends now, a routine, a coffee shop where someone, as you saunter in, smiles and says, “The usual?” One night at a bar, late, you pick up a person that somehow grows into a habit – a person who gets to know not just the you you sometimes show, but the you you truly are; a person who – when you weren’t looking – slipped a naked, wounded heart into the pocket of your jacket with a bow and a note that said, “handle with care.”

One night, you will wake with a start in this person’s bed, you will discover yourself in this person’s arms, and you will disentangle yourself for the hundredth time and dress yourself for the hundredth time and try to leave this person’s apartment, but when you get to the door there will be a sticky note over the knob that says, “but what if this time you stayed?”

And you will turn around and get back into that person’s bed, and you will get back into that person’s arms, and you will stay there for a year and a half. And you will learn how to be very, very tender with that person’s naked, wounded heart. Or is it your heart that is wounded? That was wounded all along? What are you searching for? What are you running away from?

And when the Sadness catches up, tracks you down – when you return home one day, arms full of groceries, to find the Sadness sitting at the kitchen table, casually reading a paper as if it never left, eating a muffin as if this were all perfectly natural- when the Sadness looks up at you and says, “What did you think, buddy? What did you think was going to happen?” – when the Sadness smirks at you and says with a wry insistence that unravels you in an instant, “This is the real love story here, buddy, you and me”. When the Sadness reiterates that, sure, certain smaller sadnesses dull, but this Sadness, the Sadness has never stayed from your side, not really, this epitome of stability in an inconsistent world? The sadness will always catch up to you and when that happens, you can put your groceries down and walk back out the door again to close the door behind you. And run away. As you always do. Off to a new adventure.

You can keep driving until you hit a HELP WANTED sign dangling off the edge of the new country you want to explore. You can take the new job and get all your stuff shipped out to you or throw it in the river or burn it in a fire or donate it. Go for the hike along the water and breathe in the fresh sea air. Move across the country and start again someplace new or just stop and simply look within. The answer might be right there. Just look and listen. No need to go anywhere.