Once we know love, why do we have to look at it again? Well, we don’t. You can take love when it first hits you or as you are first presented with it, and then lock it up and never look back. You can do that. The thing is, love is a movable object. It is permeable. It is changeable. It is fickle. Even unconditional love is not really unconditional. It is not everlasting. It is not all-knowing. There are forces that challenge love in every way. That is not the cynic in me speaking. At all. I believe in love and I feel it profoundly. I am just keeping it real like I always do.
We look back at love for several reasons and under various circumstances. We challenge our own feelings and the expression of another’s feelings. We ask ourselves if our feelings are the same or similar than they once were or if they’ve changed. If they’ve changed, is it for the better? Are our feelings stronger and more profound? Perhaps they are more adult and more realistic. That IS where the expression “honeymoon phase” comes from, right? We are goo-goo eyed when we meet someone. We find them charming and lovely and all we want to do is love them up or be besties for life. And then, real life invades. We see them under stress and against the wire. We see them in their truest habitat; with friends or maybe even interacting with wait staff. We know what their work voice sounds like and the fact that they have a sensitive stomach and can’t touch spicy food. Everything that isn’t seen or recognized during those initial precious moments invades. And then, you get to see the real deal and then you get to decide.
This exercise is not just beneficial directly after the official phase out of the ga-ga phase. This is a critical part of “the work” that should occur at many points during a relationship. We change so much over time. We are shaped by what happens to us in life and by the state of the world. Our bodies change, our minds change, and yes, our hearts change. To make an assumption that there are so many moving parts and we can still keep certain factors, such as our feelings, steadfast, is an erroneous notion.
Don’t get me wrong. I am not telling you that you cannot grow with another human. I am not suggesting that love cannot morph or be reworked to suit the changes of two humans. I am presenting the notion that for that change to occur, for two people to grow TOGETHER, there has to be some consciousness. Rarely does this growth occur without thought or consideration. Two people don’t just intuitively ‘get it’. I mean sure, some people do, but that fairytale is rare and most often found in the movies (remember those?). Most living, breathing humans need to communicate in order to sort out where they are going to end up with another person.
And the shitty part is that there is a lot of uncertainly. Sometimes love doesn’t prevail. Sometimes two people find that love no longer exists or that the love is there but that love, no matter how profound, is just not enough. All of these things can happen. All of these situations are difficult. All of these things and situations must be faced head on.
Or not. You don’t have to. There are so many people who bury their heads in the sand because they are afraid of being alone or terrified over the thought of disappointing another human. They don’t want to be the “bad guy/gal” or to let someone down. So instead of being the one to say ‘no mas’…they just continue to live unhappily. They might even try to fill the void that they’ve identified elsewhere. They decide that if they can satisfy some emptiness that exists inside of them with another human, they can remain linked to their first love. The two can peacefully co-exist for all of time. Good luck with that. Let me know how that works out for you. Better yet, let me know if that doesn’t result in a fiery explosion of betrayal, shame, lying, and heartache.
It is so difficult to admit that love has changed and it no longer works. It is more difficult even still when it has profoundly changed for one person and the other person isn’t quite there yet. And yet, the work must be done. We must still face this reality and decide to make a change.
Sometimes it is difficult admitting that love hasn’t changed. This ‘grass is always greener’ and ‘upgrade immediately’ world that we live in will try to convince you that everlasting commitment is the equivalent of boring complacency. You must be tired of your same ol’ partner because why wouldn’t you be? How could you possibly still feel connected to the same person after all this time? Well, one, everyone is different. And two, they aren’t the same person. You got that out of my rambling, right? We change so much that we are not the same person we were, are. Every day, week, year, brings with it change. We morph into someone we don’t even recognize sometimes. Sometimes this change is very temporary and sometimes this changing is more permanent. The key is acknowledging it. Being honest about how it impacts your needs, your wants, and the needs and wants of the other person.
This is not just about romantic relationships either. We grow out of friendships much in the same way, and I’ve certainly talked about this before. As recently as my chats on letting go, I’ve explained how critical it is to revisit relationships or all types to ask yourself what about them feels good and meaningful. I am not sharing this advice flippantly. Much like letting go, this analysis is one of the hardest things you can do. I’ve admitted that I don’t love someone anymore and I’ve had someone admit it to me. It feels unbearably shitty and you feel like you can’t survive it. One both ends. And yet, you do. The human spirit is resilient. You know when it isn’t? You know when you die a little? When you decide not to ever self-examine. When you just accept the world as it is and assume that things will never change and pray for exactly that.
Don’t do that. Change is inevitable. You can write your own story and let it be written for you. The latter feels like absolute shit. Just saying.
Talk to you tomorrow.
L.
thepathtoworthy.com 