A lot of people ask me what my biggest fear is, or what scares me the most. I know they expect an answer like: heights, closed spaces, or people dressed like animals; but how do I tell them that when I was 17 years old, I took a class called Relationships for Life and I learned that most people fall out of love for the same reasons they fell in it. That their lover's once endearing stubbornness has now become refusal to compromise and their one-track mind is now immaturity and their bad habits, though once adored, are now just money down the drain. Their spontaneity becomes reckless and irresponsible and their feet on the dash is no longer sexy, just another distraction in your busy life. Nothing saddens and scares me like the thought that I can become ugly to someone who once thought all the stars were in my eyes.
I was extremely bitter and sad when I wrote this and I left out the most beautiful part of the class. After my teacher introduced us to this theory, she asked us, "Is love a feeling or is it a choice?" We were all a bunch of teenagers. Naturally we said it was a feeling. She said that if we clung to that belief, we'd never have a lasting relationship of any sort.
She made us interview a dozen adults who were or had been married. We asked them about their marriages and why it lasted, or why it failed. At the end, I asked every person, "Is love an emotion or a choice?" Everybody said that it was a choice. It was a conscious commitment. It was something you choose to make work. Every day, with a person who has chosen the same thing. They all said that at one point in their marriage the "feeling of love" had vanished or faded and they weren't happy. They said, feelings are always changing and you cannot build something that will last forever on a shaky foundation.
The married ones said that when things were bad, they chose to open the communication, chose to identify what broke and how to fix it, and chose to recreate something worth falling in love with. The divorced ones said they chose to walk away.
Ever since that class, since that project, I have never looked at relationships the same way. I now understood why arranged marriages were successful. I had discovered the differences in feelings and commitments. I have never gone for the person who makes my heart race or my head spin. I've chosen the people who were committed to choosing me, dedicated to finding something to adore even during the ugliest days.
I no longer fear the day someone who swore I was their universe, can no longer see the stars in my eyes, as long as they still choose to look until they find them again.
... As long as they still CHOOSE to look, until they find them again.
*Completely hijacked. Not my work, just a powerful message that needs passed on.
