Do those couples really love each other so much, or are they more just attracted to a fantasy of whom their partners are? From what I’ve observed, when you scratch below the surface of such couples you find that they really DON’T know each other that well, and are just interacting – and being “in love” – with a fraction of their personalities. And they want it that way! If they knew each other too well it would shatter their illusion. No surprise that as the increase in expectation of marriage partners being “best friends” – that is, more emotionally intimate – has gone hand-in-hand with the skyrocketing of the divorce rate.
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- Being in love is projecting that someone will rescue you; loving someone is nurturing and caring for the best in them
- Being in love comes from the false self, that still damaged side of us, and wants a false image of another to rescue us; loving someone comes from the true self, and nurtures the true self of another
Category: MARRIAGE
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How can you say you love one person when there are ten thousand people in the world that you would love more if you ever met them? But you’ll never meet them. All right, so we do the best we can. Granted. But we must still realize that love is just the result of a chance encounter.
—Charles Bukowski -
Are there aspects of yourself that have been revealed to you through marriage you didn’t really think or know of before?
You have no idea. So many. There are so many things – so many passions – you don’t realize you have if you’re living on your own that marriage will bring up so that you can then realize how spiritually sick you are. This is maybe the main benefit of marriage of the many. It’s such a mirror of your soul.
—Brother Augustine -
But though we believe ourselves to be seeking happiness in marriage, it isn’t that simple. What we really seek is familiarity — which may well complicate any plans we might have had for happiness. We are looking to recreate, within our adult relationships, the feelings we knew so well in childhood. The love most of us will have tasted early on was often confused with other, more destructive dynamics: feelings of wanting to help an adult who was out of control, of being deprived of a parent’s warmth or scared of his anger, of not feeling secure enough to communicate our wishes. How logical, then, that we should as grown-ups find ourselves rejecting certain candidates for marriage not because they are wrong but because they are too right — too balanced, mature, understanding and reliable — given that in our hearts, such rightness feels foreign. We marry the wrong people because we don’t associate being loved with feeling happy.
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“You’re never too old, you’re never too young. You’re never too married, you’re never too single.”
—Fr. Michael Sorial, How Big Are Your Dreams? -
No relationship, however deep and intimate, can ever fully take our loneliness from us. And as long as we go through life expecting this, we are doomed to constant disappointment. We also do constant violence to our friendships and love relationships because we will demand from our friends something that they cannot give us, namely, total fulfillment. For example, a goodly number of persons get married precisely because of loneliness. They see their marriage as a panacea for loneliness. After marriage, they discover that they are still lonely, sometimes as lonely as before. Immediately, there is the temptation to think that there is something seriously amiss in the marriage, to foist blame on the marriage partner or on the self, to become disenchanted and seek out new relationships, hoping of course to someday discover the rainbow of total fulfillment.
The Restless Heart: Finding Our Spiritual Home in Times of Loneliness
Ronald Rolheiser -
We’re still living in a culture that misunderstands the why of singleness. If you’re over thirty and you’re still single, the gay community will push you to admit who you really are. Feminists will commend you for standing up for who you are. Traditionalists will wonder where your parents went wrong. Society will tell you that you can still do something about it and change it. And the church simply doesn’t know what to do with you.
In a culture where everything promotes marriage and family, the idea that anyone would be single by choice or giftedness seems preposterous. If you’re single, there must be a reason. There must be something wrong with you. There must be a good explanation. Every other explanation for your singleness is too outrageous to validate.
Thrive: The Single Life as God Intended
Lina AbuJamra -
“So people get married, thinking that another human being will obliterate their loneliness. It helps a little at first. But one day, out of the random blue, that loneliness that was meant to be kept at bay lifts its ugly head and plops itself in the middle of your home, reminding you of the fact that even your husband cannot totally satisfy you and that your wife does not really understand you like you need her to.”
Thrive: The Single Life as God Intended
Lina AbuJamra -
Being single is GOOD
So when Paul describes the single life in 1 Corinthians 7:8, it’s fitting that he uses the word good. Here’s what he says: “To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is good for them to remain single as I am.”
The single life is a good life. No more wondering if God has given you second best. No more asking why everyone has been more blessed by God while you keep on waiting. No more misinterpreting God’s Word and His ways.
You have been given a good life.
For now, settle it in your mind that God is big enough and wise enough to give you the best life possible–the life that thrives.
So stop wasting it. Stop wishing it away. Stop complaining about it and praying that it would change soon, and start believing the truth of God’s word.
You have been given a good life, and it’s yours by design. Do you believe it?
God created you for the sole purpose of knowing Him and making Him known. Your singleness is God’s perfect place for you to thrive. You don’t have to wait for your knight in shining armor to start living. You can know the Lord fully and serve Him wholly right here, right now.
Being single is a GIFT
The truth is that, most of the time, you and I have very little concept as to what we truly need in our lives.
Singleness, a gift? The very idea is appalling. Who would ever give anyone such a–how can I say it politely–useless gift? Weren’t we made for marriage and sex and kids and car seats?
Singleness is the gift that you never wanted, never planned on, and wish you’d never opened. Surely there’s been a mistake. Surely this is not your gift to keep forever and happily ever after?
But a careful look at God’s word reveals that your gift is no mistake. We’ve been talking about 1 Corinthians 7, and if you’ll read verse 7 you’ll see that it was Paul who brought up the concept of singleness as a gift. Here is what he says in
: “I wish that all were as I myself I am. But each has his own gift from God, one of one kind and one of another.”
Wait–say that again? Singleness–a gift? Why in the world would anyone consider singleness a gift? It sounds more like a curse to most people. And if it is a gift, who is “lucky” enough to have it? Or if I may make it even more personal: Do you have the gift of singleness?
God has decided that, for better or for worse, the best gift for you right now is the gift of singleness.
Could it be that God has given you this gift of singleness to deepen your walk with Him? Could it be that God wants to use your unfulfilled longings to draw you closer to Himself? In other words, could there be a purpose to this gift that God has given you?
Thrive: The Single Life as God Intended
Lina AbuJamra -
“And if you let those expectations go unspoken and unaddressed, it leads to resentment. Resentment leads to distance, and distance leads to broken marriages.”
—Jonathon M. Seidl, Seven things I’ve learned from seven years of marriage
SO GOOD QUOTES 