I’ve been meaning to write a piece on just how much love has changed my life in this last year but keep shying away from proverbially putting pen to paper down on this thought. When I was younger I felt so strongly about the concept of love. From the depictions of relationships that I had seen only ever played out through dominance from one partner and subservience from the other. Given the way our world tends to work that usually means that the man is the one who controls most elements of a relationship and every day life situations which are associated with this.
I never knew an equality in love, because I had never seen it depicted anywhere. It always seemed to be a painful exercise of giving up part of your soul in order to cohabitate with someone. I suppose my view was an extreme version of a general questioning around functioning relationships. This may have also come about because growing up all of the external societal and media links to being in a relationship or being married tended to romanticise what this meant. It showcased an incomplete character of an individual that would remain that way until they found that one person destined for only them. Popular culture and mainstream movies would have you believe that once you find someone, that is the end of the story; that you somehow just live happily ever after and you never face another hardship again. But this just simply isn’t the case.
The truth is we all bring an endless amount of baggage into our relationships. Some of it we see and can identify, others are hidden deeply and trigger us at the most surprising of times. Jealousy is the other element that sneaks up on us all. Feeling an irrational sense of jealousy over a long gone ex is not something rooted in sense or rationality. Yet the emotion remains incredibly strong. Within this I’ve started to understand the way that ego is factored into all of this too. We are easily affected by not being the first of something in our significant others life; not the first love, or the first person they proposed to or married. In actuality it’s a meaningless point but it still tends to sting beyond what we can comprehend.
Love is much more complicated than what was explained to us as children. As we grow and in our primary relationships love means choosing to be with someone every day. It involves working together, compromising and allowing space for another human being to exist within your equation. It means putting in the effort each and every day. Love means seeing the best and worst of yourself all at once through someone else’s eyes. No one ever tells you that this can be the most painful experience that forces you to admit an unending amount of ugly truths about yourself. Love is filled with complication, it is not easy but it is worth it.
Accepting that we have been sold an unrealistic depiction of love is the first step in understanding that it isn’t always a walk in the park. Since love has entered my life I have been aware of my short comings more than ever, but I’ve also felt an unconditional sense of belief and love than ever before. I have come to be a more forgiving and grounded human being. All because the love I am experiencing is based on truth, in which a mutual respect for each other underpins an equality in which I have never known.
Sx
I blog for Change. 