I don't believe in The One...

I've said a few times, "I don't believe in The One, I believe in the work."

And this idea is elegantly portrayed here:

Partial re-post from The Sexy Celibate's blog, Playing With The Hand We've Been Given.

 

Glennon Doyle gives us this remarkable bit of wisdom in her post called The Lie and the Truth about Marriage.

Love Does Not Just Happen. It’s Forged.

Our romantic love drenched culture tells us that you fall in love. Falling is not something you do by choice. It happens to you. Falling is even kind of a mistake, something that you didn’t control. It implies happenstance. It hints at destiny. Falling is euphoric and dreamy. It starts out exhilarating and makes you feel alive.

But falling ends. Often abruptly and with a lot of pain.

Forging is such a different verb than falling. Forging’s definition is to form by heating and hammering; to beat into shape. Forging involves taking something that is broken and making it beautiful by putting energy into it time after time. Every day it is work. Some days it is a fight. You have to go against the grain and challenge your own comfort in order to forge.

Ramble with a Plan

Here are a couple of my favorite poems from one of my favorite bloggers, Dane Johnson.  He has committed to writing one poem a day until he turns 30.  His name means "poem."  :O)
Follow him at http://ramblewithaplan.blogspot.com and http://ramblewithaplan.tumblr.com.
Keep it up Dane!


Suffering is mercy, unfiltered (30/191)
Thursday, April 30, 2015 7:34 AM

April 30, 2015 Chicago, IL

When you spend the greater part of your life climbing away from grace
Don’t be surprised how far you might fall one day
The gravity of weighted glory captivates
As God’s embrace is often wrapped in pain
Transformation happens when it hurts to stay the same
No one longs for suffering
But what if suffering is mercy, unfiltered?
To know it requires humility
Until humility becomes identity
And identity becomes nothing
And the void left by our scattered ego fills with God.

Decision (41/191)
Monday, May 11, 2015 10:45 AM

May 11, 2015 Chicago, IL

(Personal note: I finally made up my mind on what I’d turned into a “big” decision. Now, reflecting from a still place, I am compelled to share what it taught me about the decision-making process.)

A mind won’t rest in indecision
A heart won’t love without commitment
A way won’t be made without determination
Decision isn’t always a choice between right and wrong or good and bad
Mostly, it’s an adapted frame of mind,
It’s holding on to an object of love,
It’s a first step in the direction of hope
We are all so resilient
And we can draw good out of any choice we make

Shane Koyczan: Origins

Origins

She's the type of person
who wouldn't care
who was watching
when her lips
crash land into mine

she wouldn't care

if eyes were pressed upon us 
like a child's fingerprints on a shark tank

everyone looking on
like some violent punchline
was about to uncork my heart
and pour what was left of me
into a glass

like justice to wall street
none would come

it would not be a joke

and those strangers
so ready to howl
            to snicker and judge

we would watch
their poised laughter
turn to stone

their faces
etched in disappointment
forever

I imagine 
that's how gargoyles are born.

Shane Koyczan: To This Day

On love...

From the film 44 Inch Chest (2009).
I admit I've never seen it.  I probably won't because I don't like a ton of profanity.  But I saw a clip on another blog and I found it touching.  Am I willing to deal with the nitty gritty?  Or am I stuck in the dream world of perfume clouds?
 ***Apologies to the screenwriter - but I edited some of the words.

"I bet she's never farted in front of you, has she? Has she? No- I thought not. I mean, that's not romantic, is it? You just want the perfume clouds, the romance, the magicalness of it all- the false crap. Well, I've got news for you, Sonny Jim- that's not love. Love's hard work, hard graft. Love can be murder. Love is watching what she wants to watch on the tely, taking her the papers and a cup of tea on a Sunday morning in bed and inquiring to how she might be feeling, "You all right, Liz?" whilst plumping up her pillows. And she might get irritated by that, but you gotta take it on the chin and broad shoulders, because she's the queen, and you're the bee- the Dad. And so what if you cook the dinner and you get no thanks for it? Don't do it if you expect thanks. That's not why you do it. And yes, you forgot the dripping tap for ten years, and then one day- for whatever reason, who knows why- you get off your fat ass and you find yourself under the sink with a spanner in your hand and you're smiling - because you know it's gonna please her. And if she don't notice it, she don't notice it- it don't matter. It's fixed. It's plumbed. It's the maintenance of a marriage, the nuts and bolts, the nitty gritty, the reality- that's life, that's love, it ain't easy- nobody ever said it was gonna be easy. It's freaking hard work. But, you know, love can be... lovely. One day, you'll be in the bathroom, having a shave in front of the mirror, all soap on your face, and you feel her approaching you. She's hung a pair of tights, hanging on the radiator. And as she leaves, she pats you on the bum and gives you a tiny smile- almost not a smile- but a smile nevertheless. And it will mean the world to you- the whole. incredible world- the freaking universe."
And from male writers.  I love it.