Love.

Love. 

Two weeks ago we celebrated it. We dressed to the nines for it. We spent way too much on it. In our loneliness we might have even hated the idea of it. Yet we still obsess over it. We still crave it, desire it, and seek to obtain it. 

I was going to save this posting for July (hint hint), but, in truth, I just couldn't wait till then. For the last week a sickapocalypse it seems has settled in around me.  I, personally, had a second visit from the stomach flu, all of it causing me to give the whole "in sickness and in health" idea a real mental-undertaking. The thought that stuck with me in all of it was that love moves into sickness not away, love runs towards not away from pain. Love seeks to help, love seeks to comfort, love seeks to heal. 

Nothing rings truer to this idea than when I called my dad to simply say that, despite feeling like death for the past 48 hours, yes indeed I was alive. To my surprise, he wasn't where I expected him to be. He wasn't at work. He wasn't in a lunch meeting or out taking care of one of his projects. He was at the hospital with my mom while she was undergoing a routine MRI. He just was there. He just was there. He just was there because she wanted him to be. He just was there because she felt better with him being there. He just...was there. 

My parents love each other. They have loved each other since they were teenagers. "High-School Sweethearts", "Opposites Attract", "Married Your First Love", all pretty much sum up my parents relationship. 

Trumping any Nicholas Sparks novel, my parents are the real, true, bona fide deal. They met and fell in love in high-school, spent most of their college days trying to see if there was someone else out there better only to find that there wasn't, married right out of college on July 25th 1981 (now you get it) exactly 6 years to the date of their very first official date. 

Let me put it to you this way, at this exact point in their lives my parents have known each other and been together longer than the number of years they haven't been. Crazy. Crazy. Crazy. More than any of that context or backstory, the profound truth is this: 

They still hold hands in the car. Even after all these years they still are in love with each other. 

Love. Real Love. Authentic Love. 

My parent's relationship is not perfect. Like I scribbled in my last post "Expectations", my parents, like all of us, created expectations, standards that neither one of them could meet. There has been pain; there has been suffering and uncertainty. Yet, despite it all there has been one constant: the conviction, the commitment, the promise of love. My parents chose to love each other in this great adventure. My parents chose to love despite all the obstacles, despite all the flaws of the other, despite the heart-wrenching pain that life can bring. They still choose this. I have seen and continue to see them choosing this. 

There is no greater safety in the world for a child than knowing your parents love one another. I am grateful and blessed by this safety, this protection and covering. It's this legacy of love that I am honored to be a part of. 

-Authentically Me

Expectations

Expectation vs. Reality. Two ideas that are at war with one another constantly in romantic relationships. I am in awe of the truthfullness of this scene in 500 Days of Summer. For the first time in a long time the writers just…they just got it right!

Our minds are an endless stream of expectational thoughts especially when it comes to love. No person is greater at this than a woman. If she is not careful, thoughtful, her mind can literally run away from her. She creates fantastical, wonderful, hopeful sceneros in her head that are not helpful but rather hurtful to her mental and emotional well-being. 

What is it about a kiss in the rain? Got to love unrealistic expectations and the desperate hope for that perfect moment. 

Growing up in a culture that clings to perfectionistic ideology, it’s just as easy as breathing to begin to believe that perfection can be attained and acquired. That’s what we do. We work and work and work some more to be our ultimate ideal self in order that our Mr. Perfect will be with us, Mrs. Perfect, so that we can live perfectly ever after. 

The honest truth is that Mrs. Perfect doesn’t exist. Mr. Perfect doesn’t exist. It’s time that we free ourselves from the binding of these unrealistic expectations and begin to form a new clearer reality. 

As women our minds are constantly being permeated with perfectionistic stereotypes of men. Here are just a few of many that can be seen on any form of media. 

Each one of these stereotypes in some way grips our attention and captures our feminine heart. For at the core of who we are is a deep desire for an intimate, profound connection, an epic love that completely changes our lives. In truth, I have never met a woman who has not wanted to be fought for, protected, loved passionately or cared for deeply. The constant pursuit of the fulfillment of this deep desire is why we keep going back to the expectation of Mr. Perfect because on film, on TV, in books, he is made a true and tangible reality. Yet, it is a false reality. This false reality is wrecking havoc on our very real, very tangible relationships with men. 

I don't want Mr. Perfect. I want Mr. Real. I want Mr. Authentically Him. 

It's just not fair of us to keeping holding these expectations over the men in our lives. For if we keep expecting him to be Mr. Perfect, we will certainly create the assumption that we have to always be Mrs. Perfect. I don't know about you but I don't want to try and have to live up to that for the rest of my life. Nope. I just want to be Mrs. Real. I just want to be Mrs. Authentically Me. 

If you are alive and breathing than you are screwed up, really screwed up. We have to come to terms with the fact that, despite our best intentions, we are going to continue to screw up for the rest of our lives. The sooner we accept that we reach a place of true freeing reality. 

Let me make this clear, I am not saying that you shouldn't have standards. I am not saying that you should stop trying to be a person of character. I am certainly not saying that Mr. Real can just be and do x,y,and z and that's okay because we are just all screwed up anyway. 

Nope, my point is simply this. Life is not always sunshine and daisies, and thank the stars that it isn't. This life is not always a fairytale, this life is not perfect, but it is an amazing and incredible adventure! An adventure that challenges us, refines us, strengthens us. 

Free yourself up from trying to find or waiting for Mr. Perfect and Perfectly Ever After. Begin living life without all the unrealistic expectations that you put on yourself and you are projecting onto the men in your life. Begin enjoying the great adventure. 

Just let it all go, free yourself up to be surprised. When the time comes and it is right I hope that you:

Choose someone who is willing to take on the adventure with you.

Choose someone who is honest and real, someone who is brave enough to be himself. 

Choose someone who will be with you in the really epic and the epically bad. 

Choose someone who will daily choose to love you. 

Furthermore, I hope that you:

Choose to take on the adventure with him. 

Choose to be honest and real, to be brave enough to be authentically you. 

Choose to be with him in the really epic and epically bad. 

Choose to daily love him. 

Here is the kicker, Mr. Real can support you. Mr. Real can encourage you. Mr. Real can love you to his best ability, but Mr. Real will fall short. He will fall short just as you will fall short in trying to love him to the best of your ability.  

In truth, the deepest desire of our hearts for an intimate, profound connection, an epic love that completely changes our lives, to be fought for, protected always, loved passionately or cared for deeply cannot be found in any earthly relationship. That pursuit of this desire within man alone creates an abyss of loneliness, despair, self-hatred, and bitterness. It was designed that way for a greater purpose. 

For you see we are already a part of a greater love story than we could ever imagine. More epic than any 3-hour long film we have seen or 800 page novel we have read. Our great love story is found within one person: Jesus. By choosing to be a part of His epic love story we are freed up from our self-inflicted earthly expectations and called towards a new greater reality. A reality of a love that is incomprehensible and irrevocably true for all time. 

-Authentically Me