What We’ve Learned in Love + Passion
We’re coming up on four years of marriage this spring! It’s hard to believe yet it feels like we’ve had an eternity together at the same time.
To just be together, I think that is really the thing. We have become friends on levels I have never known with another human being, it is truly incredible. To care so deeply for another human, and have that human care as deeply for you. To wholly accept another person with all their flaws and baggage, and feel the depth of grace when that person embraces you and all the unpleasant places in your soul, and also still loves you for squeezing the toothpaste “wrong”! Haha! To have a person who makes you laugh as no one else can, sometimes you don’t even have to say the joke you just look at each other because you’re both already thinking it! To have a person who is so curious and interesting yet who you know so familiarly. To have a person to hold you close every night. Togetherness, wholeness, oneness, that is what it is.
Marriage is also incredibly, incredibly challenging, as is any other thing you choose to do which enhances your life and makes it more beautiful. I never used to get it when people said that, but now I do. It’s excruciatingly difficult. It’s frustrating, it’s angering! We both work on it very hard on it, cultivating it, caring for it, loving it, valuing it, and giving it all we've got. We have learned so so much. I think we were both different people when we started this journey, and the fact that we've grown is a very good thing! I thought it would be fun to share a few of the things we have learned along the way about passion and cultivating a healthy relationship - the beautiful and glorious and crazy things. These photos of a little vow renewal shoot we did with Jared Powell, which I am in love with!
Read about what we’ve learned in love and passion at the bottom!
OTHERNESS + TOGETHERNESS
We have learned to appreciate the differentness of each other. I think often times people are drawn toward each other because they are intrigued by the mystery and differentness of the other person. Perhaps they are also impressed by how in some way the person seems to complement the things they are not. They are attracted to those talents, interests, knowledge, and traits which seem a bit strange and unfamiliar. We all know the phrase “opposites attract”. What a strange thing, two unlike beings gravitating towards each other. This creates a certain tension and this tension gives butterflies and drives people wild for each other. Then, they get married, set up house, and what do they do? Try to change the person to be just like themselves instead! Then they are driven wild in a whole different way. When they try to change the other person to be like who they are, the passion fades.
That is my theory anyway. In our marriage, we have learned to respect and appreciate how different we are from each other. Truly, it seems we are nearly opposites sometimes. Our values in life are what weave us together and our bond so strong. Our beliefs tie us together, not our character traits. Isn't it sort of magical? Even after four years married, I am still intrigued by how strange of a person he is to me when I stop to observe him. He’s all the things that I am not. I’ve learned a lot of valuable lessons from him, and he from me, and that has made us better together. We both appreciate each other's differences, we respect them, and occasionally we find the quite entertaining! We are both strange creatures who are genuinely very in love!
This has a lot to do with what makes us complete together. On our own, we are something amazing and value able, but together, we are the whole picture. No one person has all the skill and vision in themselves, but together, we do. We complement each other. Perhaps we are a bit of yin and yang - combined, a perfect circle. Just right. Alone, we’d naturally tend to take a good quality to the extreme at risk of it becoming a bad thing.
I think God gave us marriage to help us become our best selves. I know that without someone to friction against, I would become set in my ways and wouldn’t have the opportunity to learn or grow or ever see that I was wrong about anything at all! I’d think I was great and right in every way and would become stagnant. Marriage does not allow you to do that, whether you like it or not in the moment! I really need the value that his witty logical mind brings, and he really needs the wisdom of intuition that I bring! I need him to be stable, plan, and create a safe haven. He needs me to set is wild heart free, be spontaneous, breathe in fresh air, soak in the sunshine, see the beauty of life and tuck a daisy behind his ear. He needs me to show the value of listening to one's heart. We both help each other chill out in different ways and also help each other to aspire higher in different ways! Together, we everything, we are whole.
To allow your love to bloom at its full potential, you have to cultivate those strange things that make you different and unique, being complete in who you are. You must be whole, strong, healthy, happy, and fully you. You have to nurture and love yourself, not because you significant other does, because you do! You can't put the sole responsibility on them to make you feel lovable and neat! Develop the things you’re passionate about, the things that make you, you! You have to keep that fire burning in your chest. You have to know you are beautiful and incredible to your own self, first. That’s one of the secrets to a successful marriage, I believe. If either of you lose yourself in the marriage, that whole you make together is not very strong. It’s just sort of mush. There is nothing giving it strength and glory and beauty anymore because it’s just sort of nothing. What happened to what each of you uniquely bring together to make it so complete, if you forget to keep nurturing and growing in these things?
Your significant other probably fell madly in love with you because of who you are! There was passion in your eyes and fire in your heart when you talked about the things you really cared about, the things you loved and enjoyed, and when you shared your perspective on life! Your eyes sparkled and you were full of life when it came to those things that really make you, you. If you stop caring and cultivating those things because you are married and all you want to think about is your marriage, that isn’t really loving or caring for the marriage. It needs your fire and passion to give it life! Both of yours! So, make time for those things, and make them a priority. Keep the people, places, and things in your life that make you feel alive will make your marriage thrive!
Equally, you’ve got to encourage and support your spouse doing the things he loves too! Camping or rock climbing or whatever it is with his friends, or spending hours in the garage working on something you see as a bit stupid or pointless may seem inconvenient at times, but surprisingly it may be what keeps your love alive and passionate! It’s important for him to cultivate who he is. I think this is HUGE when it comes to being attracted to each other and keeping a marriage that continues to thrive!
You want to be with someone because you want them, not because you need them. You want them to desire you and choose you and be drawn towards you, not be dependent on you. If neediness crops up, it becomes more like a parent child relationship and the passion and tension fades. When you choose some one because you want them, that is truly choosing them - that is love!
The best thing we have done recently for our marriage is reading a lot of books together! We share an audible account and have been devouring books on alllll kinds of topics, from personal development, leadership, finances, God, and health, and it has made for some really lively conversation! We’ve really enjoyed learning and growing together and it puts a lot of passion for life in our relationship! It’s drawn us closer comparing our unique perspectives with each other and talking about how to implement things into our life! Perhaps the best v-day gift you could give is an audible subscription to share! That’s the only way we can manage to have time to read so many books!
I love being married, our great partnership in life! This is our journey and the way that we see it. I believe each love story has it’s own journey and things that make it beautiful and special, so some one else may experience love completely differently, and each person will probably see it at least little differently because each person is so different! We’ve had to learn our own lessons and make our own way, but perhaps you will learn or find parts of this interesting! I thoughT it would be fun to share a bit about us in honor of valentines day, and I hope it brought a bit of value to your life! Much love!