Are Matches Really Made in Heaven??

So, you hear it all the time. When you see two people that are really good together, they say "They were made for one another!"  And maybe even you have felt it.  The feeling that this person is the only one for you. But then, how can that be for those who've lost a loved one and re-married, or for people who've suffered a divorce and find love again?  Is there an exception to the rule, or is the rule contradicting all in all?  That is what I had been thinking about today, and just wanted to explore my thoughts on.  Of course I asked my husbands opinion and he doesnt share the romantic view that I do.  He feels that based on personalities and likes and dislikes two people are drawn together and based on maturity and determination they make it last, but in the events that it doesn't, then it is possible to move on and find another.  So it got me thinking about my own views and caused me to challenge it and to try and find a more defined answer to the question: is there someone for everyone, and is there just one? In a way, I think that there is one person for everyone, that there is a such thing as a soulmate.  In my case, I see the reasons that I need my husband, why we work. What makes us, US.  At first these things are intriguing to the other, but after a while we can start to take them for granted. For instance, I am naturally a quiet person until you get to know me, but in the same respect, I love to talk. In the nature of having conversations, not just to hear myself say things.  But my husband on the other hand is the opposite. He is very friendly and outgoing and social right off the bat and can make friends with any one, but then once he gets to know a person he talks less and less.  Now, I wish I could say what the key is to making something like this work between such people, but I don't know yet because that is something we have yet to work out fully.  We just have to respect one another's strengths and differences and be careful not to "crush" the other's opinions and ways of doing simply because it differs from our own. I am a "learner", I like to explore and find out how things work and why, and in a matter of relationships, how people are and why so that I can be successful in dealing with them appropriately according to their personality.  One of the ways I do this is by talking. Now, to my husband who can become a quieter person with time, this "talking" come off to him in a way that makes him feel that I am nagging at him and complaining to him about whatever, when in fact I am only out to learn, I am not frustrated, or angry, just curious and eager to know what makes him tick.  Well to say the least I was very surprised to find that the manner in which I communicate, and in which I have always communicated, will not work in this relationship.  It is simply counterproductive in my efforts to reach a common ground with him and in most cases ends up making matters worse. So what do I do? Well, I try to reconstruct my approach, not bringing things up in the heat of the moment that could cause tension. I know that whatever I say (that is not obviously positive or on a positive note) I have a certain window of time before his mind shuts off to what I am saying entirely, which has made me think and decided which details are most important and to say it in a non-threatening and precise manner where it can be best received. Another aspect of my personality is that I take things pretty literally, and seriously unless I can clearly tell that it's supposed to be a joke. My husbands sense of humor, is not one in which I can always tell when he is joking and often leads to hurt feelings and annoyance of those feelings from both parties.  From that I can learn to loosen up a bit, and he can learn to be a bit more sensitive and thoughtful as to how he may come off to people.  So, tackling my husbands point of view on "matches made in heaven", and integrating it into mine I come up with this: All people are capable for the most part, to have a successful relationship with anyone, because it all boils down to their willingness to participate, and to keep participating in the relationship wholeheartedly.  Just because two people have similar interest and could have an effortless relationship doesn't guarantee that either of them will do what ever measure of effort is needed to make that happen. And vice versa.  That's where love comes to play. Do you love this person? For their good and their bad.  My mom used to say a phrase "loving their dirty underwear".  Now that sounds pretty gross and I never understood it until now.  How you can still get that "love" feeling- not to be confused with butterflies and heart stopping ooey-gooey stuff, but feeling when you know you love them while seeing them at their worst, or their dirty underwear in this case.  If you can think of their smile, or their laugh or whatever it is that gets you going about them in the middle of your WORST argument, and cant help but to smile back and love them, then thats it. That's all that matters.  At least that's how I know for myself personally that I am where I am supposed to be. Because there is just some crap that I just could not see myself doing if it were for another, because it's not meant for another.  I couldn't stay up late keeping score and actively engaging in a Call-of-Duty game for anyone else. I couldn't go to a movie and pass up a romantic comedy for a satirical irony film for someone other than him.  And because I love him I want to.  It makes me want to, because I want him. I can't lie though, that it is easy to lose sight of that, and what a person means to you when you get caught up in all the annoying things that you let bother you, because it is a choice. I don't think that the annoying little habits that get under my skin now were hiding all this time. I just chose not to focus on them. He was and always will be a know-it-all who's always right, and I love that know-it-all. Patience and grace and humbleness, and servanthood are qualities that are most essential and powerful in a relationship. At least in mine. The hardest thing though is to continue to practice these things when the other is not. It is easy to love someone and be kind and forgiving when they do the same for you, but not so easy when they are not. We have the need for self-preservation while forgetting that we gave up self, for US.  Ideally in a perfect world, the wife would be more concerned about meeting her husband's needs than her own while never having to worry about her own because he's equally concerned about her needs. But it doesn't always work that way. Often times, one person becomes much too dependent on the other expecting them to meet needs no one human can meet alone.  This fulfillment does not replace personal responsibility to oneself to achieve goals and reach dreams, or replace the need for Christ as a savior.  The lack thereof of a spouse doing his or her part should not be detrimental so much so that the person on the other end is incompetent and incapable of moving along with daily activities. It is hard though not to get so caught up in the serving of another that you neglect yourself personally, and that is something I have been guilty of and yes, that does take a toll on the relationship. If you stop investing in the things that make you a healthy and lovable you, your level of attractiveness to your spouse dwindles. After all, they loved you, and married you, so they want you, and you cannot forget the thins that makes you you. (I am speaking to myself here, so if you cannot relate, skim on until you find something of interest). I have seen this happen in my own personal life which adds another level of importance to my journey to self-discovery and understanding, because my husband and eventually children benefit from it also.  Whether people make relationships and marriages work the first time around or the third, they all reach the same point.  The point at which the feeling is gone, the problems are real and the question is raised: are we right for each other. And honestly that is a personal question. Most times you can make it work. There are special cases for everything, too many to name so this is not absolute. But in anything you have to make the choice to stay no matter what. Whatever it takes. If I have to carry around a list of things that genuinely make me love him and pull it out each and every time i feel an argument coming on, or I feel as if I need to complain, or whatever. Sometimes its just not worth it. Not worth compromising the peace and taking away the joy. My husband is not prince charming. Yes, he is charming, but he is real. Which means he is imperfect and will let me down, numerously.  But yet I can love him, and he can love me. And in realizing that we are both merely human we can enjoy each other in our imperfect-ness and reshape and reform ourselves from two separate pieces to one bigger, better piece, still not perfect, but perfectly right for and with one another so much so, that it seems that the heavens planned for them to be together in the first place.

A Journey to Self-Discovery Starts With A Look Into the Past...

So, when figuring out who you are where do you start? Your parents, your friends, other family members? Maybe, but if you yourself are unsure of who you are, how much more could they know? So my first theory on how to find out "who" I am ( saying that phrase makes me feel so lost and clueless somehow...) was to try a bunch of different activities to determine whether or not I liked them, and a variety of other means that would otherwise seems as though I am "dating" mayself, which sounds lame when you say it aloud, but whatever.  The problem with the method as I came to see, was that the approach it takes is one that assumes that eveything that I had ever done "before" this self-discovery just doesnt count, and is only concerned with the "after".  But now I am starting to think otherwise.  So I am now trying to pull from my memory specific events, titles, activities, friendships, interests and so forth that can tell me about me, beause I have always been what I am, I am just trying to understand who I am, so it is not at all as if I am lost, just maybe undiscovered??? Yea, I'll run with that.  So looking back on all those personality sheets, and books and worksheets I've filled out over the years, (which first off, the fact that I still have them tells me that I like to keep stuff. Why? I dont know, maybe for times like this! So for one I am an archiver, sort of...) So looking at those questions of whats your favorite color and book and stuff like that I see some commonalities.  One, I have always liked to read. Two, my favorite color has almost never stayed the same, but more specifically I have never really had only one at a time, they were always in variations.  In the fourth grade I liked navy and purple, in the seventh grade I liked pink and brown, which tells me that I enjoy things like colors more when they are associated with others that compliment the other... i guess, or maybe im just making that up, but it sounds nice so I'll keep it.  But I find the color thing funny because now, my favorite colors are yellow and gray and I had never really thought of how I pick colors and not one color.  Something my mom used to say to me a lot was that it was hard for her to find me things that I liked becuase it always changed! I can say that I never really liked a certain character like barbie, or who ever.  I liked toys and I had barbies, but I wasnt specific to any one kind where as my sister has always like tweety bird for example.  I did like mickey mouse for a time but it was never a fixation.  Some of the other things that pretty much stayed the same throughout time was my favorite subject: english. Least favorite varied between math and history, eventually settling to history with science staying saftely in the middle.  Hobbies were: reading, which is still true, just not as much as it used to be, singing.. uh not nearly as much as I used to, writing, well that is self explanitory, but I dont do that as much, I used to journal every day, now I do it maybe a few times a month if that, and I used to write short stories and poems which I havents since my junior year of high school, but my blogging is making up some ground.  Other things I liked to do was watch movies, and coloring and stuff like that.  I didnt meet a friend that I would have for a while untitl I was in the sixth grade, which is also the time where I stopped transfering schools and stayed in one district and she and I are still friends.  I didnt have many sleepovers or go to any parties and my social life in middle and high school was below average compared to the other kids I knew, so with that I'd have to improvise.  Somethings I would have liked to do in high school would have been to play tennis and to be on the dance team, and I really wanted to be on National Honors Society, I made honor roll and Renaissance most often but at my school you had to be nominated and all that other good stuff to be on NHS.  I was pretty active in other areas though like on STAR which was basically like an advisory board for at risk kids and I was on the executive board for that and went out of town a lot.  I was really close to many of my teachers and was good at making lasting relationships with them. I planned on going away to school after high school and graduating early.  I did graduate early, but I didnt go away to school, and now, a year from then this is where I am.  I am working a retail job, and married, and going to school for nursing.  I volunteer at a local hospital for my work study and during the school year I am pretty busy.  I tend to really challange myself and set the bar pretty high. I have always been academically smart and am a lover of a challange.  So I've looked at where I was, and Im sitting where I am now, having to decide where I want to go, and how I will get there.  Its only really been a year since I was a "kid".  Since I was in high school and I felt like the world was my oyster, but it feels much longer, and I have to keep reminding myself that I am still young, I am still capable, but somehow I have forgotten. Even the simplest of concepts.  I think the biggest reason is becuase I personally had stopped.  Some things I have stopped over time like my writing fell, off and eventually so did my interest, my reading.  I used to read over 50 or so books a year without effort.  And I used to feel... I cant even think of a word... able.  Or confident I guess is what I am looking for, because there were obstacles and hinderances and blockages to many things growing up that are irrelevant right now, but it never mattered.  I never saw them. I never felt incapable.  NEVER. And I can say that absolutely.  I had feeling of fear, and had problems of uncertainty of myself and confidence, but I never once felt like I couldnt.  It never crosses my mind "what if it doesnt happen?"  And when I started to try and live out my dreams and apsirations, as life does, things started to change, some for the good and some not so much.  For one thing I gained an incredible and amazingly smart, and patient husband who doenst recieve enought credit.  But I think that I let things that should have only been used as alterations, or editing techniques to my plans, become periods, not commas.  And thats what I mean when I say stopped.  I'll say my sensitivity grew as my creativity lessened and everything I took personally.  The world was out to get me and I just could not understand for the life of me WHY! Why  this was happening to me.  And it wasnt necessarily a bad thing.  I had just never encontered reality and when it came, it hit me hard.  My emotions became bigger than what was ahead of me and I lost focus all too quickly and too often.  I felt stripped of all that made me, me and was looking for something, someone to tell me it was wrong, and the re-dress me of who I thought I was and should be.  When I looked around for some kind of blue-print or example there was none. I just had to wing it.  I became more and more aware of my struggle and the lack thereof of others around me such as my husband and friends with no way to cope, no way to recover.  Part of me didnt even realize this shift until too late.  Until it had already taken a toll on my and my relationships.  I was frustrated and confused and emotional and super sensitive.  I needed a common ground.  A starting point, a constant, something that would never change, beacause there is something I have to learn and my future depends on the success of it. It was around this point that I was tired of arguing and being frustrated and unhappy and all the feelings that I felt that I had to stop and think about me.  That it is more than finding out my favorite color, or something to do with myself to keep busy or whatever.  I had to decied that I was worth searching for.  So I started a blog, because if I know one thing that I had always learned from best was from myself through writing.  How can I make this the best life possible for me? The biggest thing I can do for myself right now is to keep going. To not look at the past and compare it to now, beating myself up and making myself sad over the things I cannot get back.  How can I maximize the moment?  Because after-all no matter how much I may try, my permanant address is at Here-and-Now blvd. And my right now will change and effect my future now.  Just as simple as going to school and working hard now will eventually change to going to work and enjoying my career now. So, this is where I am.  Deep in thought and ready for reform.