| So, what is
love (any way!) and marriage
?  People get married for a lot of reasons.
Lots of people get married because they're "in love", then times get tough or
they meet someone else and they decide that the marriage is over (on average, after only 3
years).
What most people fail to understand is that the
institution of marriage is larger than the desires and wills of a husband and wife.
Marriage is a 4-way transformation among two partners, their community, and whatever it is
that they consider spiritual.
Marriage creates bonds between all four
participants, and changes each of them. Even when the bond between the partners seems weak
or shreded, those other bonds can provide sustenance and the seeds of healing.
Love, the only kind of love worth getting married
over, must be unconditional and unemotional. I know, I know, it sounds strange. Passion is
a fine thing, and every marriage should have some (OK, maybe a lot), but it's not what
makes a marriage bond. That doesn't mean that you should stay in an abusive situation, but
it does mean that you should never bargain anything of yourself for love, and you should
never trade love for anything of someone elses.
What a dilemma...that the thing we crave the most
can't be bartered for anything - not even for itself.
Unconditional love is not an abstract emotional
concept. It is the single greatest risk, and the single greatest joy, that a person can
experience. It doesn't say "I don't care what you are"; it is not blind (that's
right, gentle reader, unconditional love IS NOT blind). Unconditional love says,
"Whatever you have been, whatever you are, and whatever you will become, it will not
change my love for you."
- anonymous |
