234. She was devastated when he ended their romance, now the tables are turned

Life is much easier, I’ve found, when we take it as it is. Instead – and you could almost say this is a hallmark of most mature dating – we’re nearly always looking for what isn’t. “I need a man,” or “I need a woman in my life,” we think. Instead of dating because it’s just the natural thing to do we tend to think we need something that someone else can give us.

But do we really know what we need? Can we relax and enjoy life when we’re always striving and seeking? It’s like rushing for a plane to get somewhere. Once we arrive we can stop rushing. But in dating we’re often rushing constantly. The stress is always in the back of our minds: “My life won’t be happy until I have a partner.” It’s a thought that comes from somewhere and we latch onto it and believe it. Where did that thought come from? Where does it go when we’re not thinking it? It’s so transient how can it be real? Yet we usually treat our thoughts as almost sacred. We believe them totally, and we hurt as a result.

I know a woman in her mid-60s who fell madly in love with a man about five years ago. He ended the relationship some months later and she was devastated. Later they maintained some contact and became friends. Recently they’ve gotten together a few times and it’s clear to her that he really wants to resume their romance, and even wants now to marry her. But she’s not so sure. When before she thought her happiness was ended forever because he was gone from her life, she’s now seeing that he may not be the right guy at all. She realizes now that her earlier belief that life was over for her wasn't accurate at all.

Can we really know what’s best for us? That life force that brought us into being and keeps us alive is actually doing the living that we call “my” life. We’re being lived. Yet we think, somehow, that we know what’s best for “my” life instead of trusting that maybe things are exactly as they’re meant to be.

What do we really know about this life force? What do we know about how our futures should look? When you think about it, isn’t it awfully stressful to always be living with an eye toward how life could be if only we had that perfect partner? What’s that feel like? How would it feel if we simply relaxed, dated, enjoyed the adventure, and watched as life played itself out? Whichever way we view life, the actual events are going to be just as they are anyway. Maybe it makes sense to just love things as they are and stop the stress of trying to control what we can never control. Life is. That’s it.

Copyright © 2007 Chuck Custer