"What's Meant to Be, Will Be" Motto: Why I Disagree

Somebody that I follow tonight posted a somewhat angry, definitely bitter disagreement with the theory behind this phrase, and I have to say that I agree. Maybe I'm not as angry as she is, but that could be all relevant to a bad mood that she's in. Regardless - I've never had this way of thinking, and without ever considering why, never thought it could be a trusted way to live by. Sure, sometimes when the world is overwhelming and you feel like you've put an inordinate amount of energy into getting from one place to the next and made no progress, all your mind can handle anymore is to sit back and let things play out; you realize that you can't control the situation, or even affect it a bit, and that rather than pointlessly wasting energy trying to shape the outcome of a situation it is best to prepare for how to deal with whatever the outcome may be.

But really, I have to agree with this woman that living by "what's meant to be, will be" feels lazy, and gives no justification for being upset when things don't turn out the way that you want them to. This phrase is used with dreams, goals, careers, etc. and for those instances it is more obvious that you can't sit back and let things happen. Because you know what will happen? You likely won't achieve it, because you didn't put the work in. That's an obvious one. But so many people use this phrase in the context of relationships - and it drives me crazy. Relationships take work, and effort, and time, and patience. They do not just happen, they do not just thrive, they do not exist without some extent of give and take for each other, and they do not last simply because they are meant to be. Now this isn't an excuse to stay in an unhealthy relationship by saying all relationships require work and effort; what it is, though, is a challenge of this passive phrase that allows people to assume that life will take care of itself yet we can still complain about an unfavorable outcome despite the fact that we didn't put any effort in.

 

The idea of a relationship that's "right" being easy, and effortless, and simple isn't true. Those words are relative. A relationship shouldn't be chaos, and constant clashing, but it will require work, and it will require compromising and thinking of somebody other than yourself. I'm sure there are many people who disagree with me, and some people who will read this and feel like their way of life is being dismantled and attacked. It's not meant to tell you that you are living your life entirely the wrong way, and always have been, but more to challenge a mode of thinking and to show when it might be okay to use it and when it could end up doing harm rather than good. I hope this interests some people, and leads people to reflect on themselves a bit.

A Plane with Free Wifi Sparks Reflections About Love

So I will be blogging away. I miss Hanna already - seems crazy right? But it's not. It's not crazy when the purest form of happiness I reach is with her. I do not laugh with the same freedom when I am not with her, so yes, the second I walk out of her arms knowing that I won't be in them again for a while is painful and lonely. This weekend was incredible - short as it was. Our love is reaffirmed in my heart endlessly, and these last few days spoke loudly to the constant re-falling in love that I do over and over again. In the beginning of a relationship you fall fast, and hard. The world spins around you and you pray that the one you love is falling along side of you. Sometimes people think it plateaus - that you reach a certain point when you stabilize and you are madly in love but cannot love each other more than you already do. They're wrong. There are points months, years after the honeymoon period of a relationship when two people fall more in love. I arrived in St. Louis feeling like I could not possibly love this woman any more than I did. I leave loving her even more, and I sit on this plane knowing that weeks, months, and years from now I will likely look back on this time and say I love her so much more then.

The beauty of true love is that you are never done discovering and re-discovering each other. We feel like we know each other so well, like we know everything about each other, from that girl that used to be her best friend when she was thirteen to that time a man creepily stared at her eating her ice cream in a Baskin-Robbins - and we do. We do know each other better than anybody else does, and I'm confident in saying that. We know every corner of each other's hearts, dark or light, hidden or not, and there is nothing in there that makes me turn away from her; but, the magic of our love and relationship is constantly finding out new things we didn't know about each other every day. Whether it's stories we've never heard, memories that have shaped who we are, or people that have come and gone in our lives, part of the ever-burning flame that keeps this love alive is that we are never done knowing each other.

There are so many moments: like reflecting on how much our love has grown since the last time I was in St. Louis, realizing that the last time I was here was the first time I met her brother and nieces and now the kids greet me with hugs and her brother and sister-in-law and parents feel more like family than a shared connection to one person; like watching her laugh hysterically at a comedian during Pridefest, and being frozen by the beauty of her smile and the breathtaking sound of her laugh; like waking up to her arms wrapping around me and feeling that still be the first thing she wants to do when she wakes up after all this time; like still sharing and craving the passion and heat that we did one year ago; and like holding each other close, eyes glued and smiling, kissing between "I will miss you's" and "I love you's," magnets between every finger tip and nerve in our bodies, and being so in love that the airport and cars around us disappears during our goodbye. These moments are just some of what it means to be irrevocably in love, and growingly in love still.

My love for you, Hanna, will never stop growing, and never fade. We have a once in a lifetime love that I am so proud of. I am so proud of you and all that you are - I am so in love with you and all that you all. This relationship never feels old, never "the norm," never to be taken for granted, always to be worked for, and always the only thing I could ever want.

I love you then,

I love you now,

I love you always.