Being Open to Love

60: (June 2019)

If you had told me 20 years ago that I would marry for a second time when I was approaching 60, I wouldn’t have believed it. Yet my husband and I have recently celebrated our second anniversary.

My Catholic upbringing didn’t acknowledge divorce, and I never dreamed I’d experience it. So going through a divorce in my 40s tore at the fiber of my being. Healing was slow and mindful;  I worked hard at trying to heal not just my wounded sense of self, but my spiritual self—the part of me that connects with something indefinable and keeps me open to life. Open to possibilities. I’m awfully glad I didn’t shut down and miss out on what’s turned out to be a surprisingly wonderful second act of life.

When the man who is now my husband showed up at my door for a cup of tea years ago, we began to gradually get to know each other. I guess we’re not exactly spontaneous types; over a decade later, we decided to formalize our union by getting married. But I had already given my heart to him years earlier. Being open to love not only gave me a delightful life partner, it also gave me the joy of being in relationships with his grown children and their families, as well as his extended family. My life has expanded in ways I couldn’t have imagined.

The man I am now married to is smart, good looking, fun, has a great sense of humor, and he even enjoys dancing! He’s a solid person with good values—someone who can always be counted upon. But the crucial characteristic he has that rises above all the rest for me is kindness. That is the essential ingredient for me; the rest is gravy.

Are we in 100% agreement on everything? Absolutely not. But I’ve been around long enough to know that no one is ever going to be in complete sync with anyone else, and a mirror image wouldn’t even be desirable. Having differences allows for some growing edges.

I sometimes wonder how I got here. Was this relationship possible because I scraped out all the old residue from the divorce and worked so hard on releasing the pain? Does it have anything to do with trying to be thankful for everything, no matter what, and finding the silver linings? In other words, does karma really work? Or was it just a case of good luck?

I don’t know. But I think I now know what contentment feels like. It feels really good, and I am indeed thankful.

40: (June 1999)

I spoke with a friend of mine who is 40-years-old and has never married, which she now regrets. She lamented over the fact that she spent the previous decade protecting herself from emotional pain and therefore never experienced love.

We talked about relationships that had caused her heartache in her 20s. She told me about a current relationship and the complications caused by various hardships that her friend has in his life at this time. It seemed like everything we talked about involved a fair amount of suffering, so we discussed the Buddhist concept that life is suffering. There is beauty, too, but it is pure gift within a reality of transience, of bodies that age, sicken, and die.

I later mused over how the idea that life is suffering can be juxtaposed with the Biblical imperative to thank God for all things—not just the good things—but all things, including the painful things. Why, I wondered? Perhaps because pain and suffering contain the opportunity to be transformed into and by love. Suffering is a given; we all suffer at one time or another. Within that is the potential to love. We have the choice, the freedom, to be either paralyzed by pain or to create the opportunity to love.

Which brings to mind my other friend, whose child was in a coma for many months due to a freak accident on the beach. He is 12 years old now, smiles and laughs, and has made tremendous progress, but his brain has been damaged and he may never be able to walk. Yet his parents recently gave birth to a baby girl. Despite the pain they undoubtedly experience as they witness their son’s tremendous challenges, they chose to love a child again; they chose life. Perhaps my unmarried friend needs to open herself to such risk in order to move beyond her pain to a place where love can find fertile ground.

To suffer is the human experience. To choose to love is to bring a bit of the divine into our daily lives. May we all have the courage to take the risk: love.

60-40:

I have to admit that when I’m going through pain, it’s very hard to remember that something good can ever come from it. Yet I am living proof that it can and it does. Alchemy can happen, transforming painful experiences into something completely different and beautiful.

Being open to love means being open to pain, because life is unpredictable and bad things happen. Sickness, death, heartache. I try to practice gratitude for every good minute in life, because I know there will be a time when pain rears its head again; it’s inevitable.

In the meanwhile, there’s dancing, family, fun times, and day to day life to be shared. So many possibilities.