Lynden Renwick's Blog - Posts Tagged "musings"
Wives & Girlfriends
My first serious relationship began when I was twenty years old. At some point during that relationship, my good friends and mentors Simon and Jane talked to me about the difference between wives and girlfriends. They told me that marriage is not simply ‘boyfriend and girlfriend forever.’ However, although they told me what marriage is not, they did not tell me what it is.
After spending over five years with my wife Katrina (and loving her every minute of those years), and roughly fifteen months of marriage, I think I’ve figured out what marriage is in the context of contrasting it to dating.
Dating is the gradual process of revealing oneself to another person. Bit by bit, we show our true self to another, eventually opening our heart. This is, of course, why being dumped hurts so much - it is, in essence, another person looking at our most vulnerable and exposed selves and saying, ‘no thanks, that’s not for me. I don’t want that.’ Anyone who has been through a breakup can tell you that while rejection sucks, breakups are heartbreaking. The difference therein lies in the different degrees of personal exposure.
If dating is the gradual process of revealing oneself to another, the natural progression of this is complete and open exposure. When both you and the other person are fully exposed (and you each come to realize that the other is ‘the one’), you respectively look upon each true and vulnerable self and say, openly, ‘Yes! I want that. I want all of it.’ This is, I think, the essence of marriage proposal.
So, if dating is the gradual process of revealing oneself to another, and proposal is the acceptance of one another once fully revealed, what is marriage? Well, once we’re fully exposed to someone, it doesn’t end there. Each does not simply continue existing as their complete individual self in the company of another. Marriage, I think, is where each person begins to grow into the other. As each person does so, they begin to complete one another, and form a perfect union. I think (or rather, I hope) that as this growth continues, that husband and wife really do become one. That’s not to say that they lose themselves or their identity in the other. More that their true self simply forms a part of something new. Something more complete.
Although married for only a short time, this is what marriage has been for me, and, it being the greatest thing that has ever happened to me, I would hope that this is true for every married man and woman, for my life would feel rather incomplete without my wife.
After spending over five years with my wife Katrina (and loving her every minute of those years), and roughly fifteen months of marriage, I think I’ve figured out what marriage is in the context of contrasting it to dating.
Dating is the gradual process of revealing oneself to another person. Bit by bit, we show our true self to another, eventually opening our heart. This is, of course, why being dumped hurts so much - it is, in essence, another person looking at our most vulnerable and exposed selves and saying, ‘no thanks, that’s not for me. I don’t want that.’ Anyone who has been through a breakup can tell you that while rejection sucks, breakups are heartbreaking. The difference therein lies in the different degrees of personal exposure.
If dating is the gradual process of revealing oneself to another, the natural progression of this is complete and open exposure. When both you and the other person are fully exposed (and you each come to realize that the other is ‘the one’), you respectively look upon each true and vulnerable self and say, openly, ‘Yes! I want that. I want all of it.’ This is, I think, the essence of marriage proposal.
So, if dating is the gradual process of revealing oneself to another, and proposal is the acceptance of one another once fully revealed, what is marriage? Well, once we’re fully exposed to someone, it doesn’t end there. Each does not simply continue existing as their complete individual self in the company of another. Marriage, I think, is where each person begins to grow into the other. As each person does so, they begin to complete one another, and form a perfect union. I think (or rather, I hope) that as this growth continues, that husband and wife really do become one. That’s not to say that they lose themselves or their identity in the other. More that their true self simply forms a part of something new. Something more complete.
Although married for only a short time, this is what marriage has been for me, and, it being the greatest thing that has ever happened to me, I would hope that this is true for every married man and woman, for my life would feel rather incomplete without my wife.
