After I Do

by Taylor Jenkins Reid

It just goes to show how alike failure and success can appear. Sometimes only you know the truth.

These letters are the evidence of how ugly our marriage has become and yet proof that we are tied to each other. We can hate and love, miss and loathe each other all within the same breath. We can never want to see each other again while never wanting to let go.

Marriage is about commitment. It’s about loyalty. It’s not about happiness. Happiness is secondary.

Unconditional love is the freedom to follow your heart and still have a home.

I’ve come to realize that resentment is malignant. That it starts small and festers. That it grows wild and unfettered inside of you until it’s so expansive that it has worked its way into the furthest, deepest parts of you and holds on for dear life.

It may seem hard, almost impossible, to love without the expectation of love in return, but once you have figured out how to do it, you will find that you really are a parent.

it’s nice when you can let go of what you thought life should be and just be happy with what it is.”

Maybe it doesn’t matter if you need someone during the everyday moments of your life. Maybe what matters is that when you need someone, they are the one you need. Maybe needing someone isn’t about not being able to do it without them. Maybe needing someone is about it being easier if they are by your side.

Why do we do this? Why do we undervalue things when we have them? Why is it only on the verge of losing something that we see how much we need it?

“Just because you can live without someone doesn’t mean you want to,” she says.

Laughing and crying are so intrinsically tied together, spun of the same material, that it’s hard to tell one from the other sometimes. And it’s easier than you think to go from being so happy you could cry to so devastated you could laugh.

“Brutal honesty. It’s OK to hurt me. It’s OK to hurt my feelings. It’s OK to embarrass me. As long as you do it from love. Nothing you could ever say out of love could hurt as much as it did to look into your eyes and see that you couldn’t stand me anymore.

Some people love that about life, that it’s unpredictable and unruly. I hate it. I hate that it doesn’t have the common decency to wait for a profound moment to take something from you.

Look at the things we are capable of in the name of the people we love.

Here is what I can tell you. All that matters in this life is that you try. All that matters is that you open your heart, give everything you have, and keep trying.