A SOULFUL RELATIONSHIP by Rev. Ronald McFadden
October 24th, 2005 by millette05married, share it with your spouse or other married couples and
reflect on it. An African proverb states, "Before you get
married, keep both eyes open, and after you marry, close one eye."
Before you get involved and make a commitment to someone, don’t
let lust, desperation, immaturity, ignorance, pressure from
others or a low self-esteem, make you blind to warning signs.
Keep your eyes open, and don’t fool yourself that you can change
someone or that what you see as faults aren’t really important.
Once you decide to commit to someone, over time his or her
flaws, vulnerabilities, pet peeves, and differences will become
more obvious. If you love your mate and want the relationship to
grow and evolve, you’ve got to learn to close one eye and not
let every little thing bother you. You and your mate have many
different expectations, emotional needs, values, dreams,
weaknesses, and strengths. You are two unique individual
children of God who have decided to share a life together.
Neither of you are perfect, but are you perfect for each other?
Do you bring out the best in each other? Do you compliment and
compromise with each other, or do you compete, compare, and
control? What do you bring to the relationship? Do you bring
past relationships, past hurt, past mistrust, past pain? You
can’t take someone to the altar to alter him or her. You can’t
make someone love you or make someone stay.
If you develop self-esteem, spiritual discernment, and "a life",
you won’t find yourself making someone else responsible for your
happiness or responsible for your pain.
Manipulation, control, jealousy, neediness, and selfishness are
not the ingredients of a thriving, healthy, loving and lasting
relationship! Seeking status, sex, wealth, and security are the
wrong reasons to be in a relationship. What keeps a relationship strong?
Communication, intimacy, trust, a sense of humor, sharing
household tasks, some getaway time without business or children
and daily exchanges (a meal, shared activity, a hug, a call, a touch, a note).
Leave a nice message on the voicemail or send a nice email.
Sharing common goals and interests. Growth is important. Grow
together, not away from each other, giving each other space to
grow without feeling insecure. Allow your mate to have outside
interest. You can’t always be together. Give each other a sense
of belonging and assurances of commitment. Don’t try to control
one another. Learn each other’s family situation. Respect his or her parents regardless.
Don’t put pressure on each other for material goods. Remember
for richer or for poorer. If these qualities are missing, the
relationship will erode as resentment, withdrawal, abuse,
neglect, dishonesty, and pain replace the passion.
The difference between ‘United’ and ‘Untied’ is where you put the I.
When you have lots of love.. you have soOo much to do!
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