There are times when I wonder why I got involved with my partner. He's the physical representation of everything I hate in the world more often than I care to mention. He plays too many video games. He can't stand the idea of being bored. He doesn't want to sit down and have an intelligent conversation. Hell, we hardly get to spend any quality time together! I have to wonder how exactly we're supposed to function as a family when he's always lost in video game land and I'm trying to educate and expand my mind. How were we supposed to get along if I wanted to focus more on healthy eating and living and he prefers to have unhealthy foods and not waste the energy to have a healthy lifestyle? How were we going to make this work when I wanted to take the time to become more sustainable and live in a kinder way to the environment when that takes far too much effort for him?
Today I realized just why we work so well. As much as he may not want to set up a compost pile, garden, recycle, eat healthy, save energy, and educate his mind, he is incredibly family oriented, something at the very core of my being. His days off aren't just spent lazing around playing video games. He'll watch movies with the kids, chase them around the park, and play games with them. He spends a lot of time and focus on the kids, though he's been slacking as of late. Stress does that to you. Unlike a lot of men, he actually plays with his baby boy too! There are so many days I hear the kids screaming and laughing because they're actually having fun! I think back to their dad and realize that we never used to have those kinds of days. Screaming and loud laughter would be met with him yelling to keep it down, or complaining that their high pitched screams were killing his head and his ears. Now they have a chance to break out and actually do what kids do! It's not just with Mom, but with my partner as well. He feels like a part of the family.
Above all the sustainability goals, the healthy living choices, and everything else, I care about my kids. I want them to be happy. If they were truly miserable living sustainably and making healthy choices in life, there's a good chance I'd give it up, or at least focus less on it. I want my kids to grow up happy and healthy, and if that means giving in on what I believe so they can be happy, as long as they're healthy and happy, I'm okay with that. They need a sense of how a good family works, where there's plenty of love and respect for everyone. That's something they're finally getting.
My friend, the Artsy Eclectic, over at Otherwise Quite Good and Literary Magic, made a very good point to me just last week. She mentioned that many of her friends seem like they just don't get along with their significant other. I mean, obviously they get along well enough to stay together, but it's not like they go out and do the couple thing all that often. I used to be the same way with my older two's father. He would stay home and I would go out, often dragging the kids along with me. We never really wanted to do the same kinds of things, nor did we really spend any time together. I know how that goes. As much as she sees it in the women in her life, I'm noticing that more often than not, I see the same too. Very rarely do I hang out with a couple. More often than not, it's just one of the pair. I'm starting to realize how lucky I am to have a partner that I want to spend so much of my time with! I'm lucky that we can take the kids to the park together, that we can go out to visit with friends together instead of separate friends at separate times. I mean, there are times when we don't all go see the same friends together and do the individual thing, but we can do the couple thing as well. We can do the family thing quite well, and we can spend time with another family together, something I'm noticing is pretty rare.
So what if he's not quite on board with all my other goals in life. There's plenty of time to convert him to my evil ways! Well, to my better ways? I've already won with cloth diapering, which he now loves, so perhaps there is hope after all, when I show him how good healthy foods can taste and how incredibly easy a healthy lifestyle is. He'll always be a video game playing kid that never grew up, a little bit of a Peter Pan, but (as much as I never like to admit it) I can be the same way!
Our days may not always be filled with perfection, happiness, getting along, and wonderful family times, but I'm really lucky to have him in my life. He's brought so much love and happiness into the whole family. He may have his days, but the kids and I agree, he's definitely become a part of the family.
At the end of this month is a holiday for being thankful for all the wonderful things in our lives. I say, why wait! I'm taking this moment to be thankful for the wonderful man in my life, my wonderful family, and all of the challenges they bring! What do you have to be thankful for?
Very interesting blog. My wife and I were just speaking to this very same issue. We have been on the spiritual path for over 30 years.
ReplyDeleteWe see a clearly defined shift between polarities. There are the few, like yourself, who desire spiritual truth. Conversely there are others who choose to remain asleep.
Many ancient cultures, specifically the Mayan, believe we will, as a species, reach a crossroads to evolution on or about December 21, 2012. The media is making a complete mess of this topic with fear biased predictions of Nibiru and global destruction. All the Mayan are saying is that, a crossroads will be reached whereas we will be forced, as a race, to embrace fear or love. If we choose love, a path of evolutionary change will revolutionize the way we experience reality.
The Mayan believe that as we near this moment in history the peoples of the earth will experience an undefinable push toward love or fear as the nature and expression of duality remains in balance.
This experience will cause many couples, like yourselves, to remain patient with each other as diverging desires spread further your interests. In such trying times you, as the spiritual benchmark for your family, will need to be non judgmental, understanding and most importantly emphasize unconditional love.
Some couples will not be able to adapt to these ever increasing changes. They will find it impossible to follow their heart without separating from the non spiritual emanations of their partner.
Your partner sounds like a loving and caring man. It is very apparent his souls path does not include spirituality, this truth is exactly the way it should be. When looking to our partner to fulfill a connection to spirituality it is essential to accept when that connection does not exist.
Remember the illusions of time, space and separation. We are not 6.8 billion people, we are ONE. This ONE is eternal consciousness. God chose to become the multi verse, this fact endows all manifest reality with the essence of GOD. All is God, you, your husband and children, the desk you sit at, even the words you read is God. There is nothing which is not God. The essence of all reality is duality. We must embrace all reality as God dancing with God in the perfect eternal moment of NOW.
Understanding this, my sister, allows you to know eternal consciousness we will never die, we are GOD. I look forward to following your future thoughts. May peace and love be yours always.
Namaste, my siser, best regards. Love is all there is, all else is truly illusion...
Your words are truly beautiful! What a refreshing look at everything about the December 21, 2012 concept! I hadn't heard that one before, and knowing that side of things, I now have confidence that I'm far more right on that than I thought I was!
ReplyDeleteThank you for being an inspiration!