|
Work of love? It requires initial attraction, perpetual attention |
|
|
|
Tuesday, 05 September 2006 |
 | | Marc Mullinax |
"Love is everything it‘s cracked up to be ... It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don‘t risk anything, you risk even more."
– Erica Jong
•
MARS HILL – One of my great pleasures is counseling couples for marriage, and assisting in their wedding ceremonies. I insist on the counseling part, for love is easy to fall into, but hard to make stay.
In fact, you cannot make it stay. There‘s a mystery to love that defies formulaic principles for making it stay. Each couple has to work that formula out for themselves.
Then
they must renegotiate that formula. What works in Year One of a
marriage may be outdated by Year Five, or earlier. Ranier Maria Rilke
has written the truth: For one human being to love another human being:
that is perhaps the most difficult task that has been entrusted to us,
the ultimate task, the final test and proof, the work for which all
other work is merely preparation.
To fail the
tests of love in our lives means that we run the risk of living
lovelessly. Such a condition is fatal to our souls, long before our
bodies wear out.
Failing the love
requirement is only half the problem. To renounce love means that one
must ultimately renounce Mystery. For who really knows why we wake up
beside the person we do? Sure, we can enumerate various logical reasons
about looks, and sexual appeal, or even soul attraction, but can anyone
really put into words what really cranks their gears when it comes to
Mystery?
We need Mystery.
There is not a substitute for it. Love is perhaps our best device for
getting us in continuous touch with the Mystery of being, of being
connected, of forgiveness and grace, and soul-growth. Thus, as one
ages, love perhaps becomes more a means than an end.
I guess to
experience such mysteries with one person one‘s whole life-long is a
grace worth praying for. It‘s also worth working and sweating for.
To such a life,
I have a book to recommend. Asheville residents Shonnie Lavender and
Bruce Mulkey (who are married to each other) have just published a book
entitled, "I Do! I Do! The Marriage Vow Workbook." But it‘s a book that
is not so much about wedding vows but about life-promises to oneself
and one‘s lover.
I like this book
because it is a practical reminder to listen. Listen to one‘s own life,
and then get your self out of the fricking way to listen to your
lover‘s life. Many of us are perhaps raised that if we really love
someone who is our "soul mate," then that person will automatically
know what I want without asking for it.
Bull.
Truly,
communication is about becoming aware of one‘s needs and how those
needs affect one, or infect a relationship. Once aware, one can then
hear another‘s needs being communicated.
Becoming aware is key; it rarely happens, especially after the first year of marriage.
Lavender and
Mulkey‘s book then, is an excellent one. They were writing it for
wedding planners. I‘m recommending it to all those who are in love, and
want to enable love to stay.
Apart from the
workbook style of the book, there are numerous quotes on love and
relationship-building, the kind one could copy and paste onto your
computer, refrigerator, or nightstand.
Take the dare to
work to make your love stay. Pick up their book, the details of which
you can find at www.marriagevowworkbook.com.
•
Dr. Marc S.
Mullinax, chairman of the philosophy and religion departments at Mars
Hill College, can be reached at mmullinax-at-mhc.edu.
|
