Lives' Paths

Edited and expanded from my original post elsewhere ...

Each life of ours is like a path: a path we walked, leaving behind a trail - which is our personal history - and continuing this trail with every step we take, in each and every moment, in each and every day. (And so also in some ways, we are each a unique individual, for no one can share every moment of our history; even two identical twins are two different persons.)

We may not see where we are heading. At best we may have a glimpse, but only of the immediate surroundings. But a step we must take, inexorably, whether we do it volitionally or let "nature takes its course" and let "nature" carries you along. There is no "sitting on your ass" in this path of life: either take the step or the step is taken for you.

You can be like a leaf floating on a stream. You can let the stream carry you along. Then you may swiftly flow downstream, over rapids and falls, joining other streams, then rivers, and maybe eventually you reach the open seas. Or the stream may carry you into an eddy where you swirl endlessly until you sink to the bottom, or you may get caught in some obstacle in the stream and there you remain till you decay.

But you can not be like the leaf too. You can rather try to be a boat where you are the rower. Now over and above letting the stream carries you where it may, you can row upstream or stop on the bank, taking breaks now and then. You can deliberately explore nooks and sidestreams, you can go where you eye sees or your ear hears. You can even get off the boat altogether.

However if you are caught in a strong current or a raging rapids you may have no choice but merely to let the stream carry you and hope or try to stop yourself from crashing or from capsizing. But even so disasters do happen in our life.

And such is our path in life.

And also our life's paths crossed each others, like ours - you, the reader, and I - at this moment, albeit virtually. It is sometimes momentarily, sometimes for a while, and sometimes life's paths run parallel or keep criss-crossing each other for years, such as your school or work mates, and certainly your spouses'.

Now in a relationship, three things can happen to our life's paths..

One, for whatever reasons, you can make your paths parallel, as alluded above, to each other's. You accommodate each other, and such accommodation is apparently not difficult if you’re already walking the same ways - and so you have people looking for people with common interests.

But then there is no guarantee whatsoever common interests remain common tomorrow. Really what you are doing is to just make the best of what you see in the here and now. For tomorrow you give yourselves some assurances such as trying to share a common vision. But then a common vision does not mean common paths, if they can remain common in time in the first place.

Secondly, one of you can abandon your path altogether, or literally make yourself submissive to the other completely. This is perhaps have been normal in marriage, such as the female taking on the male's name, to show that she have become his 'property'- a traditional notion, but nonetheless a valid concept for a relationship, and something more secured then merely being parallel and accommodating.

But it is unfair and unequal, in the sense that one of the party lose his or her life in the other, not an entirely equitable model. And again the guarantee is not there, for the submissive party may no longer submit, or the dominant party found his or her perfect partner, or just a better submissive partner. And then of course needs changed as we all know, and people quarrel, and small difference becomes huge insurmountables, etc, etc - and hence you have divorce in marriage.

The third thing that can happen is when both parties abandon their paths, and both together and jointly go to make a new path, a new life, from scratch.

And this new path is something that either, on their own, will not and cannot walk. Only together, and specifically only with that particular other, can this path be created and walked. And furthermore this new joint and common path is better in all sense of the word than either previous paths on their own.

And it is fair, equitable and 100% common, for their is no individual histories to carry along, which can never be shared, but now you start from day one, together.

And you are no longer the person you were. For you are no longer you or I, but we and us, the new 'person', a new creation, a new being - something that your parents did not give birth too. And as the bible puts it, for this reason the man shall leave his father and mother. For both person are no longer their parents'.

Imagine in all situations and to all people instead of saying I you say we: this then will be the perfect union of persons, the ideal marriage. And I also think it has nothing to do with sex or gender and it is applicable to any two persons.

So then the question now is how do I know that I have found this person for the perfect marriage?

Using the third model as as template, we can ask the following questions. For example, are both willing to abandon their lives and be a new creature? Is the new life with him/her something you otherwise cannot and will not walk? Is this new life far far superior to anything you had or even could have imagined? Do you feel that you have become what you are destined to be?

If the answers are all positive, then it is a possible indication. Or put more precisely, if you get a negative answer to any of the question, it is a veto, and you know he/she is not the one.

But even so what is the guarantee?

Well firstly the guarantee is in the life itself, the new life. Would anyone abandon something for something lesser? Would anyone kill himself, metaphorically speaking, for something of less value than life itself? And what greater need is there than life itself?

Arguments, common interests, irritation, bodily physical changes, changing "needs", even two-timing or adultery, are, in the final analysis, all irrelevant issues. For the sake of being we and us, all these things are only something to be worked at, challenges to be overcome, tests to make us strong and revealed who we truly are and can be.

And the life will continually be interesting, just as your own life is - or should be - continually interesting everyday. Every day should count in your life shouldn’t it? You should be wiser, know more, etc with every passing day. If you are not then are you living?

So it is the same when you become a new life as we and us. You should be living everyday and that is the reason for the life, or for the relationship, to go on. It feeds on itself: life's for life.

Yes! I will still love the one I love even if he/she commits adultery! even multiple adulteries. Love, the bible says, is as strong as death! Call it folly if you want. I only concur with you, and say that love is foolish. So if you want to love you had better prepared to be a fool.

But ultimately there is one sure guarantee, namely God.

There is no way you can trust man, or woman.

No promises of commitment really count for anything. For you promised based on what you know and think today. Tomorrow something happens and even though you want to keep the promise you cannot. It is like I promised to bring you out for a birthday treat, and on that day I was recalled for NS mobilisation. The non-fulfillment is understandable, but it is still a non-fulfillment of promise. I want better assurances than mere explanations.

And this assurance is God. Love is a gift from God. And if he can bring two people, initially strangers, together, surely he can keep it for us, even forever. And so, true love is a three way relationship. You need and have a third party, a matchmaker and a guarantor, namely God.

And that is the absolute confidence and assurance I have in love.