We come to love not
by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person
perfectly.
Sam Keen
Earlier this week I was reading a
book at my favorite non-Starbucks coffee house.
Three women eventually took the table next to mine. I’ll admit it—I’m nosy—hey, I grew up in NYC
where everyone loves to listen in on other people’s conversations!
It soon became clear that one of
the women is getting married later in the summer and this was an outing for the
three of them to catch-up on all-things wedding. At one point, the bride-to-be in a loud,
exasperated tone of voice (which made think she must have grown up in NYC)
lamented: I’m marrying an O.C.D. and he’s
driving me nuts! I swear that’s all
gonna change when we get married. . .I’m not gonna put up with that sh*t!
Well, I was sorely tempted to lean
over and remind her that NOTHING was going to change after she got
married! If her fiancé is O.C.D. now,
then he’ll be O.C.D. the day after their wedding. Declaring to a coffee house
full of people that you’re not going to put up with his sh*t really isn’t going
to change the poor guy.
Yet, so many people think that
marriage has some magical properties to it that will make all the annoying
imperfections of their partner disappear.
NOTHING disappears after you say “I Do.”
So, I invite you to think about Sam
Keen’s observation. . .are you able to love your imperfect partner
perfectly? And what does that mean? I don’t think it simply means be willing to
“put up” with annoying habits. It means
seeing beyond the imperfections. And
when you do look beyond the imperfections, what do you see?
