Relationships101 - Marital 1

 

“He is in love”, how can you miss it, that broad smile, he is simply floating. No doubt the scene for many a youngster and then the not-so-young can easily at a point get hooked too.

This is a scene you find early on when boy meets girl. They marry and are all so happy. Awesome – everybody deserves to be happy. Anybody who stays in one house long enough will tell you that over the years the amount of junk they collect is enormous. The occasional spring cleaning helps but most times it takes a move from one house to another to decide to leave this pile of junk. Our lives, the emotional side of it, is really not that much different. Over the years we collect a fair amount of “junk” through various factors such as work stress, financial stress and physical neglect. The “he is in love” smile has most likely developed into a snarl.

The very many factors that lead to this situation are lost on many, but remedy can indeed still happen. Most people forget that life has its phases and this realisation can help in trying to stay on top of things. There are obvious guidelines that can help realign the emotional side to remain neutral/positive. The aim should obviously be to avoid negativity. Emotionally, we are all in need of spring cleaning but there is one rule that applies always: Don’t throw away another’s junk. Be it physical or emotional or a combination thereof, each one is responsible for his own junk and he/she needs to come to terms with that. The whole idea is to create an environment to facilitate this. Most wake up too late and start the finger pointing, finger wagging bit. The truth of the matter is that the buck stops here – The “I” factor – rather it should be the “eye” factor. Look yourself in the eye and address yourself as to why the situation is what it is and why is it not a few notches better. What was your role in the matter and be adult enough not to shirk responsibility.

We look at the political landscape and we find much finger pointing and very little, if any, indication of people taking responsibility. So, place yourself in that position and then decide whether you would have responded better than a politician in any particular case. Now, beam back to earth and your house and household and put up your hand as one who have been out of line. Pardon, humbly, those around you who you think have also wronged and don’t hold them responsible for the past – let it be. The day you got married, you promised your spouse that you will do this and that and at best you did “thi”, not even “this”, let alone that. Look deep inside yourself and draw the strength to set yourself and your family on a new path. Be the leader.

Relationships are fraught with dangers – but we need to be aware of that (another discussion, another time). Perhaps we need to be mindful of one or two things before we depart (although perhaps you will come back and read my next blog J ), make very few promises, but those you make, keep them. And a promise you need to make, is to build relationships that will last and commit yourself to find solutions when the GPS (of the heart) is offline.

Now do a good deed and like this and spread - Love

Selfless or Selfie

You have read the news headlines lately “Court hears details of shots that killed Reeva”, “Girl who survived brutal attack, dies”, “New uncertainty about missing Malaysian plane”, “Robbers get 30 years” – Sorry, sad reading.

Crime is nothing new, but the alarming rate at which it is increasing is scary. On self-examination many of us will pause momentarily and show our disgust at all of this. Very good – at least there is some feeling and emotion showing that our values have not been depleted totally. Few really care and show a keen interest and get involved. Others cannot be bothered by the detail as it is too far removed from themselves.

It is of course no secret that our own self-absorption causes us to not reflect on these situations enough. How will we know what is enough. – Aah – therein lies the issue. Until and unless we start to know ourselves, our very beings, the reason how and why we created, everything seems trivial. An atheist once argued that he does not need religion to have values. This is true to an extent, but then how does one define values. Values that shows little concern for another can that really be considered a value ; not stealing (and the implied honesty) can be considered a value, but is that not necessarily an inherent value because there is a law that prohibits stealing. So in a way, there is agreement that laws must exist.

But human laws have changed over time and as such lawlessness has become the order of the day. The penal system in itself is weak, but that is because the “value” system attaches more value to the rights of the individual than to that of society.

So you and I don’t really care – because we differ on whose value system is right. A value system indeed, guided by the whims and fancies of small, but yet seemingly powerful groups. This value system is diluted because we don’t know who we are. So let me belt it out – we were created from dust, we are mere nothings who have been given status only by our Creator. We forget that and behave as if we are self-made and we forget that we will one day return to our Creator.

We turn our back to His laws, or we twist His laws, we rewrite His laws as it suits us so that we may fit into society and claim our little bit of popularity. We dress shamelessly, we speak shamelessly and our promiscuous selves act shamelessly believing there is no beginning and no end to our fun. We forget we come from dust. Yes! Applying that make up after you were fashioned in the best of ways both inside and out – but you applied the paint on the outside and the inside become rusted. The inside where the value system is supposed to be nurtured has become a rust bucket.

There is hope yet, but first we have to clear our thoughts and words of superiority like, ”who died and made you God”, “Who gave you the right to speak to me”, “you tell me to dress like this while you have that problem”, etc ,etc. Bite your tongue and find the tonic to clear that rusted heart. It is easy for those who want to be selfless and not preparing to take another selfie.

Our most Merciful Creator has created chance after chance for us to improve ourselves internally. Let’s not be fake – show gratefulness to Him by acting on it. You are better than you look or are trying to look.