On Divorces & the Like

June 1, 2010

I have this morbid and odd fascination with divorces, affairs, &anything of a similar nature. Why? Because I find such events to be almost incomprehensible (unless maybe you're part of the event), but nevertheless, how does one even get to that point? I posted in a previous blog a story I read; I'll insert the relevant segment:

I asked him if he wanted to be married to his wife.
He said no.
As he said no, I had flashbacks of their wedding ceremony, the vows, the "till death us part" section, all the friends and family who had been there. The dresses, the flowers, the toasts. The kiss."

I think it is that flashback part that strikes me the most. I often think about how if it were possible, what would it be like to take those two days: the wedding day & the day one decides on a divorce, and place them side by side. To take the words, the vows, the promises spoken on the wedding day, the kiss, the happiness, and juxtapose them with the hurt, the anger, the broken promises, vows, and now meaningless words on the day of divorce. How does one even get to that point? When I think about a couple's mindset on the days leading up to the wedding day as well as the day of, would they have ever imagined that a mere 10, 20, 30 years later, they would not want to spend the rest of their lives together anymore? If you were to ask the groom or bride if they'd ever dream of cheating on the other person, would they not vehemently deny it and find the question to be ridiculous? But somehow, the depth of our depravity creeps up on us, and our selfishness gets in the way, and pretty soon, all the promises of 'forever,' the sincerity in wanting to serve one another, the genuine care for each other's wellbeing, and that joy that comes from looking forward to a life together, all come to be but empty words spoken and hardly remembered.

I find that so terribly sad and depressing. Being a PK means I hear of and see a lot of weddings, affairs, and divorces. I'd like to think that's why I'm always so fearful and wary of relationships, but that may not be entirely true, it might just be an excuse. But anyway, while reflecting on such depressing things, I thought about the way I deal with things.

Over the last four years, I've had plenty of instances where friendships are at the point of falling apart (or they have fallen apart), but I never gave up on the friendships, and that is why I can say that I have honestly never lost a friend. I think the reason why I never give up on friendships no matter how hard it is, or how angry or bitter I or the other person may be, is because after all is said and done, after a friendship gets to the point of falling apart, I tend to like to reflect on it, look back on past chats (gchat logs FTW, lol), emails, letters, cards, and hang outs &in so doing, I realize how much great and fun times we had, how valuable that friendship was to me at one point or another, and in doing and remembering that, all of a sudden all the bad parts of the friendship, the misunderstandings, the hurt, the conflicts, and the anger all seem to be so small and trivial. And so I never do hold any bitterness or grudges against people, because I'm only reminded of the good, and I'm brought to a place where I'm willing to work on the friendship.

I wonder though if people should do that more often: reflect on the good, look back into the past and remember all the words that were said, the promises made, the fun times, the encouraging times, the times when we were all so thankful that God had placed those specific people into our lives. I believe that in so doing, our relationships and friendships would be so much better. And this ties in with divorces and the like. If those couples could remember what had caused them to be so sure they wanted to be committed to one another for an entire lifetime and all the great times and hard times they had gone through together, maybe we'd have a few less divorces. I'm not sure, but I do think that someone told me that that is what marital/family counselors do with couples (remind them of the good).

Because in all honesty, things won't ever always be good, whether it be in friendships or marriage, there will be hard times, there will be conflicts, there will be times when you just can't stand one another, and (at least in marriage), there will be times when you just don't feel love for the other person anymore. I really hate it when people say that they don't love someone anymore, and see that as a reason to divorce, because Biblically, love is not a feeling. Movies, tv shows, and media make love to be this nice butterfly-y feeling. But it's not. Feelings come and go, but what love is and should be is commitment. What stays are those reasons that allowed one to want to marry the other person, and that is why those reasons are so important, and why they should be based on very concrete things that one can always fall back on in hard times.

There's this one scene of Enchanted that I really like, and that I think embodies what I just tried to describe, haha. The main female character, Giselle, is this princess from a fairy tale, and in fairy tales, divorces do not exist. Anyway, the main male character, Robert, is a divorce attorney, and one day Giselle happens to bump into the couple that Robert is helping to plan out their divorce with. The following conversation ensues:

Giselle: Oh my goodness, your hair is lovely. You're beautiful. The man who holds your heart is a lucky fellow indeed.

Wife about to be divorced: Well you try telling him that.

Giselle: Well I'm certain he already knows.

Husband about to be divorced: Excuse me?

Giselle: Are you him? You are very lucky. I mean just look at the way her eyes sparkle! It's no wonder you're in love!

--and then later, in a following scene, the couple comes back to the divorce attorney's office--

Husband: I was just thinking about what that girl said about Phoebe's [wife] eyes sparkling, I mean, it's the first thing I noticed when we met. It's true, her eyes really do sparkle!

Attorney: Look, as your attorney, you can't let a chance encounter...

Wife: What if that wasn't chance?

Attorney: You guys had problems.

Wife: Everybody has problems, everybody has bad times, do we sacrifice all the good times because of them? No.

I really liked that part, because even if it sounds idealistic, I think that's my mentality. I don't like sacrificing all the good times because of a few bad times. There has to have been a reason why people were friends or married in the first place. There was a point in time when people felt lucky to have that other person in their life, when their focus was shifted not on how great they themselves were for the other person, but on how great that person was for them. There was a reason why people connected, and there had to have been good and treasure-able times that allowed the friendship or marriage to have even been counted worthy or valuable of your time. There are probably a lot of assumptions that go into this mentality, but I'm too lazy to type them all out.

But anyway, as I was reflecting on the past four years, I've realized that that is honestly the way I am able to let go of whatever anger, bitterness, or hurt that I felt entitled to hold on to, because often times, I'd go through past chats (I chat way too much T_T), and after reading a few, I'd find myself smiling and realizing that actually, the bad parts of the friendship really weren't all that big, and the good parts, the fun and meaningful conversations, the hang outs all hold a lot more weight than the bad parts.

I think I'd like to challenge people to do that more often. To reflect on the good in friendships, and not to allow the Devil to trap us into remembering and exaggerating the conflicts and hurt in friendships that would only lead us to push one another away. For God has called us to love and bear with one another, and it is in fellowship and unity that God can be glorified in us, not in dissension or broken relationships.
One little experiment I'd loveee to carry out (but have no idea if I'd ever get to) is to take two people who had been good friends, but had had some sort of falling out, sit them down, and ask them to recount the beginnings of their friendship, how they met, how they had fun, why they became friends, etc., and see how that'd affect whatever remains of their friendship. It's a bit idealistic, and it probably wouldn't work in worse case scenarios, but so often times, I feel that the friendships I see that fall apart or even the friendships I had that came close to falling apart, were based on things that were and can be far outweighed by all the good times.

I suppose this ties into another issue that I often wonder about. As I've mentioned before, often times when I feel a friendship is at the brink of falling apart, I like to look at past chats, emails, letters, and cards and be reminded of the good, and I often wonder if those words that were said still hold true after everything had been said and done. If they really did believe the friendship to be worth their time, if they really did mean those words of encouragement and affirmation, or if everything said and done was only dependent on the situation and condition of having the friendship being in a good phase. I'd like to believe it isn't so, and often times I get so tempted to copy and paste past chats or emails to those people just to see what they'd say. I actually did kind of do this yesterday when I was looking over some high school emails. There's this one email thread I looked through from back in high school, and I was able to laugh and reminisce about it with the friend that the email thread was with.

And so I challenge people who are having a hard friendship with someone to do that, to think over the good times and to remember why in the first place, that friendship had been counted worthy and valuable to you, to remember all the words and promises you said and the words and promises they said. And for those who are not in that place, to remember to appreciate the friends they have now for the good that is happening now. That is one of my goals this summer, to appreciate all the people that have had a wonderful impact on me in the last four years and to tell them how much of a blessing they had been in my life. :)

(Oh wows.. my post just went from being on divorces to friendships. I guess friendships are more relevant to this stage of life, haha. )