Is Romance Dead?
I've been thinking lately about a lot of things I've heard women say, and it seems like the idea of the fairy tale romance is dead. I mean, sure, it is still dreamed of, but when it could happen for real, it seems to be denied. Don't know what I mean? Well, here's some thoughts.
1. Love at first sight is dead.
Back when I was a teenager and crazy I actually did tell a few girls on the day I met them I loved them. They acted predictably, as if I was crazy. :)
Today, I am more restrained. Yet, if I tell a woman within three months that I love her, many times I get responses like:
"You don't really know me that well" or "You haven't known me long enough."
As if I can't have fallen in love with they way she looks, the way she smiles. The little mannerisms she has and her sweet heart that I see. As if I have to know every little detail of her before I can really be "in love." Does she not realize that if I love her, the details I don't know won't matter? That I will love them too when I find them? Does it have to be reduced to a passionless equation and a map of what things I do and don't know?
More importantly, how can she tell my heart it doesn't love when I feel it does?
2. No one wants to fight for love.
It seems that if things get difficult, or there are problems, immediately I will hear "it must not be meant to be!" As if real love should materialize overnight, handed to you by fate or God or whatever you believe controls such things. Let me ask you:
Was it easy for Romeo and Juliet?
Was it easy for Buttercup and Westley?
Was it easy for RACHEL and JACOB?
A quick recap: Jacob worked and waited SEVEN YEARS to marry Rachel. And then, he was tricked by her father into marrying the eldest daughter, Leah. He then was able to marry Rachel, in exchange for SEVEN MORE years of work for Laban. Let me ask, was this easy? No. Was it worth it?
Jacob was in love with Rachel and said, "I'll work for you seven years in return for your younger daughter Rachel."
Laban said, "It's better that I give her to you than to some other man. Stay here with me." So Jacob served seven years to get Rachel, but they seemed like only a few days to him because of his love for her.
Heck, Westley even died and came back for Buttercup! She was worth fighting for! Who came up with the crazy idea that obstacles or problems means that you should give up?
Sure if you are not compatible or don't love each other, that's a real issue. But circumstance, stopping true love? Why don't we FIGHT for it anymore?
3. No one wants to work for love.
Here is another crazy idea about love. In real life, we go to school, so we can get good grades, so we can get into a good college. Then we get a job, and work on our resume so we can get a better one.
We don't expect a great job unless we 1) LOOK hard for it and 2) have built up a good resume to get it.
Yet, somehow this common sense does not translate into relationships. Women that believe in God often say things like, "God will bring him to me when the time is right." As if the husband of their dreams will instantly materialize on their doorstep.
Now, why do we think that this will happen for something as important as a relationship, when we KNOW it won't happen with a job?
God isn't going to magically send us a check each month to live on, and neither is he going to materialize a mate out of nowhere. We have to LOOK, and if we want a good one, look HARD. Just like we do for ANYTHING else in life. You don't just buy the first car that shows up on the lot. You RESEARCH it, you look at lots of cars, you learn what you want and need in a car. Women, when you buy a dress, do you just expect to find the best one, or that fate will make it appear on the front of the rack in just your size? Or do you LOOK for it, and look HARD?
Besides looking, if you really want a special man (or woman) shouldn't you be special yourself? Just like for a job, you need to have a resume, so to speak. You should have qualities that would attract the kind of mate you want. Sure, God loves you and accepts you the way you are, and it is good to be loved by someone else like that too. But you have to have the right bait to catch the fish!
The point is, finding someone really special takes EFFORT and God is not going to (well, in MOST cases) make the person of your dreams magically appear at your door. You have to work for most things in this life.
4. Perfectionism kills romance
Most women (and men) I talk to have a "list." You know what I mean, a list of what they want or think they need in a mate. This isn't a bad thing, in general. The bad thing is when the list can never have exceptions. Real romance, real love, is loving despite faults. Somehow in todays shallow TV 30-minute romance society, we expect a cut-out hero to come along and be all we imagine. But no one is. So we cut ourselves off from a great relationship because of this.
Another form of perfectionism that I see is this notion of "the One." That there is this one person, destined by fate or God out there, that is meant for you. You know, even if there is a "One", some days, it sure may not feel like he/she is. This idea of the One gives preconcieved notions of having some special tingly feeling, or that everything will work out and be easy if it is really "meant to be." Not to mention the fact that if you get married and worry you married the wrong One. You might meet someone later that magically appears to be the One and then you are full of regrets, or worse, you leave the marriage. So I think this One idea is mostly a bad thing.
Even if you are a Christian, I'm telling you most love stories I've read in the Bible don't involve God saying, "Here, this woman is the one I made for you." Sure, there was Adam and Eve, but then there was only "one" to pick from! :) Look back at Jacob and Rachel, they got married because they LOVED each other. They CHOSE each other. That is the beauty of it. We can choose our mates, hopefully wisely, yet this seems to be the way God intended it. We can sit around hoping God will make a magical aura glow around our future mate, or we can look and with God's help find a good one.
5. Women are afraid of men
This part, I don't see that there is much that can be done. There are evil people in the world, and so it is hard for a nice lady out there to trust a man. One time I was riding the bus home from college, and a girl was talking about how she was going to be late for her important doctor's appointment because she took the wrong bus. She was very upset about it, it must have been very important. I told her she could get off the stop with me and I could take her in my car if she wanted. She wanted to trust me, I could see it, but she couldn't do it. The only thing I can say is for real men to step forward and make themselves known and good and trustworthy. Maybe after years, some of the damage can be undone.
6. Poems and adulation are seen as signs of insanity
In the renaissance days (at least in the stories) a man who felt smitten with a woman could show up to her window late and night and read her a poem he had composed to her. He could speak of his great affection openly, praise her virtues publicly. It seems nowadays, this behavior is seen as a sign of being a crazy stalker. What ever happened to the romance of being love sick? Why is it bad to be "crazy with love"? All the poems and songs that have been written about love. The depth, the passion of it shown in great poems and songs, was it merely a sign of delusional minds? Once, mostly for fun, I decided to become someone's "secret admirer." When I was in grade school, this was always a great thing, so why not as an adult? I sent her little notes and things. However, her reaction was instant revulsion. I immediately was branded as a stalker, killer, or worse. Why? Where are the days of sweet, innocent, passionate love? Why is it crazy to admire someone in secret? It used to be romantic. Why is it that professing love, having passion, being romantic "too soon" is seen as crazy? Being love sick used to be romantic. Now it is looked at as a sign of weakness or insanity.
Maybe if you read this, you'll decide to give romance a chance. Don't let it die. Remember Jacob and Rachel.
1. Love at first sight is dead.
Back when I was a teenager and crazy I actually did tell a few girls on the day I met them I loved them. They acted predictably, as if I was crazy. :)
Today, I am more restrained. Yet, if I tell a woman within three months that I love her, many times I get responses like:
"You don't really know me that well" or "You haven't known me long enough."
As if I can't have fallen in love with they way she looks, the way she smiles. The little mannerisms she has and her sweet heart that I see. As if I have to know every little detail of her before I can really be "in love." Does she not realize that if I love her, the details I don't know won't matter? That I will love them too when I find them? Does it have to be reduced to a passionless equation and a map of what things I do and don't know?
More importantly, how can she tell my heart it doesn't love when I feel it does?
2. No one wants to fight for love.
It seems that if things get difficult, or there are problems, immediately I will hear "it must not be meant to be!" As if real love should materialize overnight, handed to you by fate or God or whatever you believe controls such things. Let me ask you:
Was it easy for Romeo and Juliet?
Was it easy for Buttercup and Westley?
Was it easy for RACHEL and JACOB?
A quick recap: Jacob worked and waited SEVEN YEARS to marry Rachel. And then, he was tricked by her father into marrying the eldest daughter, Leah. He then was able to marry Rachel, in exchange for SEVEN MORE years of work for Laban. Let me ask, was this easy? No. Was it worth it?
Jacob was in love with Rachel and said, "I'll work for you seven years in return for your younger daughter Rachel."
Laban said, "It's better that I give her to you than to some other man. Stay here with me." So Jacob served seven years to get Rachel, but they seemed like only a few days to him because of his love for her.
Heck, Westley even died and came back for Buttercup! She was worth fighting for! Who came up with the crazy idea that obstacles or problems means that you should give up?
Sure if you are not compatible or don't love each other, that's a real issue. But circumstance, stopping true love? Why don't we FIGHT for it anymore?
3. No one wants to work for love.
Here is another crazy idea about love. In real life, we go to school, so we can get good grades, so we can get into a good college. Then we get a job, and work on our resume so we can get a better one.
We don't expect a great job unless we 1) LOOK hard for it and 2) have built up a good resume to get it.
Yet, somehow this common sense does not translate into relationships. Women that believe in God often say things like, "God will bring him to me when the time is right." As if the husband of their dreams will instantly materialize on their doorstep.
Now, why do we think that this will happen for something as important as a relationship, when we KNOW it won't happen with a job?
God isn't going to magically send us a check each month to live on, and neither is he going to materialize a mate out of nowhere. We have to LOOK, and if we want a good one, look HARD. Just like we do for ANYTHING else in life. You don't just buy the first car that shows up on the lot. You RESEARCH it, you look at lots of cars, you learn what you want and need in a car. Women, when you buy a dress, do you just expect to find the best one, or that fate will make it appear on the front of the rack in just your size? Or do you LOOK for it, and look HARD?
Besides looking, if you really want a special man (or woman) shouldn't you be special yourself? Just like for a job, you need to have a resume, so to speak. You should have qualities that would attract the kind of mate you want. Sure, God loves you and accepts you the way you are, and it is good to be loved by someone else like that too. But you have to have the right bait to catch the fish!
The point is, finding someone really special takes EFFORT and God is not going to (well, in MOST cases) make the person of your dreams magically appear at your door. You have to work for most things in this life.
4. Perfectionism kills romance
Most women (and men) I talk to have a "list." You know what I mean, a list of what they want or think they need in a mate. This isn't a bad thing, in general. The bad thing is when the list can never have exceptions. Real romance, real love, is loving despite faults. Somehow in todays shallow TV 30-minute romance society, we expect a cut-out hero to come along and be all we imagine. But no one is. So we cut ourselves off from a great relationship because of this.
Another form of perfectionism that I see is this notion of "the One." That there is this one person, destined by fate or God out there, that is meant for you. You know, even if there is a "One", some days, it sure may not feel like he/she is. This idea of the One gives preconcieved notions of having some special tingly feeling, or that everything will work out and be easy if it is really "meant to be." Not to mention the fact that if you get married and worry you married the wrong One. You might meet someone later that magically appears to be the One and then you are full of regrets, or worse, you leave the marriage. So I think this One idea is mostly a bad thing.
Even if you are a Christian, I'm telling you most love stories I've read in the Bible don't involve God saying, "Here, this woman is the one I made for you." Sure, there was Adam and Eve, but then there was only "one" to pick from! :) Look back at Jacob and Rachel, they got married because they LOVED each other. They CHOSE each other. That is the beauty of it. We can choose our mates, hopefully wisely, yet this seems to be the way God intended it. We can sit around hoping God will make a magical aura glow around our future mate, or we can look and with God's help find a good one.
5. Women are afraid of men
This part, I don't see that there is much that can be done. There are evil people in the world, and so it is hard for a nice lady out there to trust a man. One time I was riding the bus home from college, and a girl was talking about how she was going to be late for her important doctor's appointment because she took the wrong bus. She was very upset about it, it must have been very important. I told her she could get off the stop with me and I could take her in my car if she wanted. She wanted to trust me, I could see it, but she couldn't do it. The only thing I can say is for real men to step forward and make themselves known and good and trustworthy. Maybe after years, some of the damage can be undone.
6. Poems and adulation are seen as signs of insanity
In the renaissance days (at least in the stories) a man who felt smitten with a woman could show up to her window late and night and read her a poem he had composed to her. He could speak of his great affection openly, praise her virtues publicly. It seems nowadays, this behavior is seen as a sign of being a crazy stalker. What ever happened to the romance of being love sick? Why is it bad to be "crazy with love"? All the poems and songs that have been written about love. The depth, the passion of it shown in great poems and songs, was it merely a sign of delusional minds? Once, mostly for fun, I decided to become someone's "secret admirer." When I was in grade school, this was always a great thing, so why not as an adult? I sent her little notes and things. However, her reaction was instant revulsion. I immediately was branded as a stalker, killer, or worse. Why? Where are the days of sweet, innocent, passionate love? Why is it crazy to admire someone in secret? It used to be romantic. Why is it that professing love, having passion, being romantic "too soon" is seen as crazy? Being love sick used to be romantic. Now it is looked at as a sign of weakness or insanity.
Maybe if you read this, you'll decide to give romance a chance. Don't let it die. Remember Jacob and Rachel.