Closer to Believing

It was a good pop lyric, “can’t live without you”. And so immature.

You see, when we get wrapped up in the hormonal myopia that makes us think life is over if we don’t have the love of the person we’ve zoomed in on, we’re missing a big point: we had a life before focusing on that person and were able to live just fine, thank you. And if our lives weren’t okay before that person, having them around won’t fix what needs fixing inside. Besides, what motivation is there for a healthy person hook up with someone who doesn’t have things worked out? ‘Can’t live without you’ also says that our own lives aren’t complete if it takes another person to fill it.

In a more mature person the big chunks of inner problems are dealt with. The person is a mind, heart, and spirit already formed and complete. They are attractive to the type of person they want to be with. A partner is no longer a necessity, and the jump is made from ‘need’ to ‘desire’. A partner isn’t needed to complete you; a partner is sought to complement you. They don’t fill what you are lacking; they add to what you already have. They don’t distract from personal failings or participate in them, and instead are by your side as you grow past them. And if the loved person is taken away for whatever reason, it will hurt and leave an emptiness but the mature person will go on with life.

When you give someone your heart you don’t give them your soul. You don’t give them your identity, your resources, your purpose. These all become shared, but your part is still owned by you.

We are told that God wants our love and adoration. If we refuse does God go into paroxysms of grief and want to commit suicide? Nope. God continues to offer love and all its benefits and goes on with matters of the universe. Although humans are far less perfect than God, are we not able to attain this level of maturity? Of course we can. Many people have.

It would be an interesting world if most people developed this maturity. Then we would sing that ‘I need me, you need you, we want us’ (Emerson, Lake, and Palmer, Closer to Believing).