Posts Tagged ‘spirituality’

Putting Myself Aside and Building Her Up

Posted: May 27, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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Life is full of contradictions, but sometimes it’s in the apparent paradox that truth is found.  Whoever wants to save his life will lose it.  The more you give away, the more you’ll have.  If you hold too tightly, you’ll lose control.

Shortly before we separated, I showed my wife a classified ad for a job at Dillard’s.  She applied and was hired.  I was just trying to help her out, as we were both looking for Summer employment.  It turned out that they hired her full-time, and the job paid enough that she could afford to move out and make it without me.  I had unwittingly helped give her the means to leave me.

It wasn’t long after this that we talked about her feelings of inadequacy and how, during our marriage, she hadn’t ever had the opportunity to find out what she could or couldn’t do.  Now, one of the things that she wanted to accomplish through our separation was to prove to herself that she could do things on her own and take care of things without anyone else. 

Relationships are complicated undertakings, full of pitfalls that couples often don’t see coming.  As I stated earlier, I had never intended for her to feel this way, nor had I realized that she did.  I had always believed in her and had confidence in her, but she didn’t know this.  My reason for trying to take on all the responsibilities was so that she wouldn’t have to.   The unexpected result was that she felt worthless and like I didn’t trust her to be able to do anything. 

I had no intention of supplying her with resources to make a life without me when the job at Dillard’s came up, but once we reached the point where the separation was decided upon, I consciously decided to work with her in becoming independent.  It was one of those moments of disequilibrium, when your rational mind says, “This doesn’t make sense,” and your heart says, “This is what love would do.”  Her moving out was the last thing on earth that I wanted, but it was going to happen regardless.  My choices were to fight her, and probably never get her back, or love her unconditionally, and leave the door open for a possible reconciliation. 

I supported her as she got utilities in only her name for the new apartment, even though I hoped that I would be living there soon.  I didn’t argue when she took my name off the joint checking account at her bank.  I withdrew half of the emergency fund from my bank and gave it to her.  These things were painful, and the practical side of me kept wondering if all this was really necessary.  My heart told me that it was, so I kept listening to the things my wife was telling me about what she believed she needed, and I kept pushing down the urge to discount what she was going through.

Love is about hard choices sometimes.  It’s about putting yourself aside and giving up your rights for another.  The Bible says, “Love does not demand its own way.” (1 Corinthians 13:5)  I struggled with giving up control.  A part of me believed that I could demand of her that she just stop all this and that I could strong-arm her into submitting to my authority as her husband.  It was tempting to try, but deep down inside, I knew it wasn’t right, and it wasn’t really what I wanted.

Things hadn’t been right or healthy for a long time, and what I really wanted in the deepest part of me was for both of us to find that place where, with healthy hearts, we found each other again.  There was a song called “Start Again” by the group “Red” that was out at this time.  Every time I heard it, my heart would break, but it also gave me hope that it was possible. We had loved each other once with a beautiful love and I couldn’t give up on the hope that the roots were still there and that love could grow and bloom again.

Unexpected Changes in Unlikely Places

Posted: May 26, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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Wanting desperately to give your love to someone who isn’t returning it and won’t receive most of it is a perilous place to find yourself.  My wife wanted to be pursued, yes, but by a strong and capable man, not a weak, pathetic one.  There’s a fine line between lavishing love on the object of your affection and driving her away by crawling around at her feet.  I knew it was important that I navigate those waters correctly during our separation, which was why it was absolutely critical for me to get myself healthy. 

I spent a lot of time feeling pathetic and sorry for myself, but I did my best to keep this hidden while I worked on getting myself right and overcoming the obstacles in the path of our reconciliation.  I realized that my wife needed me to be someone who had something to bring to her, not someone who constantly needed something from her.  She needed a man, not a puppy, and I resolved to put aside my pain and be the man she needed before someone else took on that role.

After my wife got her first tattoo, I began to think about getting one.  My initial idea was to get the same design she got, but smaller, and in a different place.  My reasoning was that it would mean that I belonged to her; that we were bound to each other.  I also realized (thank God) that it would be exactly the type of weak, desperate move that would be more likely to make her despise me than feel drawn to me.  It would have been a permanent statement that I didn’t have enough self-worth to be my own man.

I kept the thought of a “tat” for myself on the back-burner, since I didn’t really have any idea what to get.  I figured that until it would really mean something, I wouldn’t pursue it.  Meanwhile, I was devouring books, websites, scriptures, and anything else I could find about love and romance.  I read and re-read the Song of Solomon, the Old Testament book that parallels married love with God’s love.  It really spoke to me, and one verse stood out in particular. 

Chapter six and verse three says, “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine.” That became my verse, and I held onto it fiercely.  In chapter 8 and verse 6, it says, “Place me…like a seal on your arm, for love is as strong as death.”  That sounded like a tattoo to me, despite the cheesy and highly questionable images of guys putting their girlfriends’ names in tattoos as a way of staking a claim, or showing off their “catch.”  I was determined not to do that, so I needed to figure out how to make this work.  The answer came in the most unlikely of places.

I had an app on my phone of love poems and quotes that I can hardly believe I am admitting to reading.  One day, I read the words, “Don’t put my name in a heart because a heart can be broken.  Put it in a circle because a circle goes on forever,” and just like that, I had it!  I sat down and sketched a circle with Song of Solomon 6:3 going all the way around it and my wife’s name in the middle. 

I shared the idea with our oldest daughter and a few close friends and they unanimously loved it.  I decided not to share it with my wife, though.  I figured that if we got back together, I would have it done, but until things were worked out between us, I wasn’t going to tell her.  I also felt that it was missing something, but couldn’t figure out what else it needed.  Eventually, when we got back together, my wife helped me decide on two interlaced wedding rings inside the circle with the nickname that I had made up for her. 

My permanent seal of love

Now she teases me that I’m stuck with her because I have that on my arm.  That’s kind of the idea, and I wouldn’t want it any other way.

Change is Good…and Sometimes Necessary

Posted: May 25, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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There is one major difference between auto restoration and restoring older homes.  When a car is being restored, it’s all about original parts.  The focus is on replacing worn out and damaged parts and making the finished product exactly like the original.  No changes, no artistic license.

It reminds me of an experience I had in Spain, during a luncheon sponsored by a winery.  We were served a traditional soup, but it had been made differently than it normally was.  Our host became quite upset and had an animated conversation with the waiter about why it hadn’t been made in the traditional way.  The people of southern Spain value tradition and are resistant to change.

I was all about change at this point in my life and my marriage.  Mostly, I needed to change myself.  I was going through the process of allowing myself to be changed by God, and also learning to change with the help of my therapist and others who I opened up to and accepted counsel from.  I was listening, and that was key. 

I had never realized that my wife felt smothered and controlled.  It was a case of an unintended consequence.  I always wanted to do things for her and help her, but I was unintentionally sending the message that I didn’t think she was capable or competent.  We also had an issue regarding something she wanted that I hadn’t thought was very important.  She had talked off and on for years about wanting a tattoo, and I had always told her that I didn’t like them and didn’t want her to get one. 

She had understood me to be forbidding her and now she was intent on getting one.  It was an opportunity for me to show her that things were different, and that I would love and accept her and allow her to make her own choices.  We looked at designs and chose a tatoo artist together.  I sat with her and held her hand through the entire application.  The tatoo artist never suspected that we were separated, and I hoped and prayed that my wife was receiving at least a little bit of the love that I was desperately trying to show her.

Sometimes, the restoration of a house involves making some changes.  There is a certain amount of updating that is not only acceptable, but often necessary.  A house that was originally built with no bathrooms and little or no electricity probably shouldn’t be restored to be exactly like it originally was.  So it was with our marriage. 

I was sharing the story of the vision with a colleague and friend one day and he made a most astute observation.  He said that it sounded like the original “house” was never entirely adequate.  He pointed out that it not only needed to be restored, it probably needed to be added on to.  He hit the nail right on the head.  Even though our marriage started out as a beautiful thing, there were aspects of it that had never been healthy.  The curb appeal was amazing, but underneath, it hadn’t been built right.

Not fighting my wife over her tatoo, but accepting it and being part of it was a tangible act that showed a change in the way I responded to her.  The tattoo itself was also something tangible that showed that her life was changing.  She had told our oldest daughter that if it was going to work out between us, I would have to love all of her.  If I couldn’t accept all of who she was, we couldn’t get back together.  What a person wears, the way they style their hair, or what they put on their skin isn’t who they are.  It’s just self-expression.  True love sees the person beneath the skin and listens to the heart.

Therapy

Posted: May 24, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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My spiritual decline had begun in Dodge City, where I had become so disillusioned with church leaders and so disappointed in the way things had gone that I was angry at God and the church.  Not that I had ever been that great spiritually, but there had been a time when my faith was real and vibrant and I was really trying to serve God.  My heart had never been completely right, but by the time we left Dodge City for the Missouri Ozarks, I just didn’t have it in me anymore.

The changes to my demeanor and personality that happened after the tornado were more difficult to put a finger on.  I quit being interested in any of my hobbies.  I worked too much and withdrew from friends and family.  I carried an anger that smoldered just below the surface.  It rarely broke through, and when it did, it was almost exclusively aimed at the one person I loved the most and who deserved it the least.  In those moments, I did terrible damage to my wife, who had no way of understanding why I would treat her that way. 

For some people, therapy is a way to relieve their guilt and say they tried.  Many people don’t really want to change, and no amount of therapy can change a heart that doesn’t want to.  In my case, I was willing to do whatever it took to fix what was wrong inside and become, once again, the man that my wife could love.  I had already allowed God to change my heart.  Now I needed to fix my mind and my emotions.  The next logical step was to find a therapist.

When I made the appointment, my plan was to talk about the tornado and see if I was, in fact, suffering from PTSD.  The doctor had his own agenda, and that was to get to know what made me tick and look at the whole picture.  On the first visit, he asked me a series of questions that seemed unrelated to anything and I found myself thinking, “This is a complete waste of my time.”  I figured that I would finish the session, pay my bill, and never come back. 

So, how do you feel today?

What a shock it was when, after about 45 minutes, those seemingly unrelated questions all connected up like a dot-to-dot puzzle and I was looking at a picture of myself that was very telling and undeniably accurate.  Things that I had never realized meshed with things I knew, but didn’t understand about myself.  I didn’t find my answers that day and we didn’t even get to the subject of the tornado, but there was enough that made a whole lot of sense to make me realize that we were onto something.  Now, I found myself thinking, “Either this guy is really lucky or really good, or else God just directed the whole conversation.”  He gave me a homework assignment and I agreed to continue. 

Over the next few weeks and months, I came to understand that there had been a pattern throughout my life that now was at the root of my marriage problems.  When I experienced something traumatic or very stressful, I would shut myself off emotionally, and withdraw inside myself.  I shut others out and pushed everything down instead of dealing with it.  That would manifest itself as depression and mood swings, a bi-polar disorder.  It also showed up as some dissociation, where I would almost become a spectator in my own life.  It was as if these things weren’t a part of me, but rather I was seeing them happen to someone else.

When I shared some of this with my wife, she listened, but said nothing.  She was going to need time.  She told me that she was going to be watching me.  She needed to see changes in me, not hear about them.  I was ok with that.  I knew that she deserved much better than I had been giving her and I knew that nothing was going to stop me from getting to the place I needed to be.

The Great Romance

Posted: May 21, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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When I was a basketball coach, a saying I used with my players was, “Don’t waste your energy on things you can’t control.”  There was only a certain amount of energy they had available to them, and they couldn’t control the temperature in the gym, what the referees did or didn’t call, how the fans or other players treated them, and so on.  Any focus on those types of things only served to distract them from their ultimate purpose; winning the game.

I knew that in my marriage, the same principle had to apply.  I could spend time and energy worrying about whether there was another guy or if this was a mid-life crisis my wife was going through, or whether becoming an empty nester was at the root of the problems she was having.  Any of that would only take energy away from my ultimate purpose; winning back her heart and love.

My wife and I are both Ted Dekker fans and read everything he writes almost as soon as it comes out.  A number of his books deal with the subject of sacrificial love.  He spins tales of characters who have to make terribly difficult choices and endure awful pain for love.  The theme of rescuing the beloved is also prevalent in many of his novels.

My wife had revealed that, deep in her heart, she still carried a desire to be loved that way by me.  I went back to God for wisdom, and back to Ted Dekker for inspiration.  I began to search the scriptures for every verse I could find about love, marriage, husbands, and wives.  I wrote them all down on notebook pages and began to speak them out loud every day.  I made them my constant prayer, substituting my wife’s name into the verses and making them personal declarations.

For inspiration, I went to Ted Dekker’s Circle Trilogy to read again about, “The Great Romance,” as he calls it.  It’s the story as old as time.  The man rescues the woman, wins her heart, and makes her his bride. She is unable to resist and falls forever in love with her hero who protects and cares for her ever after.

It’s exactly the kind of love that so many people today dismiss as only a silly fairy tale and not to be believed in.  It’s the kind of love that an entire culture is on the brink of rejecting.  It’s the kind of love that I believe that everyone, deep in the secret places of the heart, longs for.  And it’s exactly the kind of love that I decided I would do anything to experience, no matter the cost.

Separation

Posted: May 20, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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My prayer life was continuing to grow and evolve as I struggled with everything I was facing and dealing with.  I continued to yield my heart to God and let Him bring about changes to my thinking and my inner being.  I was praying for wisdom and understanding in how to deal with my wife.  I was also trying to learn to rely on God instead of trying to do everything myself. 

While in prayer, I would have thoughts that were not typical of my way of thinking and I would wonder if it was God trying to speak to me.  As time went by, I became more and more convinced that the changes in my thinking were, in fact, coming from His Spirit.  Sometimes, they were specific guidance, like things to say and do.  Other times, they were advance notice of things that were going on or that were coming up, so that I could be prepared for them. 

In our relationship, we were stuck.  I was trying to change and show my wife that things were going to be different.  She realized what I was doing, but was unable to respond to it.  It wasn’t getting through to her heart, and she often felt pressure because she knew that I expected a response that wasn’t forthcoming.  The idea that we might need to experience some time apart to break that impasse began to take a stronger hold in my thoughts, even though I objected to it greatly. 

One afternoon, we stopped at a deli to eat and the fateful conversation took place.  She broached the subject. For a while, I had been trying to figure out if there was a way that I could go stay somewhere else for a few weeks or so.  I figured that if she spent some time alone, she would miss me and things would work out.  Now, sitting across from each other, she said she thought we needed a separation. 

She told me there were things she needed to figure out about herself and what she wanted and that if I could give her that, she might decide that I was what she wanted.  She said that she felt she had always had to be dependent on a man and she wanted to know if she could make it on her own.  She reasoned that if she could be independent, and then chose marriage to me, it would be because she decided that was what was best for her. 

She presented it as a way that I might possibly get her back, but it caused a major war to break out inside me.  One side understood that what she was saying was the truth, and I even told her that I had been working on possible separation scenarios myself.  The other side said, “What about what’s best for me?  I’m your husband and you made vows to me that were supposed to be forever. You already chose marriage 12 years ago.  That choice is already made and you don’t get to change it.”

I didn’t voice any of these latter thoughts.  We talked and I found out that she’d already been looking for an apartment.  She said that there were loft apartments in downtown Springfield that she could afford and where we might both want to live if things worked out between us. 

It was both a terribly painful and somewhat hopeful conversation at the same time.  It hurt tremendously to know that we had reached the point where my precious wife wanted to live apart from me.  It also cast a vision that showed her thinking in terms of reconciliation and ultimately, staying together.  We agreed to table the subject for the night, but to continue it the next day.

As it turned out, we went together and found a loft apartment within the next few days that would be hers, but that we both liked and would want to share together if we got things worked out.  The message was clear.  “I’m stepping away, but not too far.  You’ll know where I am.  Will you come after me and pursue me and win back my heart, or do I not mean that much to you?  Is this love you are now professing real, or is it just for show?”  It wasn’t a game, but she had made her move and now it was my turn.

Walking And Talking, But Not Understanding

Posted: May 19, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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My wife and I used to have a small organic farm where we raised livestock, herbs, and vegetables.  It was during that phase of our lives that I made a mess of our marriage and was too busy working the farm and my regular job to even take the time to notice what was happening.  I just plodded ahead like I was going somewhere when everything was falling apart around me.

We left the farm in the Fall of 2009 and it was an attempt, weak as it was, to save our marriage.  I didn’t know at the time that it needed saving, so I thought it was more preventative.  Things were going in the wrong direction, so I decided to let go of the thing that was taking so much of my time and energy and try to be there for my wife.

I thought we had patched everything up and moved on from my mistakes, so it was a complete shock to me when Spring of 2010 came and my wife began letting go emotionally.  We were no longer selling at the farmer’s markets, so we started walking to our local market and it was on these walks that we began having honest talks about what was going on with our marriage. 

It was on a walk to the farmer’s market that I asked my wife if she still loved me and she couldn’t tell me that she did.  It was on these walks that I realized the seriousness of what was going on inside her.  I kept thinking it was a phase that would pass, and that any day, she would say she was sorry and everything would go back to normal.  These Thursday evening conversations showed me that things were much worse than I wanted to imagine, and I began to face, for the first time, the idea that I really could lose her forever. 

During one of these talks, she told me that she hadn’t made any decisions yet, and that she was going to take it a month at a time.  She said that she had chosen me once and she might be able to choose me again, but she might need time apart to figure that out.  She said she had lost herself during our marriage (We had been pretty co-dependent at times, and there was a lot that was unhealthy in our relationship) and she didn’t really know who she was anymore.  She told me that if I could give her time to find out who she was and what she wanted, she might choose me again, not because she had to, but because she would want to.

Then she asked me the million dollar question, “Does that make sense?”  I told her with all honestly, “Not a bit, but I respect that you feel that way.” She reiterated this idea several times over several weeks, and every time I told her that I didn’t understand it even a little bit, but I didn’t judge her for it, or try to tell her she was wrong.  I just tried to listen to her heart and love her the best way I knew how.   

While everything inside me cried out to hold it together, the idea of possibly having to let her go began to lodge itself in my consciousness.  Things were already in motion that would have to run their course, and it really wasn’t up to me to figure it all out.  I was going to have to do a lot of work on making myself the person that she would want to choose when she was ready to make that decision.

I caused the Problem. I am to Blame.

Posted: May 18, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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They say that the first step in changing is admitting that there is a problem.  Sometimes there’s a disconnect between recognizing that there is a problem and recognizing what to do about it.  It’s easy to look at a run-down house and say, “There’s a problem here.”  Understanding how to restore that house can be considerably more difficult. 

Through the giving over of my heart and will to God, I had gained a lot of insight into what the problems were.  Fortunately, I wasn’t on my own in figuring out what needed to be done.  Between God showing me the places I had failed and needed to restore, and Mort Fertel’s emails giving me practical advice on things to say and do, I had a pretty good set of blueprints. 

I also had an impulsive desire to fix everything NOW!  Of course, it doesn’t work that way, but once confronted with the truth of it all, I just wanted to make it right.  I didn’t want it to take time.  I wanted it fixed this minute.  Because of that, I sometimes said and did things that were counter-productive and probably set us back instead of moving us forward. 

The most unique aspect of Mort Fertel’s Marriage Fitness idea is that you don’t focus on the problems.  You step away from the problems and begin using words and actions that will begin to rebuild love.  In terms of fitness, it is perfectly logical.

If you find yourself overweight and out of shape, it doesn’t help to talk about how you got that way.  You need to get to the gym and get to work.  You won’t lose weight, build muscle, or get fit by focusing on why you haven’t been exercising or how poorly you’ve been eating.  You’ve just got to do the work.  The result will be that you’ll get fit and it won’t really matter how you got off track in the past.

By trying to get my wife to see what I was seeing and get her to focus on the past, I was missing the mark.  I was unintentionally still making the situation in our marriage her fault.  Although I didn’t mean to be, what I was really saying was, “Why can’t you see it like I see it?  Why don’t you just get over everything and it will all be ok?”  She needed a whole lot more than that to learn to love me again. 

I quickly realized my mistake (a scenario that would, unfortunately, repeat itself many times over the next few months) and began to simply work on saying and doing as many loving things as I could to her and for her.  I didn’t try to get her to talk about what had happened and why she couldn’t forgive me or any of that.  I just started loving her, really loving her, on God’s terms and her terms, not mine.

During this time, I began writing all these thoughts and realizations down so I wouldn’t forget and lose them.  I kept papers that had scripture verses, memories, and things I needed to go back and restore like the wedding ring.  I also wrote on one paper this statement:  “I am to blame.  I caused the failure of our marriage.”  That admission allowed the shift to occur from, “Why doesn’t my wife respond in the way I want her to,” to “I caused this, it’s my responsibility to fix it.”

Seeing Her in Everything

Posted: May 17, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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You will never finish any project that you never start.  No matter how simple you think it’s going to be, nor how daunting the task.  You have to get it started if you’re going to get it done.

I’m not really sure why I was such a procrastinator for much of my life or why I would fail to take care of things that needed my attention.  With a big project, it can be so overwhelming that you simply don’t know where to start.  You look at it and it all just seems like too much.  Sometimes that was the case for me.  That was where Mort Fertel’s emails were such a godsend.  I didn’t have to figure out what to do.  I could just follow the instructions.

In the routine maintenance, however, I had no such excuse.   I just didn’t do what needed done.  I didn’t pay attention.  I neglected to maintain the romance and the special things that keep love fresh and new.  I still wanted our love to be like that, but I hadn’t done my part for years and I finally more or less gave up. 

Seemingly out of nowhere, as I would walk through the apartment, I began to see my wife and our history all around me.  Things I hadn’t thought about in years, and things that I had forgotten altogether were suddenly returning to me with great force.  As I passed by a shelf or opened a drawer or cupboard, I would see things that had always been there, but now they reminded me that they had been gifts we had given each other, or were keepsakes from special times and places in our lives. 

Where I had forgotten all of the good things that we had shared for more than a decade and allowed myself to focus on the disappointments, I was seeing anew how special and wonderful our marriage had always been.  Where I had allowed myself to blame my loving partner for the marriage going downhill, I could now see how she had always tried to make me happy and had only wanted my love in return.  I was living in the same place, surrounded by the same things, but seeing it all so differently.  I saw her in everything and knew that I had blown it.

That evening, I tried to talk to her.  “This is us, remember?”  I tried to get her to see what I had seen and feel what I felt, but her eyes hadn’t been opened.  Her heart was still hard.  And I was taking the wrong approach.  I would learn that in the days to come.

Birthday Restoration Part 2

Posted: May 14, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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It’s the first day of my wife’s 41st year and life is certainly looking good from here.  Yesterday was one of those benchmark days on the restoration tour.  It’s a specific day, with specific events, that rectify and replace some of what was wrong with everything that is now right.

This birthday was full of peace and joy, while last year’s was anxious and fretful.  Last year, love was elusive, and noticeably absent.  This year, the presence of love was pervasive and unmistakable.  Last year, we were discovering that a lot of people who we thought were our friends were no friends at all.  This year, we know that we have a number of true friends, and we value them greatly.

So what made the difference? Several things.

Of course, the fact that we reached the point last Summer where we reconciled and found each other again changed everything.  Celebrating a birthday is completely different when two people are happily in love and wouldn’t think of leaving or ending the relationship.  But what about the healing, and the restoration of the past?

This year, it was all about knowing my wife well enough to know what mattered to her, and caring enough to make sure that she got the birthday that she wanted.  It was about putting thought and intent into making this a special and memorable day for her, not just doing obligatory duties like buying gifts and ordering a cake.

My wife is a kid at heart, so I made it a princess birthday, featuring Disney princesses and especially Belle, her favorite.  I got a good laugh at the store where I was buying princess wrapping paper, stickers, silly bands, etc. and the checker asked, “How old is she going to be?”  I’m pretty sure 40 wasn’t the answer she was expecting.

I gave her gifts and little surprises throughout the day, with a big surprise or two carefully worked in at the right moments.  There were presents to open in the morning (she’s a kid remember, and they want their gifts), little surprises slipped into her lunch box, and a car full of pink ballons when she left work.

Birthday Morning

After dinner, I gave her a surprise gift that she never saw coming.  Many years ago, a diamond pendant that I had bought her came up missing and was never found.  This year, I picked out a pendant to match the ring I gave her on our anniversary.  She thought she had already received her “big gift” in the morning and was completely unprepared for the necklace.
In the evening, we had a princess party at a local specialty cupcake shop, where a small group of friends and family surrounded her and joined in the spirit of the evening by putting on stickers and silly bands, pulling the strings on party poppers, and generally being silly.
A lot of healing took place yesterday.  A lot was restored.  Some of it, I wasn’t even aware of.  That’s the way love works when you do it right.  In the passage known as the love chapter the Bible says, “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.  Love never fails.”
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