I have been here a long time. I have seen marriages restored and marriages irretrievably broken. I have seen people become who they were meant to be and those who never quite become whole.
This journey you are on, this process, is very hard. You did not ask for it. God knows, you may wish it never happened. But we do not ever know what is going to happen in life. We think we have it all mapped out in our heads. It rarely goes that way.
So, when we are given a challenge like the one we have been given, there are a few ways we can go.
We can give up, cut our losses and move on.
We can fight with all we have until we cannot any longer.
We can learn and grow and become who we were meant to be.
We can accept that life sometimes is really tough or rail against the devil and blame him.
The thing to remember is this. We, all of us, may sometimes feel like we have no choice in this and blame it all on our spouse or ourselves for that matter.
But we pay a huge price when we do that.
We do not look inside. We do not do the work. We continue to blame whomever we blame.
We sell ourselves short when we do that. We lose an amazing opportunity when we do that.
We miss out on taking control of us and OUR life.
And in reality, that is the only thing we have control over.
So, yes, this succks. It really does. It's hard and it's heartbreaking. But it is also so powerful.
When we begin to understand that we have control over our part of the journey - whether we quit or not, whether we grow or not, whether we accept or not, man, what power we have. What an opportunity we have, what great lessons we can learn.
When it gets really tough, take some time, back away, regroup, find some peace in whatever way you can at that moment.
When you are ready, get back on your path. Dig deep, find your footing, stand strong.
We have power in all this.
We have choices we can make. We can choose how to behave, what to feel, how to love.
I will tell you this. No matter what happens, you will not regret that you stood if you do the work.
You will not regret that you were someone who loved so much you were willing to let your spouse go.
You will not regret that when you realized you could do it no more, you were able to look back and see that you acted with dignity and courage and strength.
This is a journey you were meant to go on. I believe that with everything I have.
