In Perfect Love

Dear Littler Me,

I'm back, did you miss me? One of the things you are going to realize over the years on your way to becoming me is that even the best laid plans sometimes get fouled up.  With my busy week of sick children and divorcing children (read as child, because it is the same one), I completely lost track of the week and the challenge put to me by Heidi of Womanpulse.com.

If you will remember last week, one of your letters (The Business of Being Grown Up) I addressed some advice that I had for you about adulthood.  Heidi posted as well on this subject in her own way in an article on Womanpulse as well as JO-Hanny over at Have a cup of JO-hanny.  More have completed this challenge though I don't have any links as of right now.  I'll come back with those when available.

Today, I have been asked to talk to you about 3 things that I have learned about love.  Wow. Being my age and through the many relationships that you are going to go through, trying to whittle it down to just 3 things is going to be interesting.  Love is a topic I have addressed once or twice before in your letters and I am sure I'm going to touch on it many more times while this temporal channel is open.

I think after listing the wheres and what fors I have come down to some of my best lessons:

1. Compromise

One of the hardest learned lessons for me has been the learning of compromise. I know you think you are all fair and are the queen of compromise but I'm here to tell you now that I'm on the other side of it that you are dead wrong.  Looking back on the battlefields of my love life I have realized that there are more times you win the conversation not because you are right but because you think you are right and your partner is just not willing to fight over it.


This more than anything else is what is going to kill your relationships (other than money) because most of the men you will be with will either be all givers and no take or all takers (more often than not) and no give. 

No matter what shape love comes in, be it love of a significant other or a child you are going to have to learn the lesson of achieving that balance. Hopefully earlier than I did, it will save you from having to live your life on a battlefield like I have.



Blindness

No matter what relationship you are going to go through there is going to be a large level of blindness.  This will be good and bad in turns.

On the bad side, at times you are going to be blind to the way you have allowed yourself to be changed into what the other person thinks you should be.  This is going to be very difficult for you to see over the years.  It will be subtle tweaks until you wake up and realize one day that you just don't even recognize who you have become. You can't relate to the person in the mirror at all.  That kind of love is so soul crushing and unhealthy that you will have to literally shatter everything you know to escape it.

 

Don't worry about it so much though because on the flip side you will reach a level of blindness when it is true love that is good.  Those short timers will have quirks that you just can't take but when it is real you tend to be blind to the little flaws that would at other times annoy the piss out of you in anyone else.  You see the very beauty of the soul that is him in a way that others can not and that will blind you to so very many things. Like a blind person, when you lose one sense the others are intensified and you can see things in a completely different light. The light of love.


3. Love Bites Nah, strike this one and move onto the real #3

3. Forever
 Like the great Beatles sang, love is all you need.  I'm here to tell you on the other side of time that no truer words have ever been said.  Love is the only truly world changing gift we as a species have been given.  Every time you allow yourself to feel it, even when you have moved on down the road you will always take a piece of it with you. From that boy who bought your carnation for valentines day at school to the man who you walked down the aisle to meet with a death grip on your daddy's arm, a piece of them will always be inside of you.

Not only will a piece of each one be inside you, you will perfect it as you go and approach everything in that light.  Friends, children, parents. and life itself.  If there is truly one common thread in everything you are and everything you do it will be that love is the greatest of all.

"The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love, and be loved in return" - Moulin Rouge




I promise you it is going to be a rocky road, but I also promise that it will be worth every step, stumble, trip and bounce.






In perfect love,

The Business of Being Grown-up

Dear Littler B,

Good afternoon from a very frazzled frustrated you sitting in 2016. So much to learn and never enough time to do it. I have been put to a "Blog Challenge" which will require me to tailor 4 letters of yours to certain topics.  This should be creative and fun.

http://www.womanpulse.com/2016/02/blogging-challenge-week-one-what-advice.html

Your first letter is a bit of a cheat though, for you/me. The letter today is supposed to be about what advice I would give a child about adulthood.  While I know that has got your bristly hair on your shaved head up, no I don't mean you are a "child" per se, but when you become me in your mid-forties you will realize that 16-18 is so incredibly new.

Every letter I have written to you thus far has been about advice. The things that are coming for you to prepare for. These things (for the most part) are not only things you will experience but things that many at large will go through in the journey of growing up. So, while all of my letters to you are advice I will sum up some of the big hitters.



 

Always Find a Reason to Smile








Life when you are an adult dear little me is full of responsibility. It is not a bad thing. You get to work (which you might not like) but it allows you to have money to buy the things you like. You will be pulled in all different directions to be able to juggle your responsibilities so make sure you find at least one thing to reflect on from your day that will make you smile.






Always Find a Reason to Make Others Smile

Remember, young one. While you are going to be a busy grown up - others will be as well. Do you know how good it feels to have someone compliment you or just be nice to you for no reason at all? It is just as important to give that feeling to other people. Commit a random act of kindness every day, even if it is just a little one. It may be just the thing that someone else needs to completely turn their day around.


Don't Be Afraid to Try Something New

You have so much time ahead of you and so many experiences you will have the opportunity to take part in. Don't be afraid to try something new, it will be what creates the amazing grown up that you will become. It will introduce you to new people. It will teach you things you like and things you don't.

Things I Like

Things I Don't

Take a Mental Picture 

Every chance you get, take a moment to take a mental picture of the things around you and file it in your brain-album. As your pages get filled up and you look back through them you will be amazed by the beautiful moments you have been blessed to take part in.

Don't Be Afraid to Be Yourself

There are so many people who will put expectations on you about who you should be, what you should look like, what you should believe, what you should think. At the end of the day, one of the wonderful things about being a grown up is that YOU are the one who has to live your life. Make it yours!

I have so much more I can tell you, but this letter is getting rather long. Luckily, I get the opportunity to share these and so many more ideas on an almost daily basis.

Here's looking at you kid,

Background Sound

John Mayer - No Such Thing
John Mellencamp - Jack and Diane
Ben Folds - Still Fighting It
Ataris - In This Diary
Miranda Lambert - The House That Built Me
Carrie Underwood - Whenever You Remember
Kenny Chesney - Young
Taylor Swift - Fifteen
Blink 182 - Dammit
Five for Fighting - 100 Years

Whispers

Dear Littler B,

Though I don't have an actual letter prepared today as I have so very much to catch up on in the real world that I have been neglecting since our first letter. I was tagged on a photo today from one of my very best friends and it was too ironic not to send to you.  Listen to the whispers on the wind and I will do the same.

Here's whispering to you kid!

Bigger Little B

Thank you HH for the tag!