Yesterday’s post was about having a fund set aside for escaping bad situations or creating new opportunities. A great concept. I’m putting the question back out there to readers..if you had a “Go-to-Hell” fund what did you use it for? If you didn’t, what do you wish you had one for? Just click on the “give advice” prompt on the header to submit your story or you can comment directly on the post.
For today, I share more thoughts on change. Yesterday I spoke with a woman who’s recently had a life-changing situation. She’s gone from being able to afford whatever she wanted, or at least not think about whether she could get a babysitter and go to brunch, to going to social services to find out what benefits she has as a single, bankrupt mom, in legal terms at least, due to her husband’s unexpected situation. But this is not about her situation it’s about her attitude.
First of all, she’s happy that she had a career and foundation of what was important to her before she got married so she had an anchor from which to navigate what was important when all she expected about her marriage changed. Second of all, she learned the benefit of change…even when that change is scary and what most people would see as devastating. This is what she learned that surprised her and gave her new perspective on relationships:
“If you think nothing can change, in your relationship or in any aspect of life, forever seems impossible.”
When you have inflexible expectations of what you life will be like, you set yourself up for disappointment, or boredom at best. In her case, starting over gives her a whole new way to experience her marriage. It’s daunting, but when you take away the props of “what life is supposed to be like”, you see your partner and your life in a new light. The light shines on what’s important. In her case, she’s excited to get to know her husband again, without these “props” despite all the many challenges she now faces.
I think it is a great way to look at relationships and perhaps get a little more comfortable with the idea that life will change. It may seem at cross purposes with the idea that people don’t change, but actually it’s just the other side of the coin. When her life changed, she got to see her husband for who he was again, not as the great provider or with an ego masking his fears, just him. And found, she still loved him.
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