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Wednesday, October 10, 2007
MY TAKE ON "THE L WORD"
Not THAT L word...The four letter one. LOVE. It never fails. Seems like every time Tom and I do a show together, we get at least one person, or a couple that comes up to us and tells us how much we've inspired them to change their lives. And as nice as that can be, it always leaves me with the feeling that there's MORE to tell them. And i end up feeling a twisted sense of responsibility about it. Because inspiration can take different forms. These are the two most common forms it seems to take at our shows: 1. "Our relationship was hanging on the brink of doom and you've inspired us to give it another shot and really work at it this time." I like this one a lot. 2. "You've inspired me to follow my heart and my dreams so I'm leaving my marriage of 20 something years and moving to a cabin in the woods to become a (fill in the blank with your wildest dream)." This one scares me more than a little. I don't know about you. But that's some pressure folks. I don't like feeling like I'm leading folks astray...or presenting an unrealistic image to the world. So here's what I'd say to those folks at the CD table at a show if I had the time. LOVE IS FUCKING HARD WORK. Doesn't matter who you love. Or how great they are at loving. LOVE IS FUCKING HARD. PERIOD. Love is also a verb. Not a noun. I've been in good relationships. I've been in horrible relationships. They all have moments that are wonderful. They also all have moments that completely suck. I don't know why that is so hard for people to believe. Well, yes i do. We are fed from the minute we're born images of what love is supposed to look like. We see it on TV. In movies. It's supposed to be beautiful and sexy and fun all the time and easy easy easy. And we can all read the minds of our partners and never have to ask the hard questions or talk about the hard things. And if we get too close to having to do anything negative, we just look for someone else beautiful, sexy, fun and easy to start over with. The fact is folks, THAT doesn't exist. At least not in my neighborhood. Here's what i believe. We're all wounded. Most of the wounds we deal with (or run from) every day are wounds we suffered in childhood. Either at the hands of loving (but imperfect) parents or caregivers, or our other earliest relationships. And the people we're drawn to, or attracted to, in some very primitive and unconscious ways remind us of these wounds. So we seek out these people in an unconscious attempt to work out our histories. To heal the wounds of the past. Trouble is, we don't go in realizing this. We THINK we're attracted to other things: The way someone looks, the way they make us laugh, the way they challenge our intellect, or how "low maintenance" they appear. The things we all THINK we want (and DO want). But under all that, is a whole different set of criteria. The ones we don't even realize we're looking for until the shit starts hitting the fan. Maybe I'm not making sense. Let me take Tom for example. I love my husband. I'm deeply attracted to him. To the way he looks. To the way he thinks. To the way he writes. To the way he sings. The way he makes me laugh. To the way he makes me feel. But part of the way he makes me feel reminds me on the most basic level of wounds I experienced as a child. And part of my wounds have to do with emotional abandonment. When I was hurting or feeling scared or insecure, someone important that i counted on to be there found a way to not be available. And i experience that with Tom. Just as I can feed his feelings of inadequacy. His childhood wounds. And when we're not living consciously, we forget this, and get tangled in the most unreasonable arguments and resentments. Thank god for therapists. And for Harville Hendricks I highly recommend anyone in a relationship running out to buy a copy of "Getting the Love You Want". A book that explains all this in a much more coherent way than I am right now. Back to what I would tell people at shows. If you're looking at my life and thinking that what i have is easy and requires no work and isn't full of hard and heartbreaking times, you're dead wrong. I did follow a dream. And for me, it meant leaving a marriage. (Because you can't work on a marriage if you're the only one willing to work. And that's the boat I was in. And had been in for a long time.) And my dream of making music led me to another dream. A relationship with someone else who was willing to do the work. I'd never had that before. I'd always been in relationships with people who were only willing to go so far or do so much work, but when it really got down to the hard stuff (which it ALWAYS does), they checked out. And THAT'S what I most appreciate about Tom. He works at it. Just as hard as me. And that's what we have going for us that allows us to get up and sing songs about love and look each other in the eye and mean it at a gig where two hours before the gig we might have had the hugest fight. Because we both know that even though from the outside, it might look easier to go somewhere else, ultimately, it never is. The path with ANYONE, ultimately leads back to the same unhealed wounds. So to the inspired folks that are making the brave choice to work on it, I say, "I commend you brave souls for doing the work that most people aren't willing to do". And to the folks who are leaving it all to follow a dream, i would say, "Is there anything that you're running from? Is your partner willing to work with you? Are you sure you don't need to stick around and see what needs fixing here first? If you haven't done that, the same pain, the same work is bound to show up when there's someone new in your life." Okay, so this wasn't supposed to be a downer. Just realistic. And hopefully, hopeful. Because the thing about having a partner that is actually willing to hunker down and stick around and do the work, is that you actually have a chance to heal. HEAL! Really heal. A safe place to work out your deepest wounds. A soft place to fall. That's what I think love is. So there. posted by Cary Cooper @ 11:28 AM 1 Comments:
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