5 REASONS TO MARRY — A RITUAL TO THE SHORE OF MY SOUL.
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“By all means, marry. If you get a good wife, you’ll become happy; if you get a bad one, you’ll become a philosopher.” ~ Socrates
I wonder if Socrates really said this. Doubtful. But if so, he was a funny guy.
Sometime next year, I will marry a beautiful and kind man, who breathes light into my soul.
As a rebellious creative who pretty much abhors social conventions, I have always held an inner revolution against our boxed love culture — the way we attempt to tie love down to our expectations, labels, attachments, and claim some peripheral form of ownership upon another heart.
Those who know me have asked, with true curiosity, why I have decided to marry.
Isn’t this an institutionalized form of love? Why are you doing this?
These are a few of the many questions I have attempted to navigate inside the canals of my engaged heart.
Good questions. And questions I feel are essentially important to answer.
And so I decided to write my wandering thoughts around them. This is such an incredibly personal decision, and these thoughts are, by no means, an attempt to convince others that marriage is the way to go. They are simply holy opinions that I believe we each are entitled to hold.
I place them forward, in writing, as an offering — nothing more, nothing less.
1. Marriage is what we make of it.
I see marriage as a threshold, the invitation of something greater into a shared love story.
In depth psychology, Carl Jung writes often of a phenomenon called the transcendent function — when two energies come together, there is often an emergence of a third, that holds both but is far greater than simply the sum of the two.
I believe something of this nature occurs when we create space for it, when we invite it in. Do I believe marriage is needed in order for this to occur? No, not necessarily. But it is one way of consciously inviting that holy energy to appear and nestle itself into the center of our story.
2. I love ritual.
There is something undeniably lovely about holding and creating sacred space — a space dedicated and devoted to the energy of love. I am deeply enamored with the infinite potential of love.
I believe in holiness, and when we marry, I believe we enter more fully into the great unfolding mystery that is our Love. Love is the connective energy that allows us to know what cannot be known.
It is the greatest of mysteries that connects us all and moves us to our peak experiences of being, both within ourselves and within relationship. Many mystical teachings say that it is in love that we brush against the face of the Divine.
Marriage is my way of bowing before the gods and goddesses of love, offering myself and my heart in their divine service, telling them I am unboundedly grateful for their gifts.
3. I would like to honor the intimacy possible in marriage.
I do not believe that all marriages are meant to last forever. In fact, I believe many serve their purpose and are meant to disintegrate for the growth, transformation, and evolution of each individual soul. Marriage is a sacred contract, but not one that binds.
But I do believe, when you look deeply into the eyes of another soul, and enter into a commitment (for any period of time), the relationship and intimacy deepen. Love recognizes your acknowledgement, and She, perhaps, appears just a bit more brilliantly on the intimate altar of your heart.
4. There are others involved in your love story.
I am in stark opposition to marrying for others, or to please one’s family or loved ones. It is the choice of the couple how they choose to come together. However, marriage can provide an opportunity for each person to sew their thread of love and support into the fabric of the couple.
Each person holds different stories and memories of the two individuals marrying, and yet together, the beloved community spans the lives of the couple and weaves a tapestry of yearning, passion, and promise that holds the two and all of those involved into a new relationship.
In such uniting, each person is stretched and carved in new ways, likened to the deepening of a ravine. We are asked to embrace new relationships, new families, and this often demands great patience, forgiveness, tolerance and love.
5. The merging into Oneness.
This is, perhaps, the pinnacle of my heart-thoughts around this subject. I view marriage as a spiritual symbol — the movement of two into one. This movement mirrors the sacred aspiration of the yogi — moving into the non-dual perception that is Oneness.
In marriage, something of the human and divine mix. We allow ourselves to merge into the light of another soul, and yet we keep space for love to breathe, to move freely. We bow deeply before love’s wisdom, and yet would dare not claim command of her tides.
No other quote but this one captures the essence of this more brilliantly:
“But let there be spaces in your togetherness and let the winds of the heavens dance between you. Love one another but make not a bond of love: let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.” ~ Kahlil Gibran
And so, my decision to marry will not imply a traditional, scripted marriage ceremony. In fact, it is quite the opposite. It is a numinous ritual to that moving sea. It is the offering of the shore of my soul to her vast and unbounded beauty and potential.
And it is a deep acknowledgment and honoring of a man and soul whose beauty and light have completely captured my being.
*****
#Oneness
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