It was a story that went viral. During the Boston Marathon this year, a single mom running in her first Boston Marathon, was dared by her daughter to kiss a stranger as she passed through Wellesley. For decades, women from Wellesley college have lined up yelling, cheering, and even giving away kisses to the marathon runners. So when this single mom decided to take her daughter up on the dare and do a sort-of reversal of the tradition, she found a man who agreed and who's friend snapped a picture as proof to the daughter that she went through with the dare.
When the daughter realized that her mom didn't get his phone number, she decided to play matchmaker, and try and track the guy down. It got picked up by news stations, and the story and picture went viral. Shortly after, the mom got a letter from the man's wife. The wife's response is surprising. She was actually running in the marathon as well, and found out about the kiss after finishing the race. But she wrote, "We all thought this story was hilarious because it is just like my husband to do that," and goes on to say. "It was one of many memorable stories from a great weekend in Boston."
The wife and husband ask to stay anonymous but have been married for 20 years and have 2 kids who both found the story funny. But my question to you is what would your response if your spouse or significant other kissed a stranger on the lips while you weren't there? Would you laugh and find it funny? Now this story has many layers, and we clearly don't know all the details. The wife could be laughing in the letter, but in the comfort of her home, yelling, screaming, and the husband could be doing years of chores to make up for his lapse in judgment. But I doubt it. So how is it that this wife could laugh about something that would cause most wives or husbands to freak out and... you fill in the blank.
First off, let's look at the scenario. It is a common tradition that most people who run in the Boston Marathon know about; the Wellesley tunnel where girls line up to cheer on and kiss the marathon runners. Second is that the husband's friend is the one that took the picture so the lady could send it to the daughter. The man wasn't out sneaking around, trying not to get caught kissing girls. The lady approached him, told him the situation, and he thought it was funny and agreed to make it happen for the daughter. His wife was in the same marathon when it happened. He was there cheering her on.
So it's pretty obvious that this couple has something that very few couples have. First, is a trust that a complete and 100% trust in each other, themselves, and their relationship. In a society where many husbands and wives and boyfriends and girlfriends don't tell each other the passwords to their email accounts and phones, this couple has a trust that few can comprehend. It's a trust that isn't formed overnight. It's devotion and unselfishness, honesty and promises kept, sound minds and sound decisions, minutes and years in the making. It's a couple in a healthy relationship where trust was earned, gained, and repeated. It's two people who are confident in themselves and confident in each other to be trusting, and trustworthy.
The problem is that we've all been burned. We've all had people we cared about who took our trust, and stepped all over it as well as our hearts. But in order for you to ever have a healthy relationship, you can't take other people's past flaws and put those on your current significant other. You can't give them something that they haven't "earned" themselves. No matter how many times you've been lied to, cheated on, and betrayed, if you can't learn to trust someone, you will never be happy in love. It's not an easy thing to do, but if you find the right person, they can make it easy.
The second thing you notice is that these people enjoy each other, and enjoy life. We don't know the whole story about this couple, but we do know that the wife is running in a marathon, and her husband is there to support her. And after she found out about what her husband did, she laughed about it. That's a pretty good indication that these people are out enjoying life. Ever met a marathon runner who hates life? I haven't. But then again I've only met 2 marathon runners. But people who run marathons strike me as people who are out challenging themselves, not afraid to go outside of their comfort zone and accomplish something. They sound way better than me.
Now let me be clear. I'm not telling you to go out and start making out with strangers and hope that your significant other laughs about it. But I do want you to take a step back and look at your relationship as well as yourself. Do you trust your partner 100%? Do they trust you 100%? If it's not 100%, then it's not trust at all. Trust is one of those things that is either all or none. Because if you only trust someone 99%, then there's a 1% doubt, which means you don't trust them. You can tell people who have been hurt a lot, and who don't have a lot of self-esteem and self-worth by the way they trust their partner. If they struggle with it, then it's clear they need to work on how they view themself, and the way they view people close to them.
You will never be happy in love if you can't be can't be trusting. Because then there will always be that little voice in the back of your brain of self-doubt that something isn't right. Paranoia will creep in, and will cause conflict. If you have to always be checking up on your partner, or if you can't be trusted, then it's a sign your relationship is unhealthy. If you have parts of your life that you're hiding from each other. If you have to sneak around in an area, or put a password on something, it means you're doing something wrong. How can you expect someone to trust you if you betray that trust? The reason this couple can laugh and trust each other is because they're in a healthy relationship that has been built over time.
If you want to have a healthy relationship, YOU need to do your part. YOU need to have high morals, self-esteem, and self-worth. These will lead to good decisions and a trust that will create an amazing relationship. Now if you're with someone that has done something that has betrayed your trust, you have 2 options: You can either truly forgive them, and leave it in the past for good, or you can break up with them. Those are your only 2 options. Because if you can't truly forgive a significant other, then it will always be there, it will always cause problems, and you will never be happy. Trust and forgiveness are absolutely essential in a relationship. There is no getting around it. How is the trust and the forgiveness in your relationship?
http://wellesley.wickedlocal.com/article/20150503/NEWS/150508963/?Start=1
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