Just last night, my wife turned to me and said, “Remember that my love for you isn’t transactional.” Immediately I slunk lower into bed, and my initial reaction was to want to turn my back on her. With conscious effort, I pulled myself up, and made a little noise instead.
That’s progress already. Two years ago, I would have begged, insisted, maybe yelled, that she not say something like that. It would have felt pointless and it would have made me feel way worse than I did. I didn’t know back then but my critic would have raised a stink. As it was, last night, it tried to – but I managed to actively remind myself that this was her viewpoint, and I had to respect it.
If I were to be honest and talk to her about my love for her, I would say the same thing. I love her for who she is, and not what she can do for me. What she does for me is only a bonus and an outworking of the person she is. But yet, applying that to myself is not something that’s possible or easy. There exists in my mind a duality, also a contradiction. Others whom I love don’t have to earn that love, but in *my* case, I need to earn my place in the lives of others, or I do not deserve their love. I am a hypocrite.
And therein lies a contradiction and duality in people struggling with mental health issues that I hope to explain a little with this post. Warning – this is also a rather Christian post, if you are someone coming from a secular background. I still hope it can help a little – feel free to take the Christian taugeh (beansprouts) out.
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