The Way We Want to Be 💙🧿🤝🏻🔷️

𝓦𝓸𝓷𝓭𝓮𝓻 𝓦𝓮𝓭𝓷𝓮𝓼𝓭𝓪𝔂

“I believe you have to assess constantly - first individually, then jointly before you can adapt accordingly.”

I was home a few weeks ago for the Jewish Holidays, and my parents and I decided to watch one of the classics and my all time favorite - The Way We Were.

My Dad was getting a kick out of it because I was literally saying the lines before Hubble (Robert Redford) and Katie (Barbara Streisand). He turned to me and asked, “How many times have you seen this?” I responded, “I don't know, maybe close to a hundred!”

I have always loved the chemistry in the movie, the passion you feel between Barbara Streisand and Robert Redford.

This time though, I looked at it differently. I saw it through a totally different lens. Not as a hopeless romantic, but as a mature grown woman, looking for some introspection into love.

They don’t end up together, basically because they were both so set in their uncompromising ways, that they weren’t willing to change their old programming in order to find a new way to create a life together. They both pushed for a while and fought to maintain a relationship, but in the end, they couldn’t make it work.

Love isn’t enough.

They had love.

But it takes more than love.

It takes commitment, understanding, compromise, communication, and trusting not only yourself, but the person you want to partner with.

Maybe it doesn’t have to be a daily thing, but there definitely has to be an opening for checking in with one another. Working together to find a way to allow your individual beliefs to flourish while supporting the partnership as a whole.

It takes work and courage to unpack the deep painful emotional issues we carry with us.

But, in true love, we choose to unpack these with another person. We choose to share the deepest parts of our being in trust. Opening our hearts and allowing someone into your fears, your wants, your traumas, and all the layers of who you are.

It isn’t about the way we were, but the way we want to be.