I used to pursue meaning through art, and idealised the creative and expressive element of it. Then I started learning how to legitimately, meaningfully interact with people, and lost a lot of my artistic inspiration, because I had been trying to fill the holes in my life with artistic expression, and suddenly some gaping holes were no longer anywhere near as holey. A lot of my artistic endeavours were about having a voice and feeling accepted, ultimately. When I started to feel accepted by God and people, and started to experience people validating my need for a voice by genuinely listening and coming back for more, I acknowledged what I'd always known at some level: that I had been pursuing connection and intimacy through a means that could never deliver it.
My inclination is that when marriage --> child/ren, being a husband/wife and parent become equal roles. But inclination is also that as a single, childless, 26 year old I probably shouldn't be thinking I know how to do marriage and parenthood better than people who are actually married and parents. I do agree, though, that as we enter marriage, we're choosing to put the role of spouse and parent ahead of the role of "me" -- willfully putting our spouse and child/ren's needs ahead of our private passions. On another forum, a man with a wife and children is thinking of making a career change from his current, safe profession to full-time personal training, but is rightly hesitant to do so because his family's needs trump his enthusiasm for fitness. Another trainer mocked him for not going with his passions, so I came down on this guy like a tonne of bricks. Something I learned too late to save my last relationship is that it's more important that my job support the ones I love than that my job be something I love. If you can have both, great, but the former precedes the latter.
My inclination is that when marriage --> child/ren, being a husband/wife and parent become equal roles. But inclination is also that as a single, childless, 26 year old I probably shouldn't be thinking I know how to do marriage and parenthood better than people who are actually married and parents. I do agree, though, that as we enter marriage, we're choosing to put the role of spouse and parent ahead of the role of "me" -- willfully putting our spouse and child/ren's needs ahead of our private passions. On another forum, a man with a wife and children is thinking of making a career change from his current, safe profession to full-time personal training, but is rightly hesitant to do so because his family's needs trump his enthusiasm for fitness. Another trainer mocked him for not going with his passions, so I came down on this guy like a tonne of bricks. Something I learned too late to save my last relationship is that it's more important that my job support the ones I love than that my job be something I love. If you can have both, great, but the former precedes the latter.