We managed to have a mini photo session in the afternoon after girls activities. They spent 1.5 hrs at entertainment zone by themselves, then tie dye t-shirt, followed by 2 hrs at adventure zone. That left me and hubby plenty of time to work a bit, relax, remind our love story, and our 30 years journey to where we are . I know that many people say when it’s meant to be, it’s meant to be as if it’s effortless. I disagree. Love as feeling is easy to come by, just as easy to go by. Love as an act is daily mindful work. Just how I think other aspects of life, work, kids, health, relationships, I believe in hard work to achieve my goals. However, I don’t expect my hard work to always pay off because many factors and people are variables that are not under my control. Thus, I am grateful to be in love 7 years later. Both of us put a lot into it, maybe a bit more from my side as I’m more mindful of things. But I do know he puts his part just as much.
Finally a family selfie by the beach too. We are all so tanned despite pouring tons of sunscreen. Oh well… beach trauma. 🙂
Just as I was reflecting about our marriage and love story. An old friend from the US who I haven’t talked over a year reached out to me. She’s having a marriage crisis and seeking for advise. Each couple has its own set of challenges and story, I don’t really like to give advise . Yet, I shared my personal journey, especially those difficult moments and how I made difficult choices. After talking with her for 1.5 hour. I shared it with my hubby who also knows her well. His first reaction was: she’s not busy enough and is too comfortable with life. I laughed out at first but upon reflection, he has a point. Decades ago, women are busy taking care of family and don’t really have much mental space to think about emotional needs. Now, women are financially independent and self sufficient, thus what we demand from the couple changed. We seek emotional connection and bound, we seek the butterfly feeling despite being middle age, we want a co-parent who we can rely on, we want a friend to share our daily musings. We simply want more of everything. Can we find all these in one person? maybe but unlikely all the time. It might be more realistic to demand few non-negotiable things from our partner and have our other needs satisfied by different people. For example, I love physical activity but my hubby is not. I won’t leave him because he does not share hobby with me, for that I have my running friends. Yet, we both value family above all and have similar financial habits. He doesn’t like to travel as much as I do but he’s happy to tag along. He loves to eat, I love to cook, perfect combo as well 🙂 Just like that, i can mention many aspects that make us work.
What do you need from your partner/husband?
After hours at the beach, we moved to the water park area and ended at the pool with this priceless sunset.
Our New Journey 
What amazing pictures!!! That first one is stunning. This was a nice reflection on love and marriage. I like how you don’t sugarcoat the fact that it’s not always been easy for you. It does always “sound” so romantic when people talk about their marriage as a match made in heaven, but I think in reality, behind closed doors, most people have struggles and areas they definitely have to work on. I think it says a lot to realize that we can’t change people…and accept the fact that we don’t have to LIKE every little thing about someone in order to still love them, overall. There are definitely areas that I am very different from my husband, and sometimes it has/ does bother me a little now and then, but like you said, I am also okay with having my own separate interests. I don’t really feel the need for him to be “into” every single thing I am, or share my exact same personality!
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Congrats! True that you don’t need to have exactly the same interests but I suppose there should be a few that you like to do together. There needs to be a balance otherwise you also drift apart.
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