Princess Bride is one of the best movies in all of movie history. On this we can agree.
On true love…

Westley: I told you I would always come for you. Why didn’t you wait for me?

Buttercup: Well… you were dead.

Westley: Death cannot stop true love. All it can do is delay it for a while.

Buttercup: I will never doubt again.

Westley: There will never be a need.

I believe in true love. I believe in fighting for each other against all odds. I believe in never settling for mediocre. I believe in soul mates. I believe in kindness and respect. I believe in romance. I believe in sex as good. I believe in protecting love against all resistance.

My husband is my soul mate. This does not mean we have it easy or we naturally get it all right. Usually, nothing that I have thought would be natural and easy has actually been natural or easy. Well, “natural” but in the way that lions eating zebras is natural.

Birthing and caring for babies, for example, I thought would be natural and easy. We would sleep and feed and play and cuddle and we would just KNOW what to do next. It would be “natural” – As in easy… because those two words were synonyms in my head. This was so so wrong. Natural is usually hard work. Natural is of life and death and struggle and perseverance. Natural is of failure and commitment. Natural is of frustration and the will to live despite all odds. Natural is not easy. Easy is easy.

So, when I say that my husband and I are soul mates, I mean that our marriage is natural. Our guts said YES, get married. And it has been hard work ever since. Smooth sailing is not sailing… it is drifting. We refuse to drift. We chart our course and we fight for it every day. Despite storms and fights and disagreements and waves, we sail.

We are soul mates because we fell in love and decided to fight to stay that way.

It’s funny. We all fall in love for different reasons, reasons that take our breath away. Reasons that fill all our requirements and hopes and dreams. This person is everything we’ve wanted. They make us better. They inspire us. They turn us on. And then, over time, every little thing you loved will change. And that’s when you decide if you really love this person… their core… their very center. Because the outside definitely changes. Their abilities change. Their opinions. Their mannerisms. Everything changes. And you must wake up every day deciding to stay in love with their core and fall in love with everything else anew.

Love his or her face? Good. Enjoy it today and learn to love the one you wake up to tomorrow.

Love his or her abilities? Good. Enjoy them today and learn to love the talents you wake up to tomorrow.

Tomorrow, her face may change. Tomorrow, his ability may change. You do not know. And you do not get to choose which parts you love. Once you are in, you are in.  

If you do not choose to do this, every day, you will wake up one morning and wonder where your spouse went… the one you agreed to marry. The one you loved so deeply. This is not that person anymore. And you will feel cheated. Lied to. Rightfully allowed to leave.

But…

Watching your spouse unlove you is horrible. It happens slowly or all at once. They say little comments about how your face or body has changed. They mention how someone else is so successful at their job. They stop lighting up when you enter a room because you are a new version of you and they cannot accept it. They mourn the loss of the previous you so very much that they cannot love the present-tense You. They are stuck in time, wishing they had married a robot – an immortal god – who would be their idol or servant forever. But instead, they married a human. And humans change, they grow old, they adapt, they are injured and heal with weird angles to their souls. And sometimes your spouse simply does not know how to be married to a human.

It’s challenging because so many of us didn’t realize we were marrying humans or that we were really mortals. We’ve seen more tv characters and advertisements than we have seen real people… we believe the media more than real life.

But people are meant to change and grow. Our cells fully replace themselves approximately every 7 years, so if you’ve been married over 7 years, you are actually married to an entirely different person.  It’s never too late to rediscover the person sitting next to you, sleeping next to you.   It’s never too late to turn to them and ask who they are now….

I believe in true love. I believe in looking at what you have and deciding today, right now, “How much do I want to keep this thing going? How much do I value what I have?” The best gift in the world is to look into the eyes of your spouse and decide you both want it more than anything. That’s the miracle. That’s true love. 

“Sonny, don’t you tell me what’s worthwhile–true love is the best thing in the world, except for cough drops. Everybody knows that.” 
― William Goldman, The Princess Bride