To Love Her

Each and every moment of despair takes the warrior a step closer to where he belongs.

We fall. Sometimes when we fall we find ourselves devastated and others we find our hearts lifted beyond the clouds. Often, one can lead to the other as we find the hardest moments of our lives have led us to a welcome, loving respite.

We fall from grace, we fall in love. We fall into tight crevices and we fall over vast fields of time. Warriors are, after all, the epitome of stable hot messes, hard granite with mushy, bubbling cores. We often portray a steely sense about us because we can strongly feel the softness that lies underneath. The steel does not scare us; the soft parts rattle us to our core. The bruises and cuts from battle we can deal with. It’s the scars to our hearts we find the hardest to survive.

If you wonder why warriors bring out their steel it’s because we can best handle conflict there. It’s when our soft parts are threatened that we lose our shit, unable to either cope with the pain that is coming or the sense of loss that may arrive. To those of us who are conscious warriors, who have attained a certain awareness in this life, we add another battle to the mix by trying to outflank the armor of our hearts. This is done by simply accepting that we cannot love truly while building a sanctuary for that part of us that is necessary to truly love. We fight hard to make the softest parts of us open to those who we wish to invite in.

For love comes, and when a warrior woman presents herself to a warrior man, he knows he must be ready in humbled love to accept her.

It is when a man deeply loves a woman that he finds himself both skewered and healed. He throws away the shield he’s hid behind and bares his chest to her sword, knowing full well their time together could result either in the ripping out of his heart or the beauty of a true love’s touch. These men know the risks of such an adventure but walk it anyway, knowing they have given up much just to be worthy of her.

We only hope she can recognize such a gospel, and respect it for what it is. Warriors do not make agreements lightly, and the scars accumulated along their journey are not as much reminders of battles won or lost, but of moments stretched across time that have made him worthy of her now, in this moment, with a shoulder made strong for her to rest and heart made true for her to cherish.

When a warrior man loves a woman so, he does not sacrifice who he is. He has faced much to achieve the level of truth that now defines him and instead of wavering, he wraps her in the essence of that truth. He will love her with the power that has shaped him, and the strength that has seen him face death only to rise again.

When a such a man loves a woman, he prays he has found in her a wildness that matches his own. Will she throw away her shield for him? Will she stand by him fearless in the storms, honest and truthful, with the character and honor he so readily demands of himself? Will she forsake her fear, open her heart, and walk with him?

Will she look at him as her only, her partner, and not forsake him?

If not, he will look at his dissected heart beating in the palm of her hand. If so, their bond will be unbreakable and they will become equal masters in the home they have built, together.

It is, though, with such questions the man sits in idle despair, just praying for an answer. He begs the source of strength within him to hold steady the ground that shakes him. It is this love thing he cannot do alone, and that scares him. It is this love thing, however, than can finally see him home.