Love Is Also Learning How Someone Changes

Matthew Gottesman (0:02)

Welcome to The Niche Is You. My name is Matt Gottesman, at Matt Gottesman on Instagram, and this is my daily podcast where I create short, quick hitting episodes to help you uncomplicate life, creativity, and the pursuit of your highest self. There's only main character energy here. Now let's get into it.

Welcome to episode 877 Love is also learning how someone changes. Love is also learning how someone changes. I was reflecting on a wedding I went, I think it was about maybe eight years ago. And I remember the couple being told, take a look at each other. This is like during the ceremony. It was like, take a look at each other. You're marrying five different people in that person, maybe even more. And the reason it was said is that throughout your lifetime, the person you marry will keep evolving. And so the advice was, you keep dating your spouse. You always stay curious, and you keep dating your spouse. And now I want to talk about this. There's layers here, there's nuance. And I really want to dive into this, because I actually think that it's probably one of the greatest things you could ever commit to. And when you approach it from a place of like, hey, listen, you know, this feels God ordained. This is us in assignment. Let's just be all in, in our approach. Let us, you know, be involved with each other. Let us be curious about each other. Let us keep being in our individual growth. And let us always stay curious about how we are evolving. And always remember, you know, what we're doing here in this relationship with God at the center, because there's a lot of seasons. You know, it's easy to think about something feeling good in the very beginning. But let's talk about preservation and longevity, you know? I think one of the interesting things about long-term love is that you're never really loving only one version of somebody. And I think that that's pretty cool. Imagine the person you're ordained for, you're loving all the different versions that come with it. Some of you are probably nodding, like, I didn't like all the versions. You know, listen, I get that, you know, there are seasons that are tough, you know? And the person you meet at 28 isn't gonna be exactly the same at 38 or 45 or whatever, you know? The person you marry may change throughout parenthood, success, loss, faith, disappointment, all of the things. Career changes, aging, responsibility. I don't know, I like getting older and older, but also it's because I like constantly doing healthier and healthier things. God, you know, working out, you know, creating, right? But, you know, a person you marry can change throughout all these different things, right? And so will you. And we often talk about relationships as though the goal is to find the right person that God has aligned to us with and then preserve what we found. Yes. Yes. And also, developing the ability to keep discovering the person you're with. And I think this, I think, is the formula for success. Why would you? The reason you always hear me talk about devotion, devotion to your craft, devotion to your health, devotion to what's important to you, if all these things that you say are important to you, then approach them with devotion, especially a relationship. Now, it's not to say that everything is perfect. That's the whole point, is that knowing that we are all imperfect, it's how does our character show up in these moments? And so, again, yes to all that about finding the right person, preserving what you found, but also the ability to keep discovering the person you're with, what matters to them now, what are they thinking about that they weren't maybe thinking about five years ago? What are they afraid of? What are they excited about? What are they outgrowing? What do they need differently? What is God doing in their life? And who are they becoming? I think we have to be very careful with familiarity. It kind of creates this strange illusion. Like you can know someone's history, right? And their routines and preferences. I mean, or especially like their stories, right? How many times do they keep saying the same stories? Right? And you assume you may still know everything inside happening inside of them.

And I think one of the greatest practices of longterm love is refusing to let familiarity convince you that there's nothing left to learn. We will always be learning throughout our whole life. And I think when you, I know that when you approach relationships, especially your spouse, with the idea of, I will always be learning you, that sets the precedence of, we're here to grow together. So in this episode, let's explore the following. Why love, loving someone for a long time means loving more than one version of them, as I alluded to, to how familiarity can quietly replace curiosity in relationships. How familiarity can quietly replace curiosity. I'll be very careful. Oh, that's just the way they are. Really? Yes. Okay. Do they have other interests that are now, that they didn't have before and how they suddenly do? Well, no, no, you know, he or she doesn't say so. You should ask. What would you like to do differently? What has become more of an interest? It doesn't also mean that you have to partake in those interests either. It's just that, you know, that you're learning them, right? Also why growth doesn't automatically threaten a relationship and can actually deepen it. I think this is a very key component. People sometimes get scared of growth because of, you know, going in different directions. Like not if you're constantly, I think the more you're intentionally involved and understanding each other and staying, of course, also to a core set of values, you know, and the things that the foundation that it was built on in God. Yeah, you know, I think it's going to just only expand and deepen.