A Dad's Letter to His Son (About the Only Good Reason to Get Married)

Another wonderful post from Dr.Kelly Flanagan

Dear Son,

It seems like yesterday you were blowing poop out of your diaper onto your mother's lap. Yet here we are, on the verge of the birds-and-the-bees conversation. The poop was way easier.

Before we talk about sex, though, I want to talk about marriage. Not because I'll shun you or shame you if you don't put them in that order -- although I hope you will -- but because I believe the only good reason to get married will bring clarity to every other aspect of your life, including sex.

Buddy, you're probably going to want to get married for all the wrong reasons. We all do. In fact, the most common reason to get married also happens to be the most dangerous: we get married because we think it will make us happy. Getting married in order to be happy is the surest way to get divorced.

There are beautiful marriages. But marriages don't become beautiful by seeking happiness; they become beautiful by seeking something else. Marriages become beautiful when two people embrace the only good reason to get married: to practice the daily sacrifice of their egos.

Ego. You may be hearing that word for the first time. It probably sounds foreign and confusing to you. This is what it means to me:

Your ego is the part of you that protects your heart. You were born with a good and beautiful heart, and it will never leave you. But when I was too harsh toward you, or your friends began to make fun of your extracurricular choices, you started to doubt if your heart was good enough. Don't worry, it happens to all of us at some point.

And so your mind began to build a wall around your heart. That happens to all of us, too. It's like a big castle wall with a huge moat -- it keeps us safe from invaders who might want to get in and attack our hearts. And thank goodness for your ego-wall! Your heart is worthy of protection, buddy.

At first, we only use the ego-wall to keep people out. But eventually, as we grow up, we get tired of hiding fearfully and we decide the best defense is a good offense. We put cannons on our ego-wall and we start firing. For some people, that looks like anger. For other people, it looks like gossip and judgment and divisiveness. One of my favorite ego-cannons is to pretend everyone on the outside of my wall is wrong. It makes me feel right and righteous, but really it just keeps me safe inside of my ideas. I know I've fired my ego-cannons at you from time to time, and for that I'm truly sorry.

Sometimes we need our cannons to survive. Most of the time we don't.

Both men and women have ego-walls with cannons. But you're going to be a man soon, so it's important to tell you what men tend do with their ego-walls -- we justify them by pretending they are essential to being a "real" man. Really, most of us are just afraid our hearts won't be good enough for the people we love, so we choose to stay safe and protected behind high walls with lots of cannons.

Can you see how that might be a problem for marriage?

If you fall into the trap of thinking your ego-wall is essential to being a man, it will destroy any chance of having an enduringly joyful marriage. Because, in the end, the entire purpose of marriage is to dismantle your ego-wall, brick by brick, until you are fully available to the person you love. Open. Vulnerable. Dangerously united.

Buddy, people have sex because for a moment at the climax of it, their mind is without walls, the ego goes away and they feel free and fully connected. With sex, the feeling lasts for only a moment. But if you commit yourself to marriage, you commit yourself to the long, painful, joyous work of dismantling your ego-walls for good. Then, the moment can last a lifetime.

What's the secret to a happy marriage? Marry someone who has also embraced the only good reason to get married.

Someone who will commit to dying alongside you -- not in 50 years, but daily, as they dismantle the walls of their ego with you.

Someone who will be more faithful to you than they are to their own safety.

Someone willing to embrace the beauty of sacrifice, the surrender of their strength and the peril of vulnerability.

In other words, someone who wants to spend their one life stepping into a crazy, dangerous love with you and only you.

With my walls down,

Dad

This post originally appeared on DrKellyFlanagan.com

Words From a Father to His Daughter (From the Makeup Aisle) - a MUST READ!

Love this post so much!

Be true. Be you. Do not let the world define your beauty.

Dear Little One,

As I write this, I'm sitting in the makeup aisle of our local Target store. A friend recently texted me from a different makeup aisle and told me it felt like one of the most oppressive places in the world. I wanted to find out what he meant. And now that I'm sitting here, I'm beginning to agree with him. Words have power, and the words on display in this aisle have a deep power. Words and phrases like:

Affordably gorgeous,

Infallible,

Flawless finish,

Brilliant strength,

Liquid power,

Go nude,

Age-defying,

Instant age rewind,

Choose your dream,

Nearly naked, and

Natural beauty.

When you have a daughter, you start to realize she's just as strong as everyone else in the house -- a force to be reckoned with, a soul on fire with the same life and gifts and passions as any man. But sitting in this store aisle, you also begin to realize most people won't see her that way. They'll see her as a pretty face and a body to enjoy. And they'll tell her she has to look a certain way to have any worth or influence.

But words do have power and maybe, just maybe, the words of a father can begin to compete with the words of the world. Maybe a father's words can deliver his daughter through this gauntlet of institutionalized shame and into a deep, unshakeable sense of her own worthiness and beauty.

A father's words aren't different words, but they are words with a radically different meaning:

Brilliant strength. May your strength be not in your fingernails but in your heart. May you discern in your center who you are, and then may you fearfully but tenaciously live it out in the world.

Choose your dream. But not from a department store shelf. Find the still-quiet place within you. A real dream has been planted there. Discover what you want to do in the world. And when you have chosen, may you faithfully pursue it, with integrity and with hope.

Naked. The world wants you to take your clothes off. Please keep them on. But take your gloves off. Pull no punches. Say what is in your heart. Be vulnerable. Embrace risk. Love a world that barely knows what it means to love itself. Do so nakedly. Openly. With abandon.

Infallible. May you be constantly, infallibly aware that infallibility doesn't exist. It's an illusion created by people interested in your wallet. If you choose to seek perfection, may it be in an infallible grace -- for yourself, and for everyone around you.

Age-defying. Your skin will wrinkle and your youth will fade, but your soul is ageless. It will always know how to play and how to enjoy and how to revel in this one-chance life. May you always defiantly resist the aging of your spirit.

Flawless finish. Your finish has nothing to do with how your face looks today and everything to do with how your life looks on your last day. May your years be a preparation for that day. May you be aged by grace, may you grow in wisdom and may your love become big enough to embrace all people. May your flawless finish be a peaceful embrace of the end and the unknown that follows, and may it thus be a gift to everyone who cherishes you.

Little One, you love everything pink and frilly and I will surely understand if someday makeup is important to you. But I pray three words will remain more important to you -- the last three words you say every night, when I ask the question: "Where are you the most beautiful?" Three words so bright no concealer can cover them.

Where are you the most beautiful?

On the inside.

From my heart to yours,

Daddy

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Like the last letter I wrote to my daughter, I wrote this first for her and the day I'll eventually read it to her. But I also wrote it for every woman who needs to hear the words of a father. Women, no one else can define your beauty for you. But they'll try.

My daughter is 4 years old now. If her awakening to the makeup aisle comes at the typical age, I figure we have about five years to radically alter the arc of history and the subjugation-by-image of the female gender. We've got a lot of work to do. And it begins in the heart of each and every woman.

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This post originally appeared on DrKellyFlanagan.com