I have come to realize that as I get older, I understand my parents more. My mother and I are like clones in regard to how we experience life and how we handle relationships with the outside world. However, my father and I are emotional clones in the context of romantic relationships, in particular, how we like, love, and desire to be loved.
One day, when my father was dropping me off at the airport, I asked, “Pops, what made you marry Mom, even though she already had a child, and were you afraid that you would not be able to be a good father to her daughter?”
He said, “Son, I fell in love with your mother and your sister, so the rest didn’t matter. Also, I knew your mother had the potential to make me a better man.”.
Fast forward a while later, and my heart was simply smitten by an amazing soul who, after our first few interactions, told me that she had a son. To be completely transparent, when she told me, I ran away from her in every possible way: emotionally and spiritually. I kept using her having a son as a way to prove to myself that a relationship with her would never work.
At the core, however, was my fear that I was not ready to be the consistent man I needed to be to both her and him.
I kept asking myself these questions. Am I ready to be an example to her child? Do I have enough money to support him, her, and me? Will I get enough love from her because she has a child she also needs to love? Am I afraid to be my father now?
Do I need more time?
When I was done with all of these questions and running (which happened over the course of two years), I surrendered my heart fully to the fear. One of the interesting things I had to understand is as men , we have much responsibility attached to our role and gender. I feel the goal is to not seek to be perfect accept that imperfection and strive everyday to be better.
After all of these thoughts and prayer, I returned to my soulmate and I asked her to trust me and let me begin a friendship with her son.
He is a fellow Sagittarius, a curious mind and the apple of his mother's eye. I continue to learn so much from him because he is literally my younger self in many ways.
He can be impatient , subtly demanding , but at the core of him is this soul that wants to experience life to the fullest.
We are twins, so God help his mother. Ha!
I am most thankful for the ability to hear my heart and surrender to what it needs consistently; even if it requires me crossing the bridge of fear and walking to into my ultimate potential. I’m excited about the future of many years of watching my "little guy” as he matures into a young man, and I surrender to the role necessary to shape his mind and life as God sees fit.