Watching: Gladiator

Quote:
Maximus: "What we do in life, echoes in eternity."

Okay, so Gladiator is not the usual RomCom that I whine about, but it is my notoriously favorite movie. It has the best director, best script, best actors, costumes, sets, lightings, you name it. I adore all of it.
I chose this line because it's been chiming in my head for three days straight, as my Christian conviction finally plays on its new pull at my mind. I have nightmares of facing God with these dark patches on my soul and trying to explain what I was thinking. I am horrendously naive when it comes to men. It's not such an uncommon thing to have to fight against your hormones and acting upon them, but I feel like I have an especially difficult time to hold back, when I have trust in the opposite person, am attracted to them, the moment is there, and I assume I know how it's going to turn out.
I have absolutely never, ever been right.
Now that I'm come through the other side of completely immersing myself in all the secular world has to offer, I am facing the recovery mode of having to forgive myself for what I've done, and trusting that God, and my future husband, will too. This is by no means an easy feat. These people I have loved, I loved them purely when they did not, and they linger in my heart. Every one. Letting go was always the thing I had the most difficult with.
I had a friend who gave me a discouraging, yet somehow encouraging piece of advice very recently. He said that if you believe that there is a perfect "One" for you, then that means there are about 4 million men out there who are not it.
Ironically, I kissed this Fountain of Knowledge and he ended up being wrong too.
Yeah, go ahead and laugh. Go ahead, I'll wait.
Done now? I told you my life was one big self-sabotaging cliche after another. But I try hard to not let it be one hurt after another anymore. I matured slightly in this sense and upon a great adulthood discovery (Eureka!) realized I could simply change my situation with God and a nice calming attitude change.
Yeah, wow, Nobel prize winning stuff, I know! I do have these moments of awesome.
Yeah, except that's not me, that's the God in me. He brings me strength, and happiness, and good, honest friends to encourage me and laugh with. My darkest moments are becoming fewer and far between.
So, even though most of the guys I've dated have been awful, childish and selfish jerks, some of them have given me great happiness and memories. These are what I cling to, while I do my best to not bring up what is potentially hurtful.
I have a great life setup, always have. Terrible things have happened. Everyone has tragedy and mistakes. God helps, He truly does. It's all I can do but have faith that the love story He is writing will be a thousand times better than whatever I have tried writing myself. I just need to hand over the pen. Or in my case, the laptop keyboard.
And hey, if the Gladiator can phoenix his way out of his life struggles, I can too, right?

For the glory of Rome! Tally ho and onward.