Irony Of Marriage

In a society where many people are severely limited by social pressure including what they do for a living, what kind of car they drive, the kind of language they use, their clothing, and their friends, many people have a limited concept of self because the self is defined by what others have told it to be. I have concluded that I chose my marriage, which happily ended in divorce, to protect myself from freedom because my husband was confident about telling me who to be, what to say, what to wear, etc. I was afraid that if I practiced freedom by expressing my authentic self, I would be alienated and ostracized for being too weird. Ultimately I realized that maybe my husband could make me be a person that was "successful" and looked good at his side, but my soul was not going to survive. Now I practice freedom by meditating, journaling, painting, and doing other practices that help me connect with my authentic self or my soul. I then do my best to honour my soul by standing my ground and speaking my truth. I am in a relationship with a man who is also learning to honour his soul, and we have noticed that we need to let each other be free and make independent choices. This has required that I do personal work to let go of fear, loneliness, competition, and jealousy. We are still working on it, but we are finding that the more freedom we have to follow our own hearts, the deeper our connection when we come together. I used to think that couples that spent time apart were not in a healthy relationship, but my new experience has shown me the opposite: I need time apart to develop my relationship with myself, and he needs the same to develop his relationship with himself.