Valentines Day: The Not So Good Vibes Day
(Hayley’s Hot Take)
It should be said, everything written in the post has been pre-approved by Lucas (the husband) since he is my editor. In fact he is the one who inspired a title change. After much discussion over what was at the core of this post, he stated, “Valentine's Day should be rebranded as the Good Vibes Day.” Lucas is not a man who often says “good vibes” so this felt necessary to document.
Recently I was on a run listening to a song I’d thrown onto a playlist. Mid-way through the song, after finally listening to the lyrics, I yanked my ear buds out (slight curse under my breath) and started walking. I’m guilty of liking a song for its tune, and months later finally hearing the words. Maybe I’m coming into my grumpy old man phase of life, where I think things should be a certain way, and if they aren’t it’s rubbish. This is possible. But here is the thing. There are fun love songs, sure. And then there are just bad songs which at the core foster dysfunctional, abusive relationships. Hot take. I know. The frustration I have with bad music, more specifically bad lyrics is the archaically false notion, lust and love are synonymous.
I don’t want to sit here long, I really do want to get to Valentine’s Day. But I’ll say it again differently, lust and love are in fact oppositional to one another. Lust, at its root, is truly a product of selfishness. It is about consumption, self-flattery, escaping, and feeling power. Love is something different, at least when done well. It is about patience, and kindness. It does not insist on its way, it bears all things, it believes all things, it hopes all things, and it endures all things… in a word, it is sacrificial (summation of 1 Cor 13).
To be clear, I am not a total Grinch for Valentine’s… we do some decorations.
Even if you don’t subscribe to the faith of the Bible, I think we can agree love is something pure, worthy of replicating, yet incredibly hard to practice well. This is my beef with Valentine’s Day. Valentine’s Day is not about loving people well. It’s about spending, marketing, vain entertainment and pining. Set aside confections, Cupid, cards, etc, the day has become centerfold to performance and testing or loneliness. I may have lost you there, stay with me. I swear this isn’t legalistic garbage. Simply said, a day intended to focus on others has shifted into a day of missed opportunity.
What was your favorite Valentine’s Day growing up? The one you actually remember. Maybe it was the first time you got a gift from a high school sweetheart, that’s awesome and I don’t want to steal your thunder. However after talking with a few folks, I was amazed by a similar response. Remember your Valentine’s Day of kindergarten or second grade? When everyone got to make their own mailbox and set it on their desk or chair. At some point the class would break from its scheduled rhythm into a party. Everyone would begin milling about the room delivering cards and candies to one another. At the end, you’d return to your desk, with an inbox full of human acceptance. Life. Was. Good.
Mini collection of Hudson’s Valentine’s from class.
I know, we don’t stay kids forever and that socialist example isn’t modern capitalist life. But what if we could replicate it a little bit because it brings joy, for the recipients as much as ourselves. Seriously, forget about Valentine’s focusing on romantic love for a moment, and consider if it were a day to demonstrate love in a greater communal way. I think about the kids in our classes we didn’t know well and weren't friends with. We still gave them a card. The girl in my class who at 7 years old already had Queen-bee bully tendencies, she still got some love. Despite whether she deserved it or not. What would this look like now?
Chocolate’s from a classmate…
Can our driving look more patient? Can we tip a bit more for our coffee? Could we talk to the alienated co-worker? For the couples and ones with significant others, what if we dropped our expectations of the day. Instead of getting hurt or mad over what we didn’t receive, what if we reflected on the ways that person has blessed us in the past year, or month? Instead of giving flowers, we made an effort to practice forgiving first?
The wild thing about practicing love, it produces fruit that sparks newness in life and relationships. It can ask us to do things that are uncomfortable at first but bring joy or compassion or understanding down the line. When we view Valentine’s Day through a self-focused, self-seeking lens, we quickly fall prey to the notion our world and the relationships within it are inadequate. We lose out on gratitude, we lose out on joy. However, if we view the day as a reminder to love with intention and sacrifice, our life and the fruit it bears will be good.
With that my friends, Happy Good Vibes Day!
