There is this trend I have seen lately of my single friends refering to themselves as “hopeless romantics.”
A hopeless romantic is a person who has so much love, but no one to share it with.
These people listen to all of the love songs, cry to all of the sappy romantic movies, and constantly annoy their friends with their romantic quests. It seems like the hopeless romantics of the world would be the best people to date. After all, they seem to have everything figured out already.
And yet they are still single
It’s not that hopeless romantics are unworthy of love. It’s not that the hopeless romantics are inherently wrong, ugly, or impossible to date. The problem with being a hopeless romantic is in the title itself. Hopeless romantics have no hope.
To live without hope is to say that there is no chance for you to ever find love.
That’s what they call a “self-fulfilling prophecy.”
I used to describe myself as a hopeless romantic. After one really screwed up relationship, I begged God to guard my heart, and I would not rest until all of my romantic dreams came true. The thing is, even though I had all of the love of the world in my heart, I could not seem to get myself to actually do anything about it.
That’s because I was hopeless.
I could watch any movie, quote any song, or plan any date.
But I was scared that the next chance I took would be the wrong one.
Hopeless romantics are hopeless because they choose to hide themselves in their stories and their dreams, not because they are unworthy of love.
I did what many hopeless romantics do: I chose to love people that I knew could not love me back. I had crushes on people in relationships, people who were far away, people who already said they weren’t interested, and I even liked guys that were seriously considering the seminary.
If I could just be better at loving people, then maybe I could just find the exact person at exactly the right time.
That never worked.
I would get mad at God. I would take a drive, and as I drove I would yell at God. I would tell Him that I was pissed off that I lost another gift from Him. I would ask Him over and over again why it never seemed to work.
But if I kept hiding, then I would never find love.
See, there are hopeless romantics, but there is another type of romantic, one that I think we all need to take a few lessons from.
Ted Mosby: Architect
Ted Mosby is absolutely filled with hope. Every time he finds someone, he convinces himself that maybe this time they could be “the one.” He says “I love you” too soon. He steals blue french horns, makes a getaway from a wedding, and even tells an unneccessarily long story to his kids so that he can finally ask Robin out again.
As annoying as it may seem, Ted Mosby has hope in a way that everyone should.
He did rain dances, went on adventures, and forced himself to risk everything he had, just to find “the one.” A hopeless romantic will stay in their bubble, only letting themselves outside their comfort zone long enough to find their next muse, someone that they can love but not get close enough to break their heart.
"If you're not scared then you're not taking a chance. And if you're not taking a chance, then what the hell are you doing anyway?" - Ted Mosby
Ted Mosby reminds us all that there is something to hope for, to fight for. This world is filled with so much hate and hurt. It’s no wonder that people are starting to give up on love and peace entirely! That’s why we need more Ted Mosby’s out there: we need people who don’t just quit because life is hard.
More importantly, Ted Mosby’s are always searching for love.
True love.
And he doesn’t get it right every time. Actually, he screws up so many times that it takes several seasons for us to even get close to the mother. The thing is, Ted is willing to make those mistakes. He is willing to go out there, be his architect self, and be the person he is meant to be
so that when it is time for him to meet “the one,” he will be ready.
“Shouldn’t we hold out for someone who doesn’t just tolerate our quirks but actually kinda likes them?” ~Ted Mosby
I tell people that I am like Ted Mosby, not because I am constantly jumping from person to person, not because I am an architect, not because I like to hang out at a bar, not because I am annoying with fun facts or grammar.
I am Ted Mosby because I took a chance.
I am Ted Mosby because now I have hope
I wrote in a previous post that this year God answered a prayer that I had been saying for ten years on Halloween night. It was the answer to that prayer, in the form of a text from my little brother and the thoughts in my head, thoughts of hope, that made me in to a Ted Mosby.
My hope was there all along, but it burst in to my life and transformed my heart one evening as I laid my head down on my lab desk in the pitch black with a text from my brother as the only light in the room.
As I lifted my head and read his encouraging words, I was transported back to a moment that I cherish to this day.
"Oh you see Ted there?" I said, "I'm exactly like him."
For those of y'all who don't know, in the pilot episode, Ted tells Robin that he loves her on the first date. Pretty sure that's one of the worst things I have done when it comes to talking to a crush. Then again, I am an awkward turtle.
Yet as I sat there, with a guy that I did not necessarily know what would happen next with, I felt a sense of hope in my heart. Not for him, not for all of the Ted's out there, but for me. It was ok that I was a dreamer because there was someone worth dreaming of.
Everything that I did, while perhaps a bit insane, was not a loss at all. In fact, each moment of my life was leading me to the person, the place, the situation that I am made for.
My family raised me to pray, not just for myself, but for everyone in my life. And since I am a Ted Mosby, I always prayed for my crushes. When I was younger, it would be for them to have a good day the next day or for their game to go well. When I got older, I would ask God to do His will in the relationship, even if we were just friends.
Oddly enough, it was always after that prayer that these boys would move on.
I took a look at my past, and I saw how good it was that God spoke through the Holy Spirit to those boys. They weren’t bad people, but they were not the right guy for me. Some could have hurt me, but most of them just were not right.
Even the most perfect guys had their reasons to leave.
"And if we're the reason you must leave, promise me that you'll believe yourself and not my stuttered pleas for you to change your mind" ~Reasons, Bombadil
And I was finally ok with that.
Because my yellow umbrella (which is more likely a perfect swingset to be honest) is out there.
Somewhere out there is a person to love. Each romantic out there is worthy of so much love, and they should hold on to that hope. With all of the hurt in this world, wouldn’t it be better if we all hoped in something greater? Believed in something greater?
If you find yourself to be a hopeless romantic, take a look at yourself.
You are not a hopeless romantic. You have a reason to hope, a reason to believe, a reason to fight. In your heart, you know that to hope is better. Hope does not mean that you will do anything crazy. After all, being crazy doesn’t make you romantic, it just makes you crazy. But if you have hope, then you become something greater:
You become… Ted Mosby: architect.
Be an architect. Design your own dreams. Make them happen. Even if you have to fall down a few hundred times, keep on trying. Because there is nothing greater in this world than love.
“Love doesn't make sense! You can't logic your way into or out of it. Love is totally nonsensical. But we have to keep doing it or else we're lost and love is dead, and humanity should just pack it in. Because love is the best thing we do”
~Ted Mosby
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