Understanding oneself

 In my life I had the benefit (or misfortune) depending upon your point of view to date many women before I was 25 years old and met my first wife. On one hand it allowed me to see many women and to better choose the one or ones I wanted to stay with.

The problem with dating a lot of women is that you learn more about women than you might want to know. For example, my first wife I didn't really understand fully but by my 2nd wife I realized all women has some qualities that are the same. 

Once you realize that there are qualities that ALL women share you have a chance at being more successful because you realize that women are not like men at all. They are almost like a completely different species than men are.

This is especially true of people born before around 1960 or 1970 when the differences between men and women were more pronounced in an extreme way than now.

Now I'm not really sure what is happening to people of both genders around me much at all because I'm 74 years old and the world and what is "NORMAL" has changed so much since the 1950s it doesn't make a lot of sense to me now

But, being able to choose someone you are compatible with long term was an advantage I had especially when I met my present wife when I was 46 years old. My present wife has 3 college degrees including a master's degree in Business and has traveled the world all her life too and has been to places like Bali and Australia as well as sailing for 6 months to a year throughout the Mediterranean ocean between her Junior and Senior years in college.

So, she is the opposite of a provincial ignorant woman. She is a woman of the world instead.

I have found this to be an amazing advantage in that she has helped me stay alive past 50 when I naturally likely would have died from the heart virus that almost killed me in 1998. So, marrying this woman in 1995 has extended my life almost 25 years so far from when I likely would have otherwise died.

the first thing she did was to insist I have medical insurance and the 2nd thing she did was insist I retire which if I hadn't in 1998 I would have surely died from the Heart virus I had then for around 9 months time.

At that time the symptoms of the heart virus were passing out over and over again because my heart couldn't oxygenate my blood enough to keep me conscious. But, here's the thing, I was the only person I know of in California at that time to actually survive something like this because if you panic even once while passing out like this it causes your death. But, because I had had whooping cough and because I had studied meditation with Tibetan Lamas in the U.S. and India and Nepal I could disconnect from my body so I wouldn't panic and die in one of these many many episodes.

My dermatologist asked me not to see him anymore because his cousin in his late 20s had died from a heart virus like I had had. I understood completely and changed dermatologists to honor his feelings of loss.

The point of all this is: Marrying and being with the right person often will save and lengthen your life incredibly just like this marriage which began in Yosemite national Park at the Chapel there in 1995 has lengthened my life at least 25 years so far to the point where I might be living to 100 or more because of all this ongoing.

By God's Grace