As I engaged in online dating communities over the past couple of months, asking people what their biggest struggle in dating as a Catholic is, one of the top responses was, “Finding a good Catholic person who loves me.”
I related strongly with those responses as I struggled finding a good Catholic person who loves me (and is also good looking) for many years.
When I followed up by asking what they are doing to find a good Catholic person, I often got no reply. Why many people didn’t reply to my follow-up question didn’t dawn on me until last week when I shared a conversation with a co-worker.
For the past few months, I’ve been coordinating to resolve some outstanding issues for the team at work. Some people in the team didn’t want to work in fixing some of those issues, because it wasn’t innovative and is considered undesirable.
After speaking with my co-worker on resolving a particular issue we had, what I’ve noticed is that there are many people wanting to be managers and team leads, but not enough people to work on the “small details” that get the job done and produces results. The titles and results are sexy, but what produces the sexiness behind the titles and results is hard work, which is sometimes painful and undesirable.
Janitors and maintenance workers often don’t get noticed cleaning the building and keeping the lights on. However, their presence is missed only when something goes wrong, such as a clogged toilet or burnt out light bulb.
Ironically, what gets people promoted faster in their careers is doing work that’s considered beyond their expected responsibilities. By putting in the work that most people don’t want to do on top of what’s expected of us, we learn more marketable skills. In this case, the experience was an opportunity to not only analyze the issues, but also communicate effectively with my co-workers on what and how the issues need to be resolved, showing leadership. Reducing these issues is reviewed by upper-level management quarterly, which makes our manager and our team as a whole look good.
So what does my latest experience at work have to do with finding the right partner as a Catholic?
By taking multiple journeys at once, putting in the work on the “small details” in different parts of our lives that many people don’t want to do, we build skills that attract the right people and opportunities in our lives.
Having a consistent prayer life and reflecting in weekly mass built the skills and understanding that God will make a way for us if we simply get out of our own fucking ways. In addition, doing so showed me that life presents us with opportunities to have what we desire. When we ask God for patience, He does not magically make us more patient. He gives us opportunities to be patient. When we ask God for unity, He does not magically make us united. He gives us opportunities to be united. This has paid off in my relationship, since these habits encouraged my girlfriend’s family to pray the rosary consistently again.
Attending hikes while talking to people were opportunities to build and refine conversational skills, such as understanding vocal tonality, asking good questions, and knowing when to gracefully end the conversation. Hikes were exciting, since people don’t feel awkward standing looking for a conversation and the conversations were less formal. Also, I knew who looked good without much makeup and was in good shape 😉. This has paid off in my relationship, since I knew my girlfriend still looks good without much makeup and is in good shape, as we had a great time hiking a couple of months ago. (Ironically, I looked more “round” in the cover photo than usual 🤣)
Going on solo out-of-town trips is a compound exercise that all men must do. Doing so builds skills in planning, adaptation, and spontaneity. I ate local foods that I would not normally eat, such as tacos and carne asada fries from local taquerias. I experienced a couple terrible Airbnb hosts, in which one host smoked marijuana and played loud music while I slept. I experienced mass at parishes in different towns. At one church, one choir group played “What a Beautiful Name” by Hillsong after communion, which was lit and almost made me cry. Following that mass, there was a Filipino fiesta that served adobo, pancit, and lumpiang shanghai. These experiences have paid off in having numerous stories to share with my girlfriend.
Tacos 🌮 and carne asada fries 🐄🍟 in San Diego are all part of the compound exercises 💪
It is easy for us to get so caught up in the end goal that we overlook working on the “small details” that actually get us there. The “small details” shared did not happen overnight but were experienced over the span of three years. The small details are not meant to discourage, but to encourage that what we may think as impossible can be made possible with patience, humility, and perseverance. We may think that the skills we’ve learned at one point in our lives weren’t useful, but those skills may be the deciding factors that help us reach our goals at a later point in our lives.
And all we have to do is start small.
The effectiveness of starting small was showcased in Easter mass this past Sunday. For the past year, we’ve been celebrating mass outside due to county restrictions. We sat in plastic chairs that students normally sat in their classrooms during mass. Since many more people attended mass this past Sunday, many of us sat in foldable chairs used for special events. After mass, we put away the foldable chairs without being told to because one person started with putting away his chair.
That’s all it takes. One small step and a focus on doing the little details that get us to not only our goals, but to the right people God blessed us with.