Mekita Rivas

As for an extraordinary love? It is unusual, rare, and highly coveted. Finding it is only the first step, and maintaining it will require a lifetime of equally extraordinary sacrifice and selflessness.

Motherhood is an inherent sacrifice (or a series of never-ending sacrifices, depending on how you look at it) – the magnitude of which is absolutely terrifying.

No one really tells you how to prepare for falling out of love. Maybe that’s because it’s such a depressing, glass-is-half-empty thing to talk about.

You have the power to lead a life as pleasant and as rewarding as you please. That isn’t delusional; it’s possible.

When my mother emigrated from the Philippines in 1975, she landed in Ashland, Nebraska – a small town of about 2,500 people located 25 miles northeast of Lincoln, the state’s capital city.

If you don’t have time to be a friend, say that. It’s better than pretending to be something you’re not.

Nor do I think of marriage as what lies at the end of the “dating race,” as if it were some trophy to be attained to prove that you’ve found someone who doesn’t think you’re mentally insane (or who loves you in spite of your insanity).

Rather predictably, what started off as blind (and perhaps drunk) ambition spiraled into a manic and urgent identity crisis.

Admittedly, when it comes to the Path of Happiness, I am only at the beginning.