The Bachelor: Bevin Models Real Love
By Nina Atwood
In last night’s follow up to The Bachelor: Officer and a Gentleman, Bevin Powers, the spurned woman, faced Lieutenant Andy Baldwin onstage for the first time since their emotional good-bye. Despite multiple attempts by Chris Harrison, the show’s host, to prompt Bevin to say something catty about Andy, she took the high road, demonstrating what real love is all about. She was real, she was transparent, and she expressed herself authentically. As she spoke, she modeled the tenants of real love:
- Wanting the best for someone else, even if that doesn’t include you
- Not making it all about you; recognizing it’s also about another person
- Dealing with your feelings of loss without turning it into blame, resentment, and bitterness
- Being real: yes, it hurts, but I’m moving forward
- Focusing on a vision for your life going forward
- Letting the good guy who got away be a template for your future mate (values, character) instead of clinging to the past with desperate woulda, coulda, shoulda’s
- Refraining from pettiness – “Some things are better left unsaid.”
Brava Bevin! It’s easy to see why it was tough for Andy to walk away from Bevin. It’s clear that she will find a good man in the future. Her heart is still open, she’s clear about what she wants, and she’s a person who always finds a way to thrive.
What about you? If someone doesn’t choose you, do you deal with that in a mature fashion? Do you wish the person well as he/she moves on without you? Or do you degenerate into a selfish, what-about-me mode? It’s a choice, and the choice we make at the end of one relationship paves the way for future relationships. Nothing turns people off more than a blaming attitude about the past. But you can take a page out of Bevin’s book and realize that love is about care for another person. It’s about what you can give, not what you can get.
Entry Filed under: Breaking Up,Relationships
3 Comments
1. saronne | May 26th, 2007 at 11:16 pm
And in addition to her words, she managed to tastefully disengage herself from Andy’s hand’S resting on her upper knee (which is what I saw; I have seen another comment that Andy pretty-much couldn’t keep his hands to himself, and Bevin was constantly parrying this. At first I thought that he was offering friendly consolation, but what I saw was in poor taste; to say in the least, his actions were bad judgment. Were I Tessa and had witnessed this, I would have terminated the relationship that evening. It’s not that I would have worried about Bevin, but about Andy’s behavior when on deployment, among other things. I did not like to see his propositioning three women when he knew that within a day or two one of them would be gone, and just a few days later, another one.
This is not gentlemanly. It doesn’t matter whether the producer thought the idea up or not; he should not have gone along with it.
Did anyone notice he had the identical sly smile when he broached this with Tessa, Danielle, and Bevin? And when asked by someone what his faults were during a visit to one of the gal’s homes, all he was willing to come up with was that he couldn’t sing or cook; he either thinks he has none (which I doubt) or he sure doesn’t want to share any weaknesses he might have.
I am not saying that Andy doesn’t have many fine qualities- that he is not a good person- but I am glad Bevin didn’t wind up with him, and I hope Tessa will be very careful before she actually marries Andy. And I can say one thing for sure: their idea of living together is a supposed “trial marriage” it seems- which never, ever is; people discover faults while “testing the waters”- and usually, instead of attempting to work things out because of commitment, which marriage is supposed to be, people count themselves lucky to have discovered “whatever” in time and leave the relationship. Of course this doesn’t always happen, but it usually does. Again, living together to “try things out” says it all- work just is not put in to solidify the relationship. The fact is that we cannot treat a relationship identically-living together vs marriage- because we perceive the situations differently. It is a LOT more complicated leaving a marriage than a mere live-together relationship, so more effort will almost always be expended to keep the partners together. Annoying little habits will be magnified rather than attitudes- such is human nature. And then there is the Judeo-Christian teaching that prohibits cohabitation outside of marriage…
Bevin, I wish you every good thing; just work on the co-depency issues and you will choose someone different who can make you happy, rather than the “same” man with a different face, which is why you have found yourself “unlucky in love” as you stated.
God bless, Hon.
2. Lamar Cole | September 13th, 2007 at 11:56 am
Real love is a straight line to the heart.
3. Helene | December 7th, 2007 at 5:34 pm
A little birdie told me that Bevin has already met a new, sweet, genuine man. They’re both very happy together and he never saw her on the Bachelor!