Consider both your hands. One of them is stronger than the other. The stronger hand is destined to take the brunt of most of the manual work that you undertake. For example, when hammering a nail, the stronger hand lifts the hammer and makes the effort of driving the nail into the wood. Meanwhile, the best that the weaker hand can do is just hold the nail in place. In the course of daily work, the stronger hand often hurts the weaker one. In some cases, the damage is extensive and the scars might even last a lifetime. In the example of hammering the nail, the stronger hand can easily miss and strike the weaker hand. When that happens, a painful ugly welt often results and might even cause a fingernail to come off. This leaves a scar that the affected hand would live with for the rest of its life.

And yet despite these differences in strength and the amount of work that each of the two hands can do, and despite the hurt that one might cause the other, they have learnt that they are better off together than apart.

We can learn a lot about our own nature as men or women from observing our hands. And then perhaps it can become clear why God made men and women with different physical capabilities and levels of sensitivity. For example the left hand might not have as much brute strength as the right, and yet it is considered special enough to be adorned with a wedding ring and to wear a watch. But despite these clear differences, no one hand ever considers itself less equal to the other, and so every hand is free to be what it naturally is; no hand has to prove anything to the other.

Have you noticed that one hand will always clasp the other in comfort when any hurt occurs? In the case when one hand hurts the other; the aggressor will have the humility to offer comfort while the victim will have the grace to accept that comfort. Incidentally, no hand will ever hurt its opposite deliberately since it already knows that it would be tantamount to hurting itself. Is it possible for one partner to hurt the other without hurting himself or herself in the process?

When idle, the hands often come together in a warm place to snuggle. It would not matter whether the left hand hurt the right hand earlier, or that the right hand did most of the work earlier. They leave triviality behind and forgive each other without uttering a single word of blame, or raising a voice.

Consider both your hands and think about what you and your partner can learn from them.