Marriage is Difficult!

 

Marriage is difficult! Anyone who has ever been married (and is honest) will admit that being married to someone takes a great deal of patience, compassion, selflessness, and sacrifice. As mortals, we are naturally more concerned about ourselves and our own needs. Mosiah 3:19 says, “For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be forever and ever…” Being married requires us to overcome the natural tendencies we have and to put the needs and desires of our spouse first.

I recall a time in my marriage when we had only been together for a few months. It was my desire that we spend some time together on this one particular evening, but my husband had a different idea about how he wanted to spend his evening. My husband wanted to sit around playing his video games instead. We began arguing about who deserved to “get their way” and it erupted into a screaming match. I became furious at his stubbornness and the fact that he would not yield to my wants was infuriating. Eventually, I stormed out of the room and locked myself in my bedroom.

After about twenty minutes my husband came to the door of the bedroom and began trying to smooth things over with me. He said he was sorry and that he realized that there were going to be times in our lives when he was going to have to give up what he wanted in order to help me have what I wanted. While I had been alone thinking in the bedroom I had realized the very same thing. Sometimes we should give up what we want to accommodate our spouses. We both learned a tremendously valuable lesson together that night and in the end, we decided to compromise and play video games together so that he could do what he wanted, play video games, and I could do what I wanted, spend time with him.

In the book Drawing Heaven into Your Marriage, H. Wallace Goddard says, “As we turn our hearts to God, they will be opened to our partners. Turning to our partner’s requires us to worry a little less about our own needs.” I know this to be true. I have seen God opening our hearts to one another many times during our 21 years of marriage. We have learned how to worry about our own needs a little less. God wants us to succeed and when we ask for His help, He will show us our partner through His eyes.

As I sat alone in my bedroom that night, I was praying for help from God. I wanted a marriage where love and selflessness would bring our hearts together. My husband was praying as well while he sat alone in the living room. God spoke to our hearts and helped our two hearts become one and we each put our spouse's needs first that night. As I have continued to look for ways to help my husband, to show him I appreciate and care about him, we have come together and our relationship has grown stronger. I also notice when he has put my needs above his own and I appreciate the daily sacrifices he makes for me.

The Desired Failure of the Four Horsemen

 During this week’s reading I was pleased by the reaffirmation and recognition that my marriage has grown and evolved in a good way over the twenty-one years we have been together. The pitfalls of couples in distress that were described in John Gottman’s The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work used to be daily occurrences in my home. My husband and I married quite young and we both felt the need to gain our own independence from one another and to feel more important than the other. Rather than working together like teammates for our common good we were competing for first place with one another like we were opponents. In Mosiah 3:19 we are told that the natural man is an enemy to God and that as mortals we would have to learn to be submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, and willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon us. For the first few years of my married life I was failing miserably at all of these Christ-like characteristics within the bonds of my own marriage.

While I was reading this week about the Four Horsemen in Gottman’s book I was reminded of the numerous occasions when I was critical, defensive, contemptuous, and a stonewaller. These behaviors were nearly ingrained in my by my parents and their poor examples to me. These behaviors are what came “naturally” to me. As I matured and began to see my marriage in a broader perspective, I realized that if I didn’t take ownership of my selfish ways and change my heart, my marriage would most likely be doomed to failure or at best, we’d stay unhappily married. The prospect of failure or unhappiness tied knots in my stomach. I decided to rebuild my marriage the Lord’s way.

It has taken me many years to begin to understand my role as a wife. I still have a long way to go but with the Savior’s help I was able to become more submissive and less contemptuous, more humble and less critical, meeker and less defensive. I was able to abandon old habits and tendencies and begin instituting new ones that were patterned after Jesus Christ. In the early years of marriage I wanted to be most important. I wanted to be right. I wanted the last word. I wanted to be the boss. I was prideful. Once I began to understand that these selfish desires would only drive my husband and me further and further apart, I began to panic and try to figure out what I could do to begin mending our relationship.

Through much prayer and effort my marriage is being healed. We are still a work in progress and we still have a long way to go in establishing a celestial marriage but I have hope and faith that with the skill set we have learned, we are well on our way to a happy, eternal marriage. I believe that we will consistently continue to move away from the negativity of the Four Horsemen Gottman described and toward

The Importance of Eternal Marriages

I have always seen the Salt Lake Temple as the ultimate symbol of eternity and celestial marriage. My parents were sealed in the Salt Lake Temple and so were my mother's parents. This temple was the temple that I knew I wanted to be sealed to my husband and children in someday. Unfortunately I lost sight of that at some point and made some choices as a youth that have not allowed me to be sealed to my family.
For as long as I can remember I have known about the importance of eternal marriages. I was taught from a tender, young age to value the covenants made in the temple and to work to be worthy of the blessings of the temple. However, as my teenage years progressed, I became stubborn and willful and did not want my parents to tell me what I could and couldn't do. This defiant and independent attitude spilled over into every facet of my life, including my church attendance and worthiness to enter the House of the Lord. Because of some choices I made, I was disqualified from having the temple sealing I had yearned for so badly as a little girl.
It took me a decade to completely realize what my stubbornness had cost me and to begin taking advantage of the Atonement and making the necessary course corrections. After years of living away from the gospel I began to earn my way back and regain the blessings of being temple worthy. twelve years late I still yearn for the blessing of an eternal marriage and hope to be blessed to have one someday.
Through the years I have grown to value temple marriage immensely. I desire what I see so many other couples and families in the Church already have; a temple sealing. It saddens me when I see people who are married in the temple take for granted the gift that a temple sealing is. I know that marriages are hard but when a couple is sealed they should understand the importance of honoring those covenants and working together to achieve a mutual love of the Savior. As they draw closer the Christ they will simultaneously be drawing closer together as a couple, as husband and wife, and strengthening their families as well. 
I know that the family is central to our Heavenly Father's plan of happiness. I know that by turning our family struggles and heartaches over to Jesus Christ and trusting in His redeeming power to fortify our hearts and our homes, that we will be able to withstand the trials of this life and become stronger and more committed to endure to the end. Eternal marriage is the covenant necessary to bind us to our ancestors, our posterity, and our Heavenly Parents. I hope that one day I will be blessed to have this opportunity and that I will be together with my family in the eternities.

My Family 300 Marriage Blog

Defending Traditional Marriages

As I learned more about the possible realities and long-term effects and outcomes of same-sex marriage on families, marriages, and children I found myself feeling deeply distraught about the United States Supreme Court's decision to legalize same-sex marriage in June of 2015. I had not thought about all the children that will be born and raised in these same-sex marriages and the adverse consequences of these children not having either a father or a mother. I had not thought about the fact that including same-sex marriages under the definition of marriage will, in essence, redefine our parameters for married living overall. I had not thought about the impacts same-sex marriages will have upon our family bonds across generations. When I thought about the social ramifications that same-sex marriage will have upon our lives within a few decades, my eyes were opened and I began to be overcome with concern.   
I admit that when Washington State put same-sex marriage on the voter's ballot in November of 2012, I voted for same-sex marriage. I did not properly research the effects of same-sex marriage and neglected my responsibility to become an educated voter. I regret that decision now. If I had known that the realities of same-sex marriage weakening marriage in general were as evident as they are, I would have voted against same-sex marriage. The thought that my vote will most likely make the lives of thousands of children unstable, erratic, and inconsistent bothers me to my core. I recognize and fully acknowledge now that there is no part of same-sex marriage that serves to improve society at large and for me, knowing that I had a hand in creating that reality is embarrassing and upsetting.
Now that I know and understand the damage I have helped perpetuate I feel a significant responsibility to stand up and boldly defend traditional marriages! I feel compelled to open my mouth and talk to others about what I know and share my newfound understanding of the importance of defending marriage as a union between a man and a woman. As a Latter-day Saint I know that God's purposes for marriage are to create and nurture families. I should have known that men and women are designed to compliment one another and provide balance and stability for children. God's divinely designed plan for marriage has been established to provide His children with a means to achieve exaltation. God has also designed marriage and family to create an atmosphere of support, love, guidance, balance, encouragement, and unity between mothers and fathers and their children. This basic, divinely appointed structure cannot exist in a same-sex marriage.
I have learned several valuable truths this week; 1) same-sex marriage is not the same as traditional marriage between a man and woman on any level,  2) always research the topics I am voting on and all the pros and cons of the issue put before me to approve or deny, and 3) always trust my Heavenly Father and His plan of happiness for us. I am thankful for the insights on marriage I have gained this week and for the newfound commitment to personally defend marriage and family that I have solidified.

                                             
                                                                                              

The State of Marriages

As I read the marriage report by the National Marriage Project I was struck by the magnitude of how deeply a person’s decision to marry impacts our community and society as a whole. I have to admit that until recently I was one of those people who viewed marriage as an individual commitment to a solitary relationship. I neglected to see the far-reaching ramifications of the choice to marry, or as in many cases, not to marry. Through the information I read this week I was further enlightened and my understanding of marriage deepened. I was raised as a Latter-day Saint and cannot remember a time in my life when I did not know that marriage was important. My grandparents and parents were good examples to me of being committed to one another and valuing their marriages. I knew divorce was not something the Church looked upon lightly and that when entering into a marriage, one should not do so without serious and sincere contemplation and prayer. I think I have been blessed to be somewhat naïve on this subject because my personal life has been so untouched by divorce.

Another trend that is disturbing is the number of couples who choose to live together without marrying. One of the quotes from the reading from the National Marriage Project that was particularly striking was, “Disappearance of marriage in middle America is tracking with the disappearance of the middle class.” I had not thought much about how much marriages impact our financial health as a nation. Couples who do not marry often do not stay together long enough to develop a substantial financial reserve and do not contribute to the finances of the nation in the same way a married couple does. When I realized there is a direct relationship between our country’s financial health and the number of marriages, I was saddened for our economy in the future. The marriage and economic trends are not headed in the right direction if we are to create a bright future for our society.

I have been thankful to have learned many valuable lessons about marriage from my own experiences and from the examples of those around me. Some lessons about marriage are learned only be encountering them in your own life. Knowing the importance of marriage in God’s plan of happiness has given me the determination to make my own marriage the very best that I can. All that is good and holy begins with marriage and I find it devastating that so many people in the world today see marriage as a hindrance, an obstacle, and a handicap that impedes them and their individual goals and personal growth. Marriage should be seen as the beginning of a partnership that allows both parties to flourish and develop. Marriage is designed by God to provide the means for bringing children into the world and being reared in families. Marriage is also supposed to be comprised of two people who love one another and will work together as partners in this life, and the life to come.
I know I have been blessed immensely by my own marriage. I have been stretched, challenged, and pushed more by my husband and my marriage than by any other relationship I have experienced. I consider myself blessed to have a husband who is willing to accept me and all my flaws and love me in spite of them. We are committed to working together as a team to accomplish our goals and achieve our dreams and I would not choose to live my life any other way.

 My Grandparents have been married for 66 years.
They have been a great example to me of  how to
build a a happy marriage with selfless love, sacrifice,
and unwavering commitment to one another.

My parents and siblings. My parents had been married 39 years 

when my dad passed away.

This is my terrific family! My husband and I have been married for 

21 years.