Marriage & Mindset #NaBloPoMo

DISCLAIMER:

This article is written from a Christian Biblical perspective. Some of the content herein may not be in line with your personal views and/or belief system. Even so, the vast majority of the content is applicable to anyone, regardless of religion or lifestyle. Please be respectful in commenting — sharing your views is welcome. Comments submitted in an attacking and/or argumentative tone may be removed.

Today, with marital mindset revolving around the ever popular “get as much as you can get without giving more than you have to give” it’s hard to get men and women to understand the notion of servitude. Everyone seems to go into marriage looking at it from a temporal perspective; if things don’t go the way they wanted it to, it’s disposable… you can throw it away and get a new one.

It’s disheartening to realize that people go into such a sacred union which was intended to be a lifelong commitment with one foot still in their comfort zone, unwilling to budge. In any situation in which we are unfamiliar with the terms, responsibilities, and expectations we obviously go in head first with our own ideas of how things should go. It isn’t until we actually have “real life” experience in those situations that we realize how different our ideas are from the one we vowed to share the rest of our life with.

It is unfortunate that so many marriages fail… and what’s even more unfortunate is that they typically would succeed if people would get back to placing importance in giving of themselves to their spouse and making their priority learning what God expects of each of us and what roles we are intended to occupy. It’s painfully apparent that in a majority of marriages there is a gap between what should be and what is. There is discord between husbands and wives when it comes to understanding – and agreeing on – what the marital experience is realistically all about.

I’m going to speak from the majority perspective. I realize that not all husbands or wives will fit into the examples I give of reasons for failing marriages but a great deal of them will. From what I’ve seen, most marriages fail because of one or a combination of three things: issues with communication, lack of attention to personal needs, and unfaithfulness. There needs to be a proper balance of how much attention you pay to your own needs and how much you pay to the needs of your partner. You should each be spending time caring for yourself but should also each be spending time taking care of one another. You should both have a willingness to make sacrifices for the sake of your marriage. {I purposefully disregarding financial issues, because I feel that if the other aspects of marriage are tended to, a couple can weather any storm and work together as a team to overcome.}

Communication, or a Lack Thereof

James 1:19: ”My dear brothers and sisters , be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to get angry.” // Proverbs 15:1: “A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.“

So many of the problems that arise in marriages do so because of a lack of communication between the two joined parties. Not consulting one another prior to making decisions can cause major issues. Eve didn’t consult with Adam before tasting the forbidden fruit. If she had, the two probably would have decided together that it wasn’t a good idea. It’s much easier for us to be deceived when we’re alone in choosing our path.

Proverbs 12:22: ”The Lord detests lying lips, but he delights in men who are truthful.” // Proverbs 15:4: ”The tongue that brings healing is a tree of life, but a deceitful tongue crushes the spirit.”

Having NO communication at all is better than any form of FALSE communication. TRUTH is crucial in marital communication. There is nothing worse than being dishonest with the person you’ve dedicated your life to. What can you possibly have to hide from a person you’ve become one with? Being honest about the way you feel about what your spouse has chosen is just as essential. Adam, instead of telling Eve she was wrong in what she did, chose to also partake. As life-long partners, we need to all learn how to provide and accept rebuke without being apprehensive or getting upset.

When you have a problem, talk to your spouse. Be honest with them about how you feel. Likewise, when your spouse comes to you to communicate his/her thoughts/feelings, be attentive and try to understand where they are coming from. Don’t get defensive. Realize that marriage takes work and sometimes that means swallowing your pride and saying, “You’re right. I was wrong. Let’s make this right together. Let’s learn and move forward.” Being insensitive, uncompromising, inattentive, unrelenting, offensive/critical, or inconsiderate on a consistent basis is enough to make anyone question why they chose to spend their entire life with you.

So many simple arguments turn into full blown wars simply because one person states how they feel and the other decides to go tit for tat and say something like, “Well, you did the same thing when __________,” instead of saying something like, “You know what? You’re right. I did. We both have done the same sort of thing and we should both stop doing that because neither of us appreciate it. In the future, let’s always ___________ instead of _____________.” In marriage, remember the little things are nearly always the big things in the end. Most people can’t point to one simple thing that ended their marriage. It’s mostly a lot of insignificant things and one day, there was that straw that broke the camel’s back.

No argument or disagreement should end with a whatever or a slammed door. Every argument or disagreement should end with resolution and an I love you. As hard as it may seem, it’s totally possible. It goes right in line with self-sacrifice, letting go of pride, and responding out of love. You know what bothers me more than just about anything else? When someone will communicate with other people about their marital problems, but hesitates to communicate with their own spouse. They will accept advice regarding their marriage from someone who is unaffected by whether it succeeds or fails. Not smart.

Emotional, Mental, and Sexual Fulfillment

1 Corinthians 7:3-5 “A man should fulfill his duty as a husband, and a woman should fulfill her duty as a wife, and each should satisfy the other’s needs. (4) A wife is not the master of her own body, but her husband is; in the same way a husband is not the master of his own body, but his wife is. (5) Do not deny yourselves to each other, unless you first agree to do so for a while in order to spend your time in prayer; but then resume normal marital relations. In this way you will be kept from giving in to Satan’s temptation because of your lack of self-control.”

Both spouses belong to one another as they have become one through matrimony (marital union). You belong to one another and let’s face it, when you don’t pay attention to your spouse’s needs, you allow a window for temptation to be opened and not everyone is strong enough to fight it on a long-term basis. I’ve heard some women state that they should never be able to drive their husbands into the arms of another woman by not having sex with him and then on the same token, they’ll say they aren’t having sex with him because he didn’t __________. I’ve also heard men say the same, “I’m not doing ____________ for her because she didn’t/won’t _____________.”

My response? You shouldn’t test one another or use anything as a manipulative tool, which WAY too many couples do regularly. After a while, it gets old and people get tired of dealing with the same ridiculous and unnecessary ups and downs. What if your spouse tested you in the same way, repeatedly withholding from you what you view as being the most important part of marriage? Far too often,  the problem is very simple: Each spouse is failing to consider how they would feel in the other’s position.

To put it in one word — consideration.

Ephesians 4:15-16: “…speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.”

Chris led with a loving example. As the ‘head,’ husbands are to lead in the same way, giving life to his wife by loving her and even going as far as being willing to lay down his own life for her sake, as Christ did for his body, the church. One spouse is no more or less important than the other and one’s needs do not overshadow the other. The husband is not to be domineering and the wife is not to be submissive in terms of rank, authority, or concrete rule but the husband is the head of the family in love and mutual obedience as Christ is the head of the church. When the Bible mentions a woman submitting to her husband, this refers to responsibility as the husband is the one who is supposed to spiritually lead the family and is held accountable for the family as a unit. No woman wants to be ruled and no man should need to feel superior. On the contrary, both spouses are to be aware of, pay attention to, and work to fulfill the needs of the other: self sacrifice, unswerving loyalty, personal intimacy, and sexual satisfaction.  // Concept source, see: The CBE Scroll, “Misleading Phrase: Spiritual Leader of the Home” comment number 4314

For women, these needs tend to be more emotional/mental. We need to feel secure, desired/loved, valued/appreciated, special, and cherished. When these needs are fulfilled, women are more apt to be in tune with their own physical/sexual needs. For men, these needs tend to be more physical/mental. They need to know they are appreciated, respected and loved, but they also have a large dependence on sexual fulfillment, often much moreso than women.

For example, you often hear about women who will refuse to make love to their husband because he has upset her (suppressing her own sexual needs to encourage him to pay attention to her emotional ones). Meanwhile, you often hear about men who will apologize when their wives are wrong just to make sure his sexual needs aren’t ignored (suppressing his own emotional needs to encourage her to pay attention to his physical ones).

Adultery

1 Corinthians 7:2 “… because there is so much immorality, every man should have his own wife, and every woman should have her own husband.”

There are many complexities surrounding issues of unfaithfulness and many complications that arise as a result of it being exposed. There is no cause to try to blame your own or someone else’s unfaithfulness on any situation or experience. Every person makes conscious decisions to respond to circumstances in one way or another. If you feel your partner isn’t physically responsive to you or that your sex life isn’t as exciting as it once was… if you feel you aren’t being emotionally fulfilled or even if it’s just that you enjoy “variety” and you decide to fulfill yourself by putting another person in your spouse’s place, you made that decision.

It is not your spouse’s fault that you decided to step outside the boundaries of your marriage rather than working on building a fulfilling sexual AND emotional relationship with your spouse. Adultery can be worked through and my personal opinion is that in marriages where both spouses want the marriage to work and are willing to go through self-evaluation andboth make compromises and life changes in order to fulfill the other, because in many cases there are things lacking within the marriage that need to be resolved and the indiscretion is a cry of help of sorts. In those cases, the couple needs to focus on one another, rebuild the trust, heal the hurt, and move forward in a renewed strength together.

Summary

Marriage is a precious, sacred, and binding covenant that should be regarded as the most cherished aspect of your entire life. You should work together as a team, supporting one another, fulfilling the needs of your other half, and being able to count on them to do the same. It requires sacrifice, compromise, consideration, and mutual communication. It requires understanding and forgiveness… and it very may well require you to break together in order to build yourselves back up — together.

Not all marriages are going to work, unfortunately, but couples should be much slower to give up and much less willing to accept advice from others about the decisions they make regarding the success of something outside influences have no direct interest in. Your marriage’s success or failure doesn’t benefit or harm anyone but yourself and your spouse and NO ONE should be allowed to guide you in deciding when the point of failure has arrived. Remember, your vows were til death do us part. Did you mean what you said? Prove it.

#NaBloPoMo:

For the entire month of November, I’m participating in National Blog Posting Month. Read more —>