Marriage and Divorce / For Better Or For Worse

For Better Or For Worse

Marriage is a relationship existing between individuals that entails a binding legal contract and a moral promise and is usually recognized by civil authority and relate to the religious beliefs of the participants. It’s been found in most societies throughout the ages. It remains important as the socially sanctioned bond in a sexual relationship through which a couple join together their lives in emotional and economic ways, and confers rights and obligations with respect to love, emotional and physical intimacy, inheritance, raising children, holding property and more. It is regarded as a lifetime commitment and should not be entered into lightly.

Qualities of a successful marriage include love, support, tolerance, communication, realistic expectations, caring, nurturing, a sense of humor, commitment, respect, interdependence, having fun together, solving problems together, enjoying each other and learning how to handle conflict in a positive way.

Married couples tend to be healthier, happier and generally seem to have a better quality of life and may live longer than singles or celibate individuals. Contributing factors to this is the mutual emotional support during difficult times of illness for example, and sustained communication between two people on deepening levels, even when disagreements exist. The strong bond of intimate love, sharing and caring may very well speed up recovery. A most attractive quality is to be able to come home at the end of the day to someone who deeply cares about you. The “for better or for worse” factor is attractive to couples since it indicates a commitment that support and loving care will surround them when they need it most. It goes beyond having a safety net to the knowledge and deep sense of security that they can count on someone when times are troublesome. This comforting notion provides an amazing sense of emotional security, peace of mind and tranquility for the soul.

Marriage encourages couples to advance from an emphasis on individual achievement to mutual and family oriented values and qualities: from “me” to “we” and from “ego” to “we-go”. The emphasis shifts from “me” to “”us” as a sacred union in which values such as respect, commitment dependability, love, care, loyalty and more are nurtured. The enjoyment of simple pleasures and the experiencing of special occasions, phases of raising kids, festive seasons and celebrating achievements make for an invaluable lifetime of deep joy that is priceless beyond words. Hugs, cuddling, kissing, sharing silly and cute little things and laughing together, quiet moments, enjoying the fellowship of mutual friends, romance and sensuality, kindness and tenderness, pillow talk, sexual intimacy, and deepest levels of emotional connection and sharing make for marriage to be one of the most exquisitely valuable and worthwhile experiences of life. The interactive qualities of relating with one’s partner lends itself to acceptance of each other’s strengths and weaknesses, and the positive encouragement towards growth and development towards realizing higher potential in each other, so that extraordinary possibilities can be achieved together. This bond of friendship and intimate communication could be enabling and empowering and provide an emotionally secure place of safety for the partners where they can find themselves and each other, discover who they are and what they could become, share their dreams in freedom without fear of ridicule or rejection.

Marriage can be a very stimulating and fruitful environment for personal growth when the partners are mature and loving enough to look out for their partner’s best interests. It is not supposed to be detrimental or “bondage and slavery” and some cynics suggest and it could be a joyful partnership of equal opportunity and mutual respect where one’s natural desires and instincts can be enjoyed without one dominating the other or one having less importance or subjected to the other.

Like good wine, it is possible that love in marriage can mature, cure and age to almost perfection over a vast number of years, where partners know and compliment each other to such an extent that they create heaven on earth for each other in deep and enveloping love and understanding. Unfortunately the opposite may also happen sometimes, if partners did not learn good dialogue and communication skills, especially to connect on an emotional level. Once the kids spread their wings, these unfortunate couples don’t know what to say to each other, and they are not in touch with their own or each other’s feelings.
Sir Arthur Wing Pinero sums it up this way: “Those who love deeply never grow old: they may die of old age, but they die young”. James Thurber collaborates: “Love is what you’ve been through with somebody”, as shared by a 47 year old lady with 6 kids, married for 27 years.
Expectations are established between couples in marriage – sometimes in silence. It is secret, implicit and largely unconscious or sub-conscious. It specifies standards and behaviors that the partners expect each other to fulfill. It is based on each person’s instinctive belief that his or her own feelings, needs and sense of what is right are most important. These mutual very subjective expectations of the other can be risky and may lead to clashes, which may be resolved through dialogue and proper communication. The unfortunate lack of objectivity or even fairness in these expectations are not always fruitful, and some individuals have a fairly selfish approach by not questioning the fairness or reasonableness of their expectations, they just express their dissatisfaction by complaining or other forms of manipulation. Couples that seem to understand the role that these silent expectations and their ramifications play in their relationship see themselves as being “happy”.

Growing more mature and objective in the relationship, learning new skills and dialoguing as much as possible in order to learn about what your partner’s heart yearns for, may provide ways out of these situations. Fair, reasonable and just expectations should be discussed from both partners’ point of view. For a loving relationship to flourish, it certainly requires creative incentives and determined ongoing mutual efforts from both partners.

When children arrive and take up lots of time, love and physical attraction may not get emphasized like it used to be, but fulfilled couples realize that they must make it work and hang in there through thick and thin, for the sake of the emotional well-being of the kids.
The need and resolve to make the partnership work is often the secret of a happy marriage. When couples think of others, taking into account the big picture, and are not just focused on themselves and make a continuing effort to make the marriage work, they’ve made a good choice and investment in the future of their children, that they won’t regret. As Masters and Johnson related: “Although these marriages may be loveless, they are not necessarily bad. Even good marriages are susceptible to a disappearance of love.”

Therapist and anthropologist Dr Mary Pipher in “The shelter of each other: rebuilding our families” said:

“I write about families because I love them. When I travel alone far from home, I think of my children’s faces to calm myself down. I picture them smiling, studying, playing violin or volleyball. I picture my husband’s face bent over his guitar or relaxed and fresh, the way it is on the mornings when we drink coffee together on the front porch. Those faces are my mandalas. They comfort and secure me. The faces of those we love are the first, the primal, mandalas for us all.”1

If couples focused on the faces of their loved ones instead of on their frustrations and unfulfilled desires, they show an incredible unselfish willingness of reaching out to make things work for the greater good of everyone, seeing past their own egos. These are some of the attitudes that happily married people nurture and sustain in their hearts.

Marriage requires a considerable long-term commitment of both the partners investing themselves fully into the relationship. Husbands and wives realize that love and passion may not always be at the top of their daily agenda, and may receive less emphasis as the responsibilities of their marriage take them to the next phase – family life. If they are wise, however, they will keep that candle of passion burning. Romance and sensuality are vital to help couples to connect on an emotional level and to be able to share deeply with each other their feelings, dreams and hopes. Without deep emotional sharing, partners will not experience much of a sense of fulfillment in their relationship. They will not feel understood, and may experience a sense of disconnectedness or drifting, a loss of significance and purpose right there in their busyness. They may feel they have “lost” themselves somehow in the hectic pace and many responsibilities, and that life and things are gradually losing it’s value and joy generating abilities and an unsettling sense of growing emptiness, a feeling of somehow being “lost”, some emotional hurting deep down in their souls and longing for fulfillment may come to the surface. Many people can not even put a name to these feelings, but they sense that lack of fulfillment and try desperately to fill the aching hole in their soul with more things, pleasures and busyness … a vicious cycle.

When couples get married, their dreams and hopes are linked to building a home and family. Families are ancient institutions and have been unique ever since humans crossed the savannas in search of food. Homo sapiens need families to survive, and bravo to those millions of parents who are trying so hard to do the right thing. Big picture thinkers understand this very basic concept. It is not just their own family environment that needs caring, but the entire institution of marriage and the family as a social unit. By seeing the bigger dream and unselfishly serving their spouses and children, many people realize that they are actually in love with their spouses, and loving their children, and in that sense they are fulfilled and happy tending to and nurturing those vital relationships. When the smallest unit survives, the larger units survive. When marriages flourish, so do families, communities, societies and whole nations, becoming stronger and progressive.

From the book “Anatomy of Love” by Helen E. Fisher:

“When Darwin used the term survival of the fittest, he was not referring to your good looks or your bank account; he was counting your children. If you raise babies that have babies, you are what nature calls fit. You have passed your genes to the next generation and in terms of survival you have won…only in tandem can either men or women reproduce and pass on the beat of life.”

All too often couples fall victim of the “Murphy’s law” of marriage as mentioned “by Mira Kirschenbaum in her book “The weekend Marriage”: The less time you have together, the more things go wrong in your relationship”

The following may indicate that your marriage relationship may be eroding and needs some focused attention:
Being together don’t seem to be as much fun as it used to be
When you are together you both still seem to be in your own little world
Your lives are very fragmented and you spend more time running all over the place than you get to spend together
Both of you are not sharing your feelings with each other
For quite a while you haven’t had time alone together – months may pass before you realize that you two haven’t had a date or planned time together
You feel as if you are taken for granted
You aren’t being kind or nice to one another
There seem to be irritations over small matters and both of you are easily annoyed with each other so that misunderstandings and disagreements increase
Conflict is rather being avoided by both of you
Your life and home seem to move from one small crisis to another
Your spouse’s teasing hurts and there is a sting to the humor
Your sex life is diminishing – time for romance or interaction is saved for weekends along with catching up on chores around the house
You are both just too exhausted during the week and your life centers around your kids or your jobs
You are contrasting 2 different types of love and getting confused between the two when you think you have to choose between your spouse and your kids

Marital mistakes - things some spouses do that may offend, hurt, irritate or turn off your partner may include:

To take your partner for granted and omit to thank, appreciate, compliment or declare your love
To rush through sex quickly without enough time lovingly sharing feelings, snuggling, caressing and paying attention to each others emotional needs – devastating especially for women
To be untidy or messy all the time and not helping to clean up
To neglect your appearance or your personal hygiene
To be cheap and let your spouse feel to be not worthy of better
To be disagreeable, offensive, crude, grumpy, unthankful or criticizing from a negative base all the time.
To refuse your spouse any autonomy or right to think or act independently
To talk down to your spouse, lecturing or manipulating him or her with emotional leverage
Always having to be right or having the last word. A continual know-it-all will eventually destroy any partner’s love and patience. Don’t be long-winded and answer every simple question with an hour’s dissection of the topic. Admit mistakes and that you don’t know all the answers.
Ignoring or not listening to your spouse, including allowing your mind to wander during the discussion, paying more attention to the computer, TV or what you’re reading, ignoring body language and interrupting your partner.
To be argumentative, complaining and reviving old grudges all the time
Lack of respect, badmouthing your spouse to friends or associates. Spouses need to be thanked and appreciated.
Lack of sexual intimacy – a killer for a marriage. Don’t leave your spouse wondering why you aren’t interested in sex. Seek medical and therapeutic counseling if necessary.
Not walking the talk: Do what you promise - soon – since actions speak louder than words. Follow through on your word.
To tease your spouse in a way that hurts and is actually aimed to get back at him or her - a sting disguised with humor. If your partner considers it a put down or inappropriate, stop it. To claim your spouse is over- sensitive is inconsiderate and unkind.
To be dishonest with each other – lies and secrets between the 2 of you can create distance and lack of trust.
Being constantly annoying - includes always being late (which indicates disrespect), and nitpicking everything your spouse does.
To have temper tantrums & an angry outburst so that you can win an argument will make you the loser in the end since such conduct is degrading and cause you to lose respect – in her eyes and in your own. All couples need to learn how to handle conflict in a constructive way.
Selfishness or greediness – when spending money on yourself, but making a big deal if your spouse spends a dime. Hogging the remote, not watching movies your spouse wants to see, only going to cheap restaurants when you could afford better, not inviting friends and family into your house because you hate the hassle of entertaining and prefer to be alone.

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