Preparing for marriage

Does she like me or is she just being nice? How do I know if I am ready for marriage? How can I prepare now for marriage? What preparation should I do? How will I know? How do I date?
All of these are questions that many young people may face when they begin to realize that dating and marriage is or should be a part of their life. These questions make dating and marriage preparation very stressful and full of anxiety. With this kind of fear it is understandable why many people choose to stay single and to not enter a relationship. It is also understandable why many people get so nervous. Dating and marriage prep can be a nightmare if we don't have answers to some of the questions I just mentioned. My goal today is to help by answering some of these questions and providing insights on what research has said and what I believe can help anyone prepare for marriage through proper dating and preparation.

Something that a person might ask themselves is what kind of person they want to be with. They may have a list of qualities or attributes and only see a possible future with those who meet some if not all of these qualities. People also may believe that they have a soul mate and that there is only one possible partner for them and that they must find that one person. There are several harmful side effects to both of these ideas because they create unrealistic feelings and expectations. In the book "Successful Marriages and Families Proclamation Principles and Research Perspectives" this topic is mentioned. In talking about the belief of soulmates it says "The trouble lies in the unrealistic expectations and resulting consequences that arise from approaching marriage this way... The romantic notions of a soul mate love give spouses very little direction on ways to improve, restore, and maintain marriage in the real world." This idea of soul mates is wonderful and a dream that we all want to have. It just says here that if we expect a relationship to be effortless then we are missing the mark. I believe that we can have a soul mate like relationship. But it is not given after finding the "right" one. I believe that you create that kind of relationship with your spouse. You through effort, love, time, affection and kindness foster and develop a relationship that can be powerful, joyful, life changing and lovely. We are the creators of our own future and destiny. Not victims of it. So in the end it is our choice whether or not we will develop the kind of relationship that we dream of.

The flaw in thinking of having a list is not necessarily as bad. It is good to have standards of what kind of person you want to date and marry. It actually saves you from a lot of trouble. But a list is just half way thinking. The best way to date someone that has high standards and the kind of person you would want to date is that you must be the kind of person that that person would want to date. For example, if I wanted to date a very smart, driven and successful woman. I should probably do things that would make me attractive to that kind of woman such as working hard in school and work, getting good grades and try new things. A list is good but being the kind of person that your dream partner would want to be with is how you attract a good person and ensure that you date good people.

The greatest way to prepare is to become the kind of person that the person that you would want to marry would want to be with.

Dating and marriage prep is a scary thing. It takes time and practice. It takes determination and foresight. But if we focus on being the right person and being bold in asking people on planned activities to get to know them then it is easy to gain confidence and have the strength to go forward. Dates are planned activities that are paid for and paired off. They are not just hanging out.

It is important to be patient in this process of marriage preparation. In time everything will work out if you put your best effort forward.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Sexual Intimacy and Family

Many of us remember "the talk". Whether it was from mom or dad, friends or our health teacher we may have felt uncomfortable or uneasy. We may have felt uncomfortable because our parents or teachers may not have known how to teach us about sexuality. As we have gotten older and had our own experiences we may have had difficulties because of the ways that we were taught. Many of these difficulties could have come up because of the way we were taught. The truth of the matter is that many people do not know how to talk about and to teach about sexuality and its aspects. My goal today is to talk about the fallacies of many of the teaching models in sexuality and also offer the proper way to teach children and to lean about sexuality. First of all, there are many ways that parents and teachers teach sexuality. One of the fallacies that we often see in teaching sexuality is that we often see fear-based metaphors. A fear metaphor is not when parents or teachers use fear to teach ot...
Read more

Divorce, Remarriage & Aging

Many of us have heard stories where people are married and remarried over and over again. Maybe you have an uncle or aunt that has been married three or four times. Something that may scare us out of getting married or pursuing a relationship is that we may have a relative or know someone who has been through similar experiences.  Divorce is something much more common these days than it was in the past. It has become much easier for couples to get a divorce now because of the no-fault divorce. My goal today is to talk about divorce openly. I want to talk about possible reasons for divorce and what we can do to avoid it. Many hear the statistic that 50% of marriages end in divorce. While this may be true it is not a complete representation of marriages that end in divorce. Many assume that if we take 100 people and survey how many of them will get divorced that we think that 50 of them will. But this is not true. Only about 24% of people go through a divorce. But that 24% of people...
Read more

Fathers and Finances

Are fathers even important? What good do they do to families and to the world? If mothers are better at nurturing and can also hold  stable job then why do we need men in the home. With almost forty percent of children being born into fatherless homes and fifty perfect of all marriages ending  in divorce less and less children are having exposure to fathers in the home. Fewer and fewer children have the positive influence that a father can have on the home. Many people today say that this isn't a big deal. Many claim that fathers don't contribute much to the home and that they are not needed. But are they helpful or needed? Though the world may disagree the fact is that they are vital to a child's healthy development. My purpose today isn't to prove that fathers are useful but to talk about effective ways of connecting with family members and things that fathers can do to connect with their kids. My hope is that this will help fathers know how to be better fathers and t...
Read more