What makes a Marriage?

Hey peeps,

Howz it going? It’s been a while…….and I have missed this space so much. I was out of town for two whole weeks by myself …..yeah… I took a long and well deserved break from everything…….it was a tough decision leaving hubby in charge of our 14month old son…hehehehe…..but they did alright and missed me like crazy.

During my vacation, I did a lot of soul searching…..why do we labor so much? It’s just to provide us with three basic needs which are Food, Shelter and Cloths….. these needs don’t come cheap that’s why it looks like we work too hard for too little…….then most people live above their income based on what they spend on these three needs, a colleague of mine has a belief that he should not pay more than his monthly salary for one year rent and it’s working for him…….hence the need for us all to apply wisdom in whatever we do.

For us to live a relatively good life in Nigeria costs a lot of money, gone are the days where one parent (the wife sits at home to raise the kids) while the other takes on a full time job to meet the needs of the family, in the times we live in; both parents have to pull their resources together to be able to make ends meet, each person has his/her own responsibility mapped out for them as that is the only way all the needs will be met without frustrations.

Don’t get me wrong; a lot of people can still afford to have just one parent doing all the labor, but for the average Nigerian which is over 85% of Nigerians, both parties have the responsibility to contribute to the wellbeing of the family.

It’s beginning to really dawn on me that Marriage is not all about loving each other, having loads of fun, sex and kids…….there’s much more than we think. That is why I am sooooo thankful that we had the pre-marital classes where all these things were taught. Then we didn’t really see the need why the Pastor was teaching us about the following:

·         Balancing our finances.

·         Making a 5 to 10 years goal/plan and stating how we will attain them.

·         How many kids do we want to have as against how many we can afford.

·         Vacation plans: this must be done in advance.

·         Joint account for major projects like home ownership.

·         Who should be responsible for what and why….

·         And so much more.

Indeed we were too in love to have thought out all those by ourselves and this is why I strongly recommend pre-marital counseling before you walk into that marriage, if not you are going to run out in a hurry, marriage takes maturity and this does not necessarily come with age, you may be 40 years and be very immature in your actions.

A lot of challenges comes when two now becomes one, there are so much decisions to be taken as one and no longer as two because the bible says “and two shall become one” it’s not about you anymore, you owe someone else an explanation and you must both be accountable to one another, agree on everything before it Is executed, communicate constantly, communication is the key to every successful union; in fact you can never over emphasize the usefulness and importance of communication.

During our pre-marital class and discovery of all that marriage comprises of, there were lots of arguments and adjustments cos we both as individuals had a vision/goal/plan of what we wanted out of marriage but had no idea how each person’s understanding and interpretation of their goals impacts on the relationship……..so it was a learning process for us and our counselor was very patient and gentle with us, as he helped us come to a complete conclusion that we were happy with…..he confided in us that a lot of couples did not make it pass that stage of counseling as they were not ready to become one entity together by letting go or partnering in the same goal for the purpose of building a family; each person was still holding onto their individuality.

Marriage is beautiful, it is peaceful, it is wonderful and much more……but it takes a lot of work, patience, communication, trust, confidence and self esteem. You cannot have a good marriage if you don’t understand who you are and what your purpose here is; that is where confidence and self esteem comes into play.

Phew, enough for one day, we will continue this topic.......please feel free to add your comments.