A week before I was
to be married my uncle visited me. He handed me a bag and told me this was my
Aunt’s and that he would like me to have it, if I wanted to use it. It was a
white dress that was usually worn in a temple dedicated as a house of God. I
thanked my uncle for the gift.
Twenty years later I still hold the dress with remembrance
of the importance of being true and faithful in marriage.
My Aunt was only 35 when she left. She left her husband, her
home, and her three boys. She was fun to visit with fun to talk with and was a
great listener, and then she left. She had met my uncle at BYU as an aspiring
musician, my uncle was a singer she was a pianist. They were married in the
Hawaii temple and had three boys. Around the time I was 16 she started spending
all her time on the internet. When we came to visit we rarely saw her. She had
many friends across the country even the globe all online. What surprised us
the most was that they were all men. One day one of them visited and then she went
with him. Her boys were heart broken and her husband was devastated. It was the
first time I realized even good marriages were susceptible to infidelity. A few
years later I was given her temple dress. I decided that I should start early
to safe guard my feelings, emotions, and marriage from the small and simple
intrusions that can come into our relationships.
Warning
"There are those married people who permit their eyes to
wander and their hearts to become vagrant, who thinks it is not improper to
flirt a little, to share their hearts and have desire for someone other than
the wife or the husband. The Lord says in no uncertain terms: “Thou shalt love
thy wife with all thy heart, and shalt cleave unto her and none else” (D&C
42:22).(Matheson)
And, when the Lord says all thy heart, it allows for no
sharing nor dividing nor depriving. And, to the woman it is paraphrased: “Thou
shalt love thy husband with all thy heart and shalt cleave unto him and none
else.” ”( Matheson, 2009) With these cautions in mind I have made rules for myself
that help me to “abstain from all appearance of evil (1 Thessalonians 5:22)”.
A few of the rules I have set for myself are:
1.Internet chat is not a viable place for making good
friends.
2.If I am doing anything online my children should be able
to look over my shoulder and read what I am doing.
3.Any conversations carried out online should be things I
would say in front of my family.
4.I don’t friend anyone on social media that I haven’t met
in person.
5.I don’t friend males that I am not related to on social
media.
6.I only use the computer out in the open at family
gathering areas such as family room and kitchen.
Resources:
Matheson, K.W. "Fidelity in marriage: It's more than
you think." Ensign, Sept. 2009, 13-16.
I learned to drive in Southern California, where the
distance from my house to the beach was less than 45 miles. But the amount of
time it took to get home was 2 and ½ hours. It was not because I lacked
knowledge of the roads or even capability in driving over the speed limit. The
problem was the amount of traffic on the road the gridlock was terrible. We
went 10 miles in 30 minutes. The slow dragging traffic was one of the reason we
only planned very short beach trips. If you left the beach by 2:00 it only took
you one hour to get home. And if there was an accident on this stretch of road
it added another hour to the drive.
What dreams may come
John Gottman talks about marital gridlock in his book, “The
Seven Principles of Making Marriage Work”. Marital gridlock comes like traffic congestion;
we have problems in our marriage that make it impossible to move forward with
being a loving and successful couple. The gridlock comes as issues arise that
cannot be overcome simply by talking about them. Gridlock is actually the
dreams that you have for your life that your spouse is not aware of. These
dreams shape our actions which in turn regulate our responses and the weight of
their importance to us will not let us side step them in our marriage but are
as solid to our person sometimes as the need to eat. Thus we will not let them
go but are forcing our spouse to accept them, even though they may be directly
opposite to our spouse’s dreams.
After reading chapter 11 of Gottman’s book I realized that
one of my hidden dreams that I have carried from childhood is the need to be at
church early, not just early but 10 minutes before the meeting starts, sitting
in our seats, waiting patiently and listening to the prelude music. This need
comes from my childhood; my single mother always conducted the music she had to
be at church really early. We came and settled ourselves 10 to 15 minutes
before the meeting so she knew where we were and she could meet all our needs
before she had to leave us. My husband is the opposite his family has sat in
the same pew since their building was built, by them. They came in anytime and
it was always available, so there was never any reason to hurry or rush out the
door. So on Sunday as I am hustling to get my family out the door, my husband
is at his leisure dressing and getting his things together. We usually arrive 1
to 2 minutes before the opening song, which in my mind is late. It’s really not
wrong, but it’s a contention we’ve had in our marriage for almost 20 years. I
realize that this is no way to start our Sabbath day worship, and that we can
change and let go a little more.
De-fang
Dr. Gottman says, “Your problem is not to solve the problem- it
will probably never go away completely. Instead the goal is to defang the
issue, to try to remove the hurt so that the problem stops being a source of
great pain.”(p.253) Working together to take time to talk one on one, each
respecting the time to talk of the other will help us overcome some of the
difficulties these gridlocks can cause in marriage. Unlike Southern California
traffic we can sail clearly through our relationship instead of being stopped
by things that in the long run will not matter.
My
favorite video game, as a teenager, was always Mortal Kombat. You choose a
fighter and then fight until someone loses. No skill is needed you just pick
the meanest character and push all the buttons. Sound a little like marriage?
Are you choosing to be the meanest character in the room? Do you push all your spouses’
buttons? If this reminds you of your marriage I urge you to stop, examine what
the real problems are. They are not the messy counter, the laundry on the floor
and spilt milk there are much bigger factors that are perpetuating the
conflict. Dr. John Gottman said there are two kinds of marital conflict, 1)
conflict that can be resolved and 2) perpetual conflict that will be a part of
your lives forever. (p. 137)
Perpetual Conflict
According to John Gottman 69% of
the problems we face in marriage are perpetual. We sometimes keep cycling
through the same problems but in different ways. It’s not until we realize what
these problems are and decide that they are our own individual problems not our
spouse and overcome them ourselves do they actually go away.
Despite what many
therapists will tell you, you don’t have to resolve your major marital conflict
for your marriage to thrive.
You can learn to deal with the issue at hand, using humor,
realizing that you don’t have to solve it all at once you can take your time,
and choose not to let it ruin your relationship. For some reason there is three
point line around our laundry basket that my husband can’t seems to make. The sock
lies within feet of the said basket but yet fail to achieve their final resting
place. I have termed this his one human frailty and decided to just love him
for it. It’s not worth arguing or fighting over I kind pick them up and throw
them in.
Gridlock
Gridlock
in marriage is what happens when you are not able to move through a problem but
it circulates around and around until there is nothing but angry and malice in
the relationship. When you hit a gridlock, step back explore what the hidden
issues might be. (Gottman p. 141) Sometimes these problems occur because we
have not seen our spouses unrequited dreams, or dreams that they have that are
unspoken, said Dr. Gottman (p.141) For example my spouse always had the dream
of owning a business which was absolutely against everything I wanted. We kept
hitting a gridlock with arguing and disagreeing until we decided we had to
change. I took a leap of faith and we tried, my husband started his own company
and went to work for himself. He was elated. He came home happy every day.
Overtime I got use to the lifestyle. We have owned our business for over 10
years now and I am thankful every day for that inspiration to just let go and
follow his dreams. Our conflict had decreased
and we seem to be able to get through any problem because we consistently look
to each other’s needs and try to make the other more of a priority than ourselves.
A short clip from Dr. Gottman on how to overcome conflict in marriage:
