Advice for Marriage
As mentioned in the previous post, the failure of romantic love to continue doesn’t mean that there is something the matter with a particular marriage, or marriage in general. It means that selecting life partners on the basis of this supposed love feeling alone just isn’t enough. If a marriage is to succeed, we must exchange these fancies for facts.
In giving advice for marriage let us now consider what some of these facts are.
Advice for Marriage Fact One: Love is not any more strange and mysterious than many other human experiences. Actually there does exist a real and growing body of scientific knowledge about it. We know a great deal about the nature of love, why it hits the way it does, and why it can or cannot stand up under the long pull of marriage.
Anything is mysterious; the rising and setting of the sun, the circulation of the blood, or changes in the weather – all are strange and mysterious to those who lack scientific knowledge about them. Many who drive cars have only the slightest idea of what goes on under the hood, or what to do if the car refuses to start. Why people suddenly become ill, or are suddenly hit by a pain at the back of the neck, may be as complete mysteries as the sudden coming of love.
But as our knowledge grows, all such experiences become increasingly understandable. In love as in health, you can tell little by the way you feel. The man in terrible pain may have only simple indigestion which will cure itself, while the man who feels nothing wrong may suddenly drop dead of heart failure. Those who feel most sure of their love are often the poorest marriage risks. Having a healthy marriage, like having a healthy body, calls for the best scientific knowledge we can get.
Advice for Marriage Fact Two: There is not just one, but there are many forms of love. The man who is not well may use just one word to describe how he feels. He may say that he feels sick. The medically trained man knows that although many forms of illness may feel alike, actually they represent many different kinds of diseases which are quite different from each other.
So it is with love. There are many forms of it. Those in love may feel quite similar to those whose love is of a very different type. Actually, however, one form of love may be quite unlike another.
Some forms of love are essential to successful marriage, or even to successful living. Other kinds of love are forms of selfishness. For example, we say that we love oranges. The orange would not think so. We destroy it for our pleasure, and then throw what is left in the garbage. Sometimes we love people in the same way – even our own children. We get what we want out of them, often regardless of their wishes or best interests.
Sometimes young people love and want to marry, mainly because they want to get something out of the other, not because they desire his good. Yet this selfish kind of love may look and feel just like any other kind. Not all forms of love are good and sound. Some forms should be warning signals, rather than bases for marriage. The important question is not, “Do I love him enough to marry him?” It is rather, do we feel the kind of love toward each other upon which a marriage can successfully be built?
Advice for Marriage Fact Three: The richest, deepest, and most permanent forms of love are those which we build over the years. So you are in love. You feel a warm, romantic glow toward each other which you do not feel toward anyone else. Grand. The love which you feel toward each other may be honest and true. If you marry, it will give you a good start.
But the love which will make your marriage most worth-while, which will not only endure but grow through the years, is not this romantic kind. It is the richer, deeper kind which comes from Having with another who is in a true sense a life partner; one with whom you have in common the basic purpose of building a family together; someone who is going your way. Only such a love can really meet your needs. Only such a love can weld your marriage together so that it can easily withstand the storms and stresses which pull against it.
The romantic form of love may be able to give you some thrilling experiences for a few weeks, or even a few years. Only this richer form of love can make the latter part of your life richer, and in a sense, more romantic than were the first years. And this love is not anything you can fall into. It must be built.
Read some of our other posts for more advice for marriage.
Posted in Marriage Communication
