The Random Musings of a Marriage and Family Major Student

So I’ve been reading this book “Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work” and pretty much the entire thing, in essence, is about conflict and how to resolve it.  It’s either because this is a self-help book, those who are reading it have troubles in their marriage so conflict is the theme to help those people in their rocky marriage, or marriage is made up of conflict.  I suppose the truth could be a bit of both but I’m thinking it’s really because marriage has a butt-ton of conflict. Now I suppose that sounds like I depressing view of marriage, but is it really? What is the purpose of this life? “To be tested”, drones every Sunday school student.  We all know that answer but do we really take it to heart? If the most rewarding things are the biggest challenges because we are on this earth to be tested, then I’d say marriage is up there on one of the biggest rewarding/challenging things we’ve got on the docket in this life. Conflict is inevitable and I think will be e...

Pride. We all know what this word means and we all know people who we would use this word to describe. There are those people who we think are the pride posterchild with their haughtiness, arrogance, selfishness, and a high score on the jerk-ometer. We have a certain vision of pride and we almost make it seem like you’re either a prideful person or you’re not. Those who have pride are stuck up jerks that just look down their nose at you. But pride has many different facets and manifests differently in people, and we all have it one way or another. That’s why Ezra Benson, a former president of the Chruch of Jesus Christ of Later-days Saints, called it the “Universal sin”. I’m going to be drawing on quotes from an address he gave to the church in 1989. “Pride is a sin that can readily be seen in others but is rarely admitted in ourselves. Most of us consider pride to be a sin of those on the top, such as the rich and the learned, looking down at the rest of us. There is, however, ...

John Gottman, in his book "The Seven Principles of Making a Marriage Work" spends an entire chapter talking about letting your partner influence you.  This is very much tied to sharing power as equal partners in a marriage. This I think can be a source of contention and a battle for every marriage, but some worse than others.  Gottman talks a lot about being willing to share power in making decisions from buying a car to who should wash the dishes that night.  According to his research, one of the sexes has a little harder time with that than the other. “We have found that, even in the first few months of marriage, men who allow their wives to influence them have happier marriages and are less likely to divorce than men who resist their wives' influence. Statistically speaking, when a man is not willing to share power with his partner, there is an 81 percent chance that his marriage will self-destruct.” He points out that he’s not trying to single men out as the probl...

Part of me hates the topic of same-sex marriage because it always steps on so many toes, and there are always many angrily spoken opinions.  You can give a never-ending list of facts arguing both sides and the other will never be convinced.  I don’t pretend to know the solution.  All I know is that God loves all of his children.  I feel like Nephi 11:17 “I know that he loveth his children; nevertheless, I do not know the meaning of all things.” I know that God has said that marriage is between a man and a woman, a partnership that is meant to bring children into the world as our bodies are designed. I know that “The family is ordained of God. Marriage between man and woman is essential to His eternal plan.”(The family: a proclamation to the world) In his address to students of BYU, our past Prophet and president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Thomas S. Monson said, “Social and political pressures to change marriage laws are resulting in pr...

Elder Bruce C Hafen wrote an article entitled “Covenant Marriage”.  In his article, he spoke of three “wolves” that test a marriage, Natural Adversity, our own imperfections, and excessive individualism.  I find the last wolf really interesting because I feel like individuality is a really fine balance.  On one end you have those who believe marriage is a ball and chain and once they tie the knot they’re individual identity gets sucked into the glob of marriage.  On the other, you have those who have little concept of self-identity and wish to jump headlong into marriage hoping their “better half” will give them identity.  Neither scenario is good and it’s hard to find the right balance. When I was younger and much more insecure, I fell into the latter group.  I craved relationships because I didn’t feel like enough on my own and I needed someone else to give me worth.  That is just a bad co-dependent relationship ready to happen.  Instead of comp...