Married? 7 Questions You Should Ask Yourself
Marriage is kind of a pickle, huh?
I mean, maybe not for everyone, but for a lot of people, like me, the union of "holy matrimony" can sometimes seem like an obstacle course set up all over the floor of my feeble mind.
But, I think that maybe that's what makes marriage something worth fighting for, right?
Over the course of the last eight years, I have been both a witness and a player in the game of marriage and I have come to spend a lot of time contemplating what it means to be 'happily married.' I'm no expert, mind you, in fact, I'm far from it. But, like anyone else who believes two is better than one, and who believes that their own marriage is a puzzling shape-shifter worth working on day in and day, out I truly enjoy crawling up into my own head to spend time pondering what it is exactly that brings couples together.
Related: 10 things you should NEVER say to your husband...but probably do
And what it is that makes them last.
There are no easy answers, of course. Truth is, there are far more questions than easy solutions.
1. Do you believe in meant to be?
Is it something real or is it an idealistic vision? And if it is real how often do people actually end up with the person they were 'meant to be with?' I think that I believe that it IS something real and that I DID end up with my proverbial soul mate, but I struggle with the reasons behind why I feel that way.
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2. Can marriage change you too much?
I don't mean in all the obvious ways. Of course we have to change things about ourselves when we marry someone else; it's a meaningful part of being together. But, is it possible that marriage can actually twist up and contort definitive parts of us to where we might actually resent the change, even if it's unconsciously?
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Related: 7 things I wish I knew about men before I got married
3. Why is marriage easier for some people?
I wonder if maybe there is a certain 'mental chip' that some folks have that others simply do not. The idea of marriage seems to be largely about self-sacrifice and living much of your life for the greater collective good, but is that what most of us really do, day in and day out? Human beings are self-centered by nature, I believe. I know I am and I think that overcoming that inner-struggle might be the key to happiness in this life.
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4. Does a sense of spirituality help a marriage?
I'm not really talking about specific religious beliefs here, but rather the more wide open andless indoctrinated appeal of a belief in something bigger than us. Marriages, at their best, foster lessons learned through the years, and ultimately a little wisdom, if we're lucky. So does a couple that share similar spiritual conceptions benefit from that connection much?
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Related: 15 sex-free ways to spice up your relationship
5. How do you know if you're marriage material anyway?
Is there a way to decide? Or do we have to actually be married before we ever realize if it is right or wrong for us? There are so many divorces in the western world these days that it doesn't necessarily take a major cynic to say that people might be becoming less 'talented' in the marriage department. Why is that?
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6. Have we done enough to redefine what marriage really is?
Or should there be no allowance for such a thing? Our grandparents lived lives quite differently from ours in terms of so many things. But are those daily everyday differences enough to force us to reconsider what marriage should mean to us today as opposed to what it meant to people 50 years ago?
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Related: 10 ways to do date night without leaving your home
7. Are we equals today?
I mean, do we each pull our own financial weight and our own parental weight? And all the other things that we are supposed to be splitting pretty much down the middle, everything from chores to sex to being as good a listener as I am a talker: are we good at dealing with our collective burdens?
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- By Serge Bielanko
For 3 more questions to ask about marriage, visit Babble!
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Monica and Serge Bielanko have been married for eight years. Along the way they have practiced and perfected the dark arts of couch dining, clandestine boozing, bambino wrangling, wide-open domestic warfare, and modern love. Monica writes all over Babble.com and, in addition to Babble Voices, is featured on Strollerderby, FameCrawler, and Toddler Times. She also regularly updates her personal blog, The Girl Who. If he's not on Babble Voices, Serge can be found over on Dadding and is King of the Corner over at his own blog, Thunder Pie.
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