How Did You Learn to be Married?
(I am away on a vacation/study break during the month of July. The posts that appear during the month are from the archives.)
I have a question.
I talk with a lot of people about marriage. Some of these people would like to be married one day but don’t have anyone in mind. Others in these conversations are engaged. I also talk about marriage with people who are married.
What is difficult for many, many people is that they have never seen a healthy marriage up close. They may have grown up in a single parent home. Or, they may have grown up in a home where their parents were married and then divorced at some point while they were still in elementary school, middle school, or high school. Others have never seen a healthy marriage up close even though their parents were married throughout their growing up years.
I mention this because it is often difficult for a young guy or a young woman to imagine themselves being married when they aren’t quite sure what that looks like or feels like. Some of these people ask questions like these:
- What do people do everyday when they are married? (Remember if you have never seen this up close, it may not be that obvious.)
- Are there marriages out there that really do work?
- What do I do in order to contribute to a healthy marriage?
Question:
How did you learn to be married?
I am particularly interested in hearing from you if you never saw a healthy marriage up close while you were growing up, and yet you married. What helped you? Whom did you learn from? What suggestions would you give others?
I am also interested in hearing from you if you did witness a healthy marriage. What did you observe? What do you hope to put into practice in your own marriage? I am interested in hearing your response to this whether you are single or already married.
Categories: Family