The Map to Falling in Love

A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person. ~Mignon McLaughlin

I have to say that I love this quote. Marriage requires falling in love with your spouse over and over again. However life can become busy. It can be filled with work, children, church activities, or volunteer activities. It can become easy to become disconnected from your spouse. You are no longer best friends who intimately know details about one another. That is not what marriage is meant to become. This quote is about continually falling in love. We fall in love as we continually get to know one another. Being connected in marriage allows one to weather the storms that may come. We must know one another in order to love one another.  In his book The Seven Principles for Making a Marriage Work John Gottman Ph.D provides a way for us to reconnect with our spouse on a constant basis.  He calls it a love map or “the part of your brain where you store all the relevant information about your partner’s life.” A love map is where you store the details about your spouse: their likes, dislikes, or important experiences in their life. To love someone is to know them. Marriage is a living thing. It is constantly changing due to the arrival of children, challenges at work, or life problems. You need to continually A love map is completed as you get to know one another intimately.

These are some questions that are part of a love map:

What are the names of your spouse’s friends?

What are my spouse’s major aspirations and hopes in life?

What stresses are they experiencing right now?

What are they most sad about?

This is a link to more of the love map questions.

https://celectcdn.s3.amazonaws.com/files/0031/8009/Love_Maps.pdf

I am not married but I can think about my family. I cannot honestly answer most of these questions. This means that I need to take time to get to know my family. I cannot truly help my family until I know them. Knowledge is power in saving our marriage. Love maps provide a way for us to continually fall in love with our spouse. 

A Chapter View or a Story View?

How often do we become frustrated with those around us? How often do we say things in the heat of the moment without knowing the full story? As humans we can only see things from our own perspective. It is like only knowing a chapter from a book. We do not understand the full plot because we only know one part of the book. In Jane Eyre I remember so intensely disliking Mr. Rochester. He was angry and rude. He did not truly care for anyone. He had a string of mistresses. As I learned his story, my feelings toward him became to change. My heart broke as I learned that he was tricked into marrying a woman who was mad. My heart broke as I read of the deception of Mr. Rochester’s father and brother in arranging this marriage. Mr. Rochester was in an impossible situation. As I continued to learn more of his story, I came to admire him caring for his mad wife. He eventually risks his life to save her. As I came to know the full story, I came to change my attitude and opinion of Mr. Rochester. By the end of the book, I was rooting for him and Jane to marry. I was blind to the true nature of Mr. Rochester as I only knew part of his story. Our feelings and thoughts change as we come to understand the story from their point of view. Understanding the full story makes a difference in how we feel and react.

In marriage we are understanding to situations and events surrounding our life for we know the full story. We understand why we were running late.  However we do not extend that same compassion to our spouse. When they run late to dinner, we think of how irresponsible they are. We become angry and frustrated with them. We forget that we have done the same thing. We do not extend compassion and mercy as they have done to us. We only see the chapter instead of the story. We are so good at seeing only the chapter. We hold judgement against them. We need to have compassion and charity for our spouse. We need to see the full story. In his book Drawing Heaven into Your Marriage Dr. H Wallace Goddard says we need to change our thoughts. We need to go from thinking about our self to thinking of our spouse. We need to ask questions so we may see the full story.

These are questions that open our eyes only to the chapter:

Why are you doing this to me?

What’s wrong with you?

Don’t you understand why this is important to me?

These are questions that allow us to see the full chapter.

I wonder if I can understand why this is important to my partner?

What is my partner really telling me?

I wonder if I can understand her pain?

Can I get God to help me get beyond myself in order to understand my spouse?

True friendship is mercy, compassion, and forgiveness. It is reaching beyond yourself to help someone else.

This video is an excellent example of a woman who only saw a chapter.

May we all have a little more compassion. May we all be a little more understanding. May we all be more open to the full story of someone else’s life. 

The Power of True Love

As I have thought about what to write this week, my mind keeps going back to a lady I taught while I served a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The lady’s name is Diane. Diane is in her early seventies. She married young and then at the young age of 40 her husband died; she has been a widow for nearly 35 years. As we talked and came to know her, the most beautiful expression would come across her face as she talked about her husband. You could feel the love she had for her husband enter the room. You could sense the love that he had for her as well. I learned so much about true love from Diane. The way she spoke created a desire in me to have a marriage like the one she had. After several lessons my companion and I asked her if she had any advice on marriage. What followed was one of the most powerful lessons on my mission. She gave advice on having a marriage that is filled with love- true love.

1. She said to love your spouse. You never know what day will be your last day with them. Every moment we have with them is precious time. We should never waste that precious time. Even when they drive us crazy, we need to love them. This meant a lot from Diane. Even today she treasures those moments with her husband. They were never able to have children so the memories of her husband is all she has left. We need to live everyday as though it could be our last one together on this Earth.

2. She said to marry someone special. She said that we were special young ladies and that we should never settle for less than a special young man. We needed to marry someone that we could love and respect. Each of us should never settle for anything less than a special young man or woman. Each of deserve someone whom we can love and cherish and who will love and cherish us in return. In other words you need to marry your best friend.  Remember on those hard days those reasons why you chose your spouse. Imagine your life if they were not there by your side. We so often see the bad that we cease to see the good in those we love. We forget to love our spouse. One month on my mission my companion and I were given a challenge that helped us to love one another. Each night after planning for the next day we were to make a list of 5 things that we loved about each other. The catch was we could not repeat any attribute. Our mission president’s wife said that we were the happiest companionship. We were happy because there was no room for the bad. Instead of seeing the bad, we were focusing on finding new things that we love and admired about one another. We were building up one another instead of tearing one another down.  On those days we were frustrated with one another, we would be reminded about what we loved about one another. It made a difference to see the good in each other.

3. The final thing Diane taught was that love is about sacrifice. Diane said was that she would live in a tent by river if it meant she could have her husband back. She would give up everything to have one more moment with him. One of the most beautiful parts about the gospel is that our families can be together forever. True marriage is happiness. From Diane I learned the beauty that comes from marriage. Love can be eternal.

People may wonder if true love really exists. I know it does. It is not the fancy passionate love that Hollywood depicts. It is two people growing more in love each day. It is watching a ninety year old wife lovingly ask her ill husband if he is okay. Letting him know that she is there. It is still loving someone after 35 years of widowhood. It is caring for another when illness or sorrow comes. Bruce C. Hafen said: ‘Be friends first and sweethearts second. Lowell Bennion once said that relationships between young men and young women should be built like a pyramid. The base of the pyramid is friendship. And the ascending layers are built of things like time, understanding, respect, and restraint. Right at the top of the pyramid is a glittering little mystery called romance. And when weary travelers in the desert see that glitter on top of the pyramid from far off, they don’t see what underlies the jewel to give it such prominence and hold it so high’ (“The Gospel and Romantic Love,” in Brigham Young University 1982–83 Fireside and Devotional Speeches [1983], 32).”

I Will

Sister Bonnie Oscarson, the general young women’s president said, “Sisters, few of us will ever have to face an angry mob, but there is a war going on in this world in which our most cherished and basic doctrines are under attack. I am speaking specifically of the doctrine of the family. The sanctity of the home and the essential purposes of the family are being questioned, criticized, and assaulted on every front.”

I know that a concern that I have is how I can defend marriage. I am not a lawyer or a politician. I am a college so what kind of an impact can I make.  How can I stand for marriage? In his article, “The Attack on Marriage as the Union of a Man and a Woman” Lynn D Wardle gives an answer. “We must make that argument in new and creative ways… We need conservative intellectual forces — think tanks, scholars, religious leaders, and politicians — to actively engage the issue of marriage.”

Lynn D Wardle also says, “And what’s true for the news media is even worse for the cultural media. Keep in mind that Fox is the network that aired Beverly Hills 90210, Melrose Place, and now Glee — each of which has done its part to undermine a healthy vision of marriage and human sexuality. But what is the conservative alternative to Glee? We need more concerted financial commitments to advancing sound culture. There is opportunity here. Roger Ailes famously described himself as a media genius for discovering a niche market that ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, and MSNBC were all ignoring: half of the American population. What was true for the market in news consumption is just as true for entertainment more broadly. Enterprising entrepreneurs who can create television networks or film studios that produce high-quality family-friendly content not only perform good deeds, but will likely make a nice profit. There is an audience for high-quality entertainment that doesn’t undermine the values that parents are trying to impart to their children. Those of us with vocations in policy and the academy need to encourage those with vocations in the artistic realm to continue their important work. It’s not that we need fewer natural-law philosophers or appellate litigators; it’s that we need more of everything. There’s work for everyone, for artists and musicians, for pastors and theologians, for statesmen and lawyers, for scholars and activists.”

Each and every person has an important part to play in showing the world why marriage needs to between a man and a woman. While I may not be a prominent figure, I can use my talents to defend marriage. I do not need to stand on a soapbox and yell at passersby that marriage is between a man and a woman. I can use my talents to proclaim my beliefs. This blog is one way that I can share my beliefs and defend the family. Even small people can make a difference. We can use the social media for good. We can use it to show the world what God has ordained.

The film Courageous tells the account of a man who is awakened to the duties of associated with a father. He seeks to defend the importance of fatherhood. At the end of the movie he asks who will stand up be a father by saying, “Who will? Who will?” 

That is the question that we have today. Who will you stand and defend marriage?

Read Lynn D Wardle at http://www.nationalreview.com/article/378538/marriage-where-do-we-go-here-ryan-t-anderson

Read Sister Oscarson at https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2015/04/defenders-of-the-family-proclamation?lang=eng#watch=video 

The Power to Create a Happily Ever After

Ever since I was little I have been obsessed with books and the magical worlds that they create. I loved to be swept up in the stories of heroes whether big or small. I always waited eagerly for the very last page to see if the hero. I especially loved when happy endings involved a wedding. Often for the happily ever after to occur characters had to change. In Pride and Prejudice the 2 main characters had to change in order to fall in love. While this is a small example of change, we can also make big changes. Every hero has some sort of personal obstacle that they must overcome in order to have a happy ending. We all have less than perfect lives that leave obstacles to overcome so we can have happiness in our marriage. The obstacles could be abuse, addiction, divorce, separation, abandonment, or other fears. Just as the heroes in the books do, we too can overcome these obstacles and change our story.

“A transitional character is one who, in a single generation, changes the entire course of a lineage. The changes might be for good or ill, but the most noteworthy examples are those individuals who grow up in an abusive, emotionally destructive environment and who somehow find a way to metabolize the poison and refuse to pass it on to their children. They break the mold. They refute  the observation that abused children become abusive parents, that the children of alcoholics become alcoholic adults, that “the sins of the fathers are visited upon the heads of the children to the third and fourth generation.” Their contribution to humanity is to filter the destructiveness out of their own lineage so that the generations downstream will have a supportive foundation upon which to build productive lives.” (p. 18)

- Carlfred Broderick (1992). Marriage and the Family. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall.

As this quotes states we are the characters and we impact the ending of our story. We decide through our choices to change for the better. Our story does not end with us but lives on through our posterity. They continue the story when we pass on. No matter our background we can truly change. We can change because of the Atonement of Jesus Christ. We do not have to blame our past for why we cannot be happy now or in the future. We all had less than ideal things happen in our families while growing up but we can change that. The Book of Mormon tells the account of the Stripling Warriors. These young men were incredibly valiant young men who helped preserve the Nephite nation during war. What may surprise one is that these valiant young men came from a family whose past had not been ideal. Their parents had been Lamanites meaning they had lived lives filled with iniquity such as murder. Upon accepting the gospel of Jesus Christ, these parents never looked back. They changed their children’s lives. People say we cannot change but it is an untruth. I know that we can change. I have seen so many people change. The Savior performed the Atonement so we could change our story to have a happy ending. No matter the past we have had in our family, we can make a difference for the future. The marriage we begin is a new chapter in our story. Just as any hero picks their choices and ultimately their ending so do we. We can have a happily ever after as we seek to use the Atonement every day. We need the Savior and He will help us achieve a happy ending.

Hans Brinker says, “Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.”

Let us be the hero of our own story.                              

Choose to be a transitional character and change the ending of your story.

No one else can change it.