In-laws: Adding Spice to Life

I want you to think about your last name or your maiden name. Ask yourself this question. What does it mean to be a (insert your last name)? What does it mean to be a Willis? It means having a very strange sense of humor. It means trips to the mountains. It means trying new things. It means a love of dirt biking. It means having bounteous traditions created over the years. Each and every family has its own personal recipe that distinguishes it from any other family. However it becomes hard when in-laws enter the picture. In-laws present new theories and ideas that test the constitution. They may not like dirt biking. They may not think my family is very funny. Soon the in-laws can be seen as outlaws. Having in-laws is a blessing. They provide new methods to an old recipe to make it even better. How can one accept in-laws? Here are some suggestions for adapting to a changing recipe. This list applies to parents in regards to in-laws, siblings to new in-laws, and to your new in-laws.

·         Trust the choice that they have made in marrying this person.

·         You need to work towards establishing a relationship with your new in-law. Respect and love them. Try to find a balance of self-disclosure and acceptance. You are family now.

·         As parents or the new in-law, view the new set of parents as an additional set of protectors who can help your child  or you with guidance and advice. Inquire about their in-laws health. Avoid competing with your spouse. 

·         Pray to be able to love your new in-law. Pray to see them the way that the Lord sees them.

·         Be understanding of the fact that they cannot do everything with you anymore. They will have to find a balance between both sets of families. Be understanding that they will have to refuse some activities in order to achieve balance.

·         Don’t give advice.

·         Don’t criticize.

·         Do not pin them down to a specific reason why they will not be attending a specific event.

·         No criticizing or disciplining if grandchildren. Your family member is now creating their own recipe.

·          Do not have unclear or indirect communication.

·         Accept differences in your family. Having differences in your family allows you to gain new perspective.

·         Spend quality time with your new in-laws. Seek to have one on one time that is positive.

A lady once explained what each in-law contributed to their family. One of her daughter-in-laws is a talented photographer. Another son-in-law helps them figure out technology. Each in-law makes your family better. Each in-law adds spice to the recipe of life. A recipe can always become better. That is what happens when in-laws are embraced into the family.

Oxen, Unity, and Happiness

I have always been fascinated by the pioneers. I loved the stories of faithful men and women leaving behind their life in favor of taming a wild frontier. Many came by wagons carried by teams of horses or oxen. Horses may have been faster than oxen yet they often ran out of strength. Oxen were a slow and steady team that made it to the valley. The key to the oxen’s success was that they worked in harmony consistently pressing forward. President Packer gave an account of an ox team pulling contest. He said, “A wooden sledge was weighted with cement blocks: ten thousand pounds [4,535 kg]—five tons. … The object was for the oxen to move the sledge three feet [91 cm]. … I noticed a well-matched pair of very large, brindled, blue-gray animals … [the] big blue oxen of seasons past. Teams were eliminated one by one. … The big blue oxen didn’t even place! A small, nondescript pair of animals, not very well matched for size, moved the sledge all three times. The big blues were larger and stronger and better matched for size than the other team. But the little oxen had better teamwork and coordination. They hit the yoke together. Both animals jerked forward at exactly the same time and the force moved the load.” In marriage we are two different sized oxen yet we can still move our marriage and family forward. The important thing is to work together as a team.

Marion G. Romney said, “Remember that neither the wife nor the husband is the slave of the other. Husbands and wives are equal partners, particularly Latter-day Saint husbands and wives.” A marriage is a partnership between a man and a woman. One spouse is not more important than the other spouse. Both partners contribute special gifts and talents to a marriage that benefit the entire family.

 I look to my parents as an example of unity in marriage. As children we always knew how to play our parents. When they were not united, we played them to get what we wanted. However when they were united as one on decisions, we could not play them to get what we wanted. Unity led our family to push onto the West together with the oxen pulling the load. “It is important that parents work together in their leadership in the family... It is vital that parents support each other in the presence of their children…It is important that parents make sure that they are working together and making decisions that are consistent with each other. Except in cases of abuse, passively not supporting the other parent or actively undermining the authority of the other parent causes serious damage to children” (Richard B Miller).

One may ask how they can be united. President Joseph Fielding Smith gave this advice.

Parents… should love and respect each other, and treat each other with respectful decorum and kindly regard, all the time. The husband should treat his wife with the utmost courtesy and respect. The husband should never insult her; he should never speak slightly of her, but should always hold her in the highest esteem in the home, in the presence of their children… The wife, also, should treat the husband with the greatest respect and courtesy. Her words to him should not be keen and cutting and sarcastic. She should not pass slurs or insinuations at him… Then it will be easy for the parents to instill into the hearts of their children not only love for their fathers and their mothers, not only respect and courtesy towards their parents, but love and courtesy and deference between the children at home.

May we become more united as a couple. No matter the difference in size, a couple can push forward as they work in teamwork. Working as a team you can figuratively press forward to the West. Happiness will illuminate your family. You will find greater peace and happiness than you have ever known. 

Sex: It Is So Much More

Often times when we teach about sex we focus on it being used for the creating of children. We are taught that it is not to be used outside the bonds of marriage. Throughout our years growing up, we hear how it is wrong to participate in sex until one is married. It leads one to believe that sex is dirty; that it is only to be used when creating children. While sex is to be employed only between a man and a woman lawfully married, there is much more to it. I am single so I do not have much experience with this which is why I want to focus this article on teaching the youth the true meaning of intimacy. There were times in young women’s that I felt that this part of intimacy was dirty. I know that I dreaded law of chastity lessons. Heavenly Father did not create sexual intimacy so we would fear it. There is a greater purpose to it that we must understand.

In the Meridian Magazine Sean E Brother talks about the purpose of intimacy in marriage. Prior to marriage he was trying to learn what to expect. He asked his mother what sexual intimacy was like. “My mother laughed and said that sometimes it was fun, sometimes it was comforting, sometimes it was romantic, sometimes it was spiritual, and sometimes it was just a willingness to love.” Heavenly Father gave us sexual intimacy so that a couple can nearer together. It is meant to be more than creating children. It is a binding of two souls together throughout the experiences and trials of life.

Hugh B Brown said,   “Thousands of young people come to the marriage altar almost illiterate insofar as this basic and fundamental function is concerned. The sex instinct is not something which we need to fear or be ashamed of. It is God-given and has a high and holy purpose … We want our young people to know that sex is not an unmentionable human misfortune, and certainly it should not be regarded as a sordid but necessary part of marriage. There is no excuse for approaching this most intimate relationship in life without true knowledge of its meaning and its high purpose.” The thing that youth need to understand is that these urges were given to us by our Heavenly Father. It is a beautiful expression of love between a man and a woman when done as commanded. President Harold B Lee taught, “The divine impulse within every true man and woman that impels companionship with the opposite sex is intended by our Maker as a holy impulse for a holy purpose, not to be satisfied as a mere biological urge or as a lust of the flesh in promiscuous associations, but to be reserved as an expression of true love in holy wedlock.”

One of my companions had a friend who was getting married. The friend told her that her whole life she had been told not to have sex. In one night she was supposed to forget those years of being told not to do it. It is a great disservice to our youth. We need to help youth understand sex is not dirty. We need to be open and frank with them. We must help them understand that it is truly beautiful when done in the Lord’s way. They need to understand the eternal purpose of sexual intimacy.