The Walking Wed: Surviving the Marriage Apocalypse

Last night I attended a Theology on Tap event (you should come!) with my Parish in Washington DC. The emcee set the context for the series on marriage with an article from CNN detailing a coming marriage decline in the United States among young adults. Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 are asking if marriage is worth it. With this question in mind, a very dynamic and comical couple took the stage and captivated us all with their welcoming anecdotes and adorable banter. 10 years of marriage looks damn good on these people. 

Their initial comments brought the room back to reality: "When did anyone say marriage was going to be easy? Who told you it would be perfect? Marriage is hard work and it is absolutely worth it." They offered three main points for people who want to prepare for marriage during their single life.

Invest in your prayer life to open your heart to receive God's plan for you.

• Marriage isn't in everyone's future and prayer will help you discern, with grace, if that is the case. Prayer will also build up your spirit and help your soul be complete in God. You don't need someone else to complete you!

Become intimately aware of how your family of origin has shaped your world view, your faith, and your personality.

• Our families really do shape who we are - for better or worse there is no getting around this fact. Take time to think about how your family traditions, worldview, and interactions have shaped you and your expectations. Did your parents argue in front of you as a child? Would you be comfortable having an argument in your relationship? Did your parents keep arguments and affection out of your view? Would you feel comfortable being affectionate in front of other people, in front of your children? Where do you need to be on holidays? How did your upbringing shape your personality and are there things about that upbringing you want to carry into your own marriage and how you raise your children? These are some questions to ask yourself and determine what can stay and what can go when you finally meet your person.

Work on communication NOW!

• How do you communicate to the people around you? You don't need to wait to be in a relationship to work on your communication skills. Relationships and marriages can end because of a lack of communication. Being misunderstood is the worst! But we can't read minds so it takes a lot of work to make sure everyone is on the same page. The couple last night suggested using "I feel" statements. Instead of attacking the behavior of someone else, let them know how their action or words affected you - "When you leave your clothes on the floor, I feel like you don't respect our shared space. It makes me feel like you don't care about how hard I have worked to clean up this space." The other person can empathize and work out a solution rather than reacting and feeling attacked.

I enjoyed this talk particularly because it was applicable to me now. I'm engaged and working toward marriage but these are skills I can really hone in on while I'm not yet married. The couple took some questions from the group and I felt they all served the group well. Have you ever been to a group thing and someone asks a very long and incredibly specific question and the answer doesn't really help anyone else in the room? That didn't happen!

One question, however, had a misleading premise that I'd like to address: "How do you work around each other's flaws as you're building a relationship?" I think that question itself is flawed. Yes, human beings are flawed because of sin nature. There is an innate good nature about us that comes from God but we are flawed in that and it often takes a lot of work to be good. However, we should make sure we don't mean 'differences' when we say 'flaws'. This is something I learned early on in my relationship with my now fiancé. I'm very particular about a lot of things. I usually know exactly how I want something to be and I often think that because it is the best way (in my mind), it is the only right way - flipping through the TV guide channel the right way, loading the dishwasher the right way, chopping onions the right way.

I had to realize that just because someone does something differently than I doesn't mean they are doing it wrong. It's just different. My fiancé and I have different ways of doing many things. Sometimes this can be incredibly annoying. But it's not a flaw. It's just a difference and it's okay. People have a tendency to hold everyone else to their own standard of living, doing, acting. There are some things that are wrong across the board and some things that are right across the board. But I encourage you to take some time to examine if the "flaws" you see in people are really just differences and if you can make it a habit to accept these as simply (and only) that.

Finally, I'd like to encourage you to be intentional with your communication. Having previously been in a long-term committed relationship that turned out to not be what I wanted, I made it a point in my current relationship to be very intentional with my communication. It's a work in progress but I still try to say what I want and say what I mean. In the past I would hold people to a certain standard that seemed entirely obvious to me. I would get angry and hurt because I didn't get the response I was looking for or the attention I wanted. Now I just say what I want and what I expect. Sometimes my wants and expectations are unrealistic and as a couple we work through those to come to an agreement. We are happier for it and I'm thankful I found a person who works equally as hard to communicate intentionally with me.