What's Marriage Anyway?

I once read a quote that said “90% of being married is just yelling ‘what’ from other rooms” Yes, it definitely is, and in our house I’m the one doing the yelling most of the time, as I have an extremely loud voice. I can’t help it, but my voice is just not soft, and if I put my mind to it, the entire neighborhood can hear me without putting in effort. My husband is nice enough to say it’s because Im a singer, and I pretend I’m naive enough to agree with him. So, the reason I brought that up is because my husband’s pet peeve is yelling across rooms and my habit is doing so. LOL. That brings me to my point of what marriage really is, and that’s compromise. Now, that’s a simple enough example to give, so I can elaborate on what I’ve learned, being married now for 6 years.

Often times I hear couples saying I just want to be married and I used to say the same thing! I just wanted to be married, live in a hole with him, as long as we were together. Now, not to say that wanting to get married is a bad idea. It’s definitely the best step a loving couple can take to validate their love and create a family. The bad idea behind it is that often times, marriages end in divorce because people either had a different perception of marriage before getting into it, or they didn’t think about the reality of it. Another concept I have heard and love, is to think of the worst traits of your partner. If you can live with them for the rest of your life, then you are solid. If you can’t, then you will have a problem, because reality is people don’t change who they are. Now if my loud voice was something my husband couldn’t live with, then we would be in trouble, because it’s not going to change. I can try to control my tone for as long as I remind myself to, but best believe I will hit those high notes at least a few times a day.

Quickly I am going to lay down some expectations of marriage for you and then hit you with the realities. And so no one takes it personal, I will give my own experience. I pictured marriage to be coming home to my hubby every day, getting surprise dinners and flowers, being swept off my feet on rainbows and so on, and living in a “hole” as long as I get to be with him. Some of it proved to be true, and some of it is seriously laughable looking back.

In that perfect, pretty, glamorous and vivid image, we forget to calculate bills, stress, kids, the fact that we are human, and a few other MINOR things. I quickly learned that although being married has its amazing aspects, mixing everything in the equation blurred my vision from the “expectations” I had, and opened my eyes to the reality.

Here is my experience: Marriage isn’t always perfect. It is two imperfect people joined together to help each other through an imperfect life. It is two individuals brought together who are meant to be best friends, compromise and always lift each other up. Marriage is the perfect example of teamwork. No-one owns the other, and both work together to build their version of a good life, for themselves and their family. It is a constant learning process from each other and about each other. At times uncovering more about each other leads to different beliefs and disagreements. However, the key to any successful marriage is to know that these things are a part of being married, and communication and compromise are key. Without the two, marriage is nothing but a delusional fantasy; one that is just that.