The Work of Marriage- Vanessa Phillips

You plan your big day, it’s beautiful and wonderful and you go home and say ok I’m married. Now what? The general feeling seems to be: you just keep doing the same thing, have some kids, buy a bigger house and keep it rolling. It’s just a piece of paper they say. Oh how wrong they were. 

Marriage, I learned, when done RIGHT, is some of the hardest work there is. If you enter or maintain a marriage with the thought “this is how I am” or look at it as “I can settle down” I assure you it’s not going to be right. You have to let go of a lot. Inhibitions, ego, “I” mentality, and being right. If your partner can’t look at you and call you out, who can? No one? Then stay single. Working on your marriage is saying “hey I know this hurts but you have let yourself go, I want to be attracted to you, let’s go to the gym together.” It’s “hey let’s try this sexual adventure together.” It’s hearing “you are no longer fun or pleasant to be around can we work on this?” 

Marriage is the gift of someone working with you to make each other better people and partners. It is letting go of "I" and thinking we. It’s taking care of someone else, how they need to be taken care of. It’s checking yourself to say I need to really work on me to be better. It’s changing together, not replacing each other. 

If you’re thinking “he better just accept me for who I am” you aren’t ready to work on a marriage. Is he the wrong partner or are YOU?