HOW was your Valentine’s Day? Before I got married, I always thought love or a relationship is all about honey and milk.
I only learnt later that there are prickles and problems.
Marriage is a great Godly institute.
More work and effort is needed from all people involved for it to be a success.
Like any other choices we make in life, marriage has a greater say of what will become of us.
Today, let’s walk the less travelled road of things most people should have known before they got married.
In this article I will give you 10 things which I wish I knew before I got married.
Align
A successful relationship is based on what we put into it and not so much of what the other party brings to the table.
Aligning our efforts and values creates harmony.
Self-alignment and truth is crucial. Living a lie kept me insecure.
Living a lie always had a question tag; What if one found out the truth about me or what I did?
Living a lie makes you look for more lies to cover up for other lies.
First, be true to yourself and you won’t struggle to be true to others.
Don’t bring false imagery and flattery into an affair.
Awareness
Sex never ceases to thrill.
Sex is always great, but we should not let it drive us into ditches.
Talking to a woman recently, she said she had intercourse with her boyfriend thinking that it would help them fortify their love, but regrettably the opposite became reality.
Simply put, the cake was cut before time and because there wasn’t so much of a prize to get it, they just decided there could be a better one and they walked away.
Sex never ceased to be a thrill, but it is best in the right context.
Action
My looks were never the problem!
Take action to work on your inner beauty.
Outer beauty is inadequate until you realise and work on your inner beauty. It’s a daily practice.
I never chose how I should look, but I definitely chose how I felt and thought of myself.
Outer beauty is inadequate until you realise and work on your inner beauty.
It’s a rule in any facet of life, you first become successful internally.
The best you can tell yourself is that I am the best and anyone who comes into my life is just coming to complement the best that already exists in me.
Assertion
Assert your worth. Don’t let groupthink or negative comments from others define you.
Know you are a great asset the world needs.
People, especially peers or even parents have their own perspectives of love, of who we really are which is not entirely true.
I vividly remember one close relative once saying I would amount to nothing in life.
Those words gnawed at my deepest inner being!
The tide turned when I knew I am a great asset the world needs.
Accept
Accept the truth about yourself and your past.
Living a lie only leads to insecurity and distrust.
Acceptance is the foundation of authenticity.
For me, inner healing was necessary.
Everyone has a past and at times we use our past experiences to judge our current realities.
The past wounds, when brought into a relationship, may cause pain to the other party that doesn’t deserve to feel it.
I shouldn’t have brought my past pains into my relationship and my judgment would not have been that skewed.
That nearly bogged me in my past more than I should have been focusing on my future.
Association
Associate rational thought with emotional control.
If only I was taught or learnt how to control my body and emotions by using my head at a tender age I would have evaded most mistakes I made.
Your body, your feelings and hormones should never supersede the power of your mind!
Advertise
Advertise your boundaries clearly and very early.
Your partner is not a dump site for your negative emotions. Communicate and work it out.
There are some relationships where only one partner is responsible for dousing every fire that flares.
In every negative emotion, you expect your partner to bail you out.
If only I had learned that before that my spouse was not a dump site, I would not have burdened them with the baggage I carried.
It could be a bad mouth, nagging, sour emotions and negative attitudes. Work it out and never allow it to mar your marriage
Assist
I should have known how to serve before I got married.
It’s easy to spot someone who is going to be great in life; they serve.
The best marriages are when husband and wife are of service to each other. Learn to shed excess power!
Adapt
Adapt to the times when being right is not important.
Forgiveness and understanding are essential.
Learn to let go of the need to always be right.
There are times when being right is not right at all.
There are times when being right is not that important, but forgiveness is the best.
I did not forgive because I thought I was right.
If God dealt with us in relationship with the sins we committed, some of us would be outcasts.
He draws us closer because of his forgiving love.
The only time I saw the necessity of forgiveness was when I needed to be pardoned of the wrong I did. But why didn’t I do that first?
Accelerate
Learning never stops. I should have known at my tender age that I have infinite capabilities and so was my spouse.
I would not have wasted my time doing some trivialities.
I would not have limited myself; neither was I going to put limit tags on other people.
