I have been married for a month now and it has been an incredible experience so far. I have learned so much about my husband as well as myself. We have learned how to better communicate, love, and to help each other with whatever we need help with. I'd say the most important thing in a marriage is communication. Without communication, it's really hard to know what your significant other needs. He/she may be holding something in that they need to tell you and if you don't give them a reason to trust you by communicating with you, then you're going to have a hard time knowing what he/she needs. Marriage can be an amazing thing, you just need to make sure your significant other is happy so that you can be happy.
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Lately we've been learning about parenting and the different ways that you can parent your children. First of all before i go into any detail, I want to express that it CAN be so hard to parent. I've never been a parent before but i remember my parents and other people's parents who have struggled with parenting and it can be hard. But parenting means a little more than knowing how to discipline your kids. If you parent your children in a way that will help your family become better, then you will be just fine. Having children can help you to draw closer together as a couple, but it doesn't just happen accidentally. You really have to work at making your parenting skills better and get to your child's level. This graph to the right are different types of parenting that is done and what type of child comes with this type of parenting. First: We have the Authoritarian Parent. This type of parent is very control oriented. These kinds of parents will sometimes Dis courage their children or manipulate them. This leads to a passive child. A passive child is just kind of there. He/She starts to feel unimportant. Second: We have the permissive parent. This type of parent is the type to neglect their child. There is little effort, direction. The parent acts more like a buddy instead of a guide. This leads to a rebellious child. This type of child will be the type to lash out, or not listen to the rules because there are no set rules. Third: We have the Authoritative parent. This type of parent is the kind who is firm and friendly. We call it "Long-game." There is consistency in the home. This type of parenting leads to a cooperative child. When there are boundaries in the home, the child is going to be more willing to listen. The child will eventually understand that you care as a parent. A lot of people think that communication is only about talking to each other and not SAYING much, but communication can mean a lot of different things. Communication can also happen through actions, thoughts, and just the way that you treat people in general. Communication is a great tool in any relationship. My family relations teacher talked about communication being like a man who's wife is drowning under water while scuba diving. He sees her not being able to breathe. So the first reaction he does is take off his oxygen and put it on her mouth so she can breathe. This relates to communication because if you think about it, once someone understands you, (as my teacher put it), you get that breath of fresh air, and it's a relief to know that someone understands you. They allow you to breath. To simply listen to the person makes the situation a lot easier and it helps both of you to relax and to just breathe. Love can only begin to grow as long as you allow it to. And that means to be willing to understand the other person. Listen to them. Be their friend, their councilor, and guide. Another important thing that we talked about in class was the phrase we always hear at weddings. "Don't go to bed mad." I truly believe that this phrase is so important. There was a question asked about this little phrase. The question was, "What if we can't come up with a compromise before bed?" My teacher explained first of all, the word compromise isn't really a good thing to do when you're trying to deal with a negative situation. The word compromise means that you both have come up with a good enough reason for what is going on. First of all, that's not really a good thing to do in a relationship because what you want to do is come up with a logical explanation that both of you agree on, something that will keep the relationship strong. You don't ever want to come up with just good enough. After he explained this, he said, "You don't have to go to bed with the situation delt with, just go to bed still loving each other. Stop being mad. It will work out eventually." To me I feel like that's definitely a mental thing. We really have to be strong together to keep a relation ship strong.
Another thing that we talked about that would help to communicate better is to involve Heavenly Father. Council with him as a couple. That's what love is all about because God comes first in all relationships. He is what helped you to come together in the first place. I know that if you involve Heavenly Father with your needs in a relationship, it will remain strong. :-) As most of you know, families aren't always going to be peaches and cream. There are going to be things that upset a family member. In class we've been talking about the definition of a crisis, and many other things. But I want to talk about this first. Many people seem to think that a crisis is always something that's crazy and impossible to make better. But a crisis can be something as small as a family member breaking his/her leg
There are many ways that we can handle a crisis whether it be something as mild as a broken leg or something like somebody breaking their leg. The first thing we need to ask ourselves is "will my reaction to this problem make the situation better or worse? Things like this are definitely situations that we need to keep under control One big reason for families breaking apart is because they don't handle the situation in a way that will pull them closer. One important thing we should also remember while going through a crisis is that turning to our Heavenly Father is never a bad idea. He is always going to be there for us no matter what. He loves us, and will always be there for us. The second thing I would like to talk about is stress. We are definitely going to have problems that cause us to stress out. It could be really anything that causes us to stress. A lot of people seem to think that stress is a bad thing. But what I found to be true is that stress is actually a good thing to have sometimes. Of course not always but if we don't have stress in our lives, how do we manage to get better at the things that we do stress over. An example I have of this, is being in college. There are five classes that I have to make sure I keep my grades up in, and it is so stressful sometimes. But if I didn't stress out about these things, how would I be able to keep or get my grades up. Another example, for a family situation would be when a couple is fighting. If the spouse isn't worried about what his/her spouse is going to do, how would that spouse be able to fix what he/she did wrong if he/she isn't worried about what the other person thinks or feels? Stress can be a good thing but it's also good to know that we can do things to keep stress at a minimum. The best thing we can do to solve our family crisis or coping with stress is to simply keep loving. Without that, there's nothing, And also, don't be afraid to turn to God. He's there because He loves you. If you don't have God in your life, how can you manage to love? Families are forever and they need to be cherished not forgotten. Last weeks class, we talked about marital intimacy and how we should involve it the right way into our lives. Marital intimacy is something that should be sacred, and between you and your spouse. It can be a way to connect your love towards each other. Our Heavenly Father made this possible for us so that we could create beautiful families.
We also talked about how we can make pregnancy a better experience for both spouses. When women go through such experiences, they go through a lot of pain, and discomfort. Often, pregnant women get depressed and don't even want to be touched. A way that the guy could make this better for his wife would be to help her with things around the house such as cleaning, and when she doesn't want to be touched, don't push it on her. But the problem with this is that when a mans wife doesn't want any form of affection, the guy will sometimes start to feel unwanted. It's not that he's being selfish, it's just a natural thing that he would feel. He doesn't get to feel how the woman feels so he wouldn't be able to completely understand. The way that the wife could help this is to simply give the guy a kiss or touch his hand affectionately letting him know that she still loves him. :) In family relations, we've been talking about what culture are all cultures equally valid? Well first off, we need to talk about what the meaning of the word valid. Basically it means to be equal, at least in this sense. In today's world, I don't think that culture is valid. There are a of families who have a culture where they celebrate premarital sex, immoral things. etc. A lot of cultures these days celebrate things that are completely opposite of what the world SHOULD be portraying. I think that culture is important but as long as it's culture that isn't offensive to others. I think that culture is a very important aspect on life but it shouldn't be portrayed as something that draws away from the meaning of family. It should be something that draws the family closer together. Culture is an amazing part of life if done properly. Now i'm not saying that there is a proper way to celebrate your family life or anything like that. But if you are using culture as a way of drawing all of the negative things in life toward you, It's not going to make you or your family happy. As a matter of fact, family shouldn't be just a happy matter, it should be a joyful. This last week we've been talking about how we can prepare for marriage. We also have been talking about what the difference between dating and courtship is, etc. A lot of people in this generation get these mixed up. First off I would like to start with dating. Dating is a planned activity with the opposite sex. Usually the guy takes charge of this. If it's payed for, and planned then it's a date. When people these days talk about their significant other, they always say "yes, we are dating." But that's not the case. It's completely different. Is what you should be saying is "We are in a courtship." But that's not the way we speak anymore. Our language has been changed throughout the generations. It's just the same with the LDS church. People say that we get married in the temple. But we don't we get sealed in the temple. It's different because when we get sealed, we don't just have an Earthly marriage, it's eternal. It seals us to our spouse. The next thing we talked about was knowing how to date and who to date. First of all, you should never rush into a relationship. It will not make a successful marriage. When you are picking and choosing who you want to marriage, yes you want to have similarities but you also want to have differences as well. If you were exactly the same, what would you be able to teach each other. How could you help one another if you're already both alike. Choosing who you marry is a big part of your life. Choose wisely! :) Lately in class we have been talking about how Marriage between a man and a woman is essential to not only what should be portrayed here but it's also a part of our Heavenly fathers plan for us. His plan wasn't for us to be sexually attracted to our same sex. How do you have children if you are in that mind set and you are with the same gender? The answer is: There's no way it's possible. I don't judge people who are attracted to the same sex but what I believe is that marriage should stay between a man and a woman. God put us on this Earth for a certain reason. And if we don't follow that plan, then there's no way that we could be with Him again.
How is family forever? That beautiful temple above this is not just a temple. It's a sacred castle for people who want to be with their family for eternity. Heavenly Father wanted us to have eternal families from the very beginning. It's the only way to truly be happy. Why only have the people you love be with you for a short period of time here on Earth? Have them for eternity :)
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