Seven years ago when the wife and I got hitched we were love drunk on each other. We were high on the excitement from the wedding, the reception, the honeymoon, the sex…you get my point. I don’t think either one of us knew exactly where we were headed the day or even the months after we were married. One thing’s for sure, life happens all around you and your marriage is at the center of it all. Between 2 children, buying a house, changing jobs and just learning more about ourselves a few things have stood out about marriage.
When you get married you instantly become a trailblazer. And even though there have been millions of trailblazers before you, not a single one has blazed the trail you’re about to travel with your new partner. You can travel with all sorts of manuals and “how-to’s” but they’ll only help in small fragments of your journey through marriage. Hands-on experience is far more effective than straight up book knowledge.
Here we go…5 things that surprised me about marriage:
1. How Much Things Will Change
Seven to eight years ago I was ready to don my top-of-the-line Marmot gear, grab my Charlet Moser ice axe and take on the north face of Torres del Paine in Chile. Now I’m a cubicle dwelling daddy blogger with an access security badge and a 4-door sedan. (<-- Hey, at least it’s a Honda)
Things change...things change all the time and sometimes we welcome the change and other times it can eat at us for a long time. Through life experiences we can determine what direction to travel and the changes we welcome into our lives. I'll be honest, I've learned that I'm way too wimpy to travel to Patagonia and take on some of fiercest climbing routes in the climbing community. I’m okay with the change away from mountain man to suburban dad.
Not only do you change, but your spouse also changes as well. The two of you will have to manage those changes in order to stay connected and on the same path. And once you become parents your life doesn’t just change, it will be turned upside down and will never be the same again. Getting married and becoming a father is an honorable and manly path to travel but some days the changes can overwhelm you leave you wondering what’s to come.
Need a GPS for marriage?
2. How Easily It Is To Get Lost
Being able to read and understand a topographical map and compass are essential skills if you want to safely navigate through uncharted territory. Okay, so nowadays you’d just wip out your Garmin Oregon™ 400t and locate your lost ass. No matter what, you still need to have a basic understanding of maps in order to safely navigate back home.
In marriage, I have yet to find a GPS that will tell me how to find my way home. It’s easy to get lost in marriage…easy to get sidetracked…easy to lose sight of your goals. We are all too often caught up in what’s for dinner, who’s on twitter, how to make more money, making friends on Facebook, how many RSS subscribers you have, when will you clean the house and worrying about change just to name a few. You get the point – It’s easy to see why, with one misstep, it’s easy to get lost in marriage.
Many times I feel like I’m standing in a forest, cold and almost out of both food and daylight trying to figure out where the hell to go next. Needing shelter and some rest I realize that I have no idea how to read a map. I wish I paid attention in Compass Reading 101 back in the day. Sometimes I’ll find the trail and start heading in the right direction. Other times I’m not so lucky and feel like the trail is gone for good.
3. How Much Work It Takes
This isn’t easy!
You have to work at your marriage…I mean; you really have to work at if you want your marriage to succeed. My initial concept of marriage was one of ease and smooth sailing. I wish someone had told me something along the lines of “…you know, anything that’s rewarding isn’t always easy and will require a ton of work”.
I thought that once we got married, the road ahead would be smooth and without many changes (see above). I soon learned that I knew nothing about marriage (see below) and that I’d have to work at it almost everyday. I’m sure you’ve all heard the phrase “Garbage In = Garbage Out”. You can’t expect to put garbage into your marriage and have it return happiness and love.
Finding the time and energy to actually work on your marriage is also an ever present challenge to couples…the wife and I not excluded. Sometimes working on your marriage feels like an uphill battle in the cold. It’s challenging to make progress uphill but it’s necessary if you ever want your marriage to improve and move forward.
4. How Much Learning Is Needed
As I’m writing this article I realize that I’ve taught myself how to modify not only my own CSS to give my blog a custom look, but also my .PHP files to bring you custom content. What I haven’t done and don’t really know where to begin is how to tweak things in my marriage. Marriage isn’t about going into some file, making a few changes and expecting things to work. I want to avoid the term “fix things” because I don’t want to sound like things are broken. Some things in marriages could just use a little tightening here and there every now and then.
As we grow up and progress through the school system we are taught everything from tying our shoes to advanced applied mathematical theory something and everything else in between. One thing we are never taught is how to “pass” marriage. We aren’t taught how to be married and how to be a great spouse. It’s up to you and your spouse to figure out what works the best and it’s tougher than I imagined.
5. Learning That It’s Not All About Me
I still, to this day, feel like selfishness is my biggest weakness in my marriage. I don’t know if it’s the man in me or if it’s general nature to feel this way. I try to relinquish control over things but it does not come natural to me. I know in marriage it’s all about “compromise” but when it comes to the everyday little things, it’s hard for me to recognize and turn my back on my own selfishness.
If you and I were lost in the mountains of south western Patagonia together, we’d probably rely on each other a great deal in order to make it out alive. You might want to go one way and I might want to go another, but together we would have to weigh the pro’s and con’s and come to a mutual decision. If our selfishness got in the way, we would more than likely suffer from starvation and exposure to the elements. We’re talking life and death decisions here…food and shelter may be one way but we decided to go another way.
Learning to be aware of and trying to control my selfishness will be a big challenge for me and probably for many other men out there. Selfishness can cause some contention on the home front and it’s harder to manage than I realized.
