For Marital Happiness — Love... Not Strife and Hatred!

Few are the married couples who have not passed through hard spells of quarreling and misunderstanding; but if they thought a little, they would conclude that they had not grasped the meaning of married life.

Husband and wife must watch over many things in their bond, which hangs on the edge of a deep abyss if it is not supplied with love and understanding. Marriage stumbles once again when the two face the reality of life together, with all its demands and the struggle to secure a living; and the better each understood the other before marriage, the more the obstacles before them melt away. Yet here too we cannot understand a person unless we have followed life with him, for a period of time, under one roof. Husband and wife must not surrender to despair if marriage has not fulfilled all their sweet hopes for them, and they should not stand bewildered and confused on learning that love alone does not solve serious problems.

I have concluded, after inquiry among many couples, that problems are solved easily when both partners are emotionally mature. Here are some of the causes that lead to discord and rupture. The first of them is hatred: in the relations of two persons, explosions occur whose source is haste

and weakness of will, and rancor shows itself either in silence or in gestures, and comes out at last when one partner refuses to grant the other's request. And sometimes a person finds himself unable to make his mate happy, or takes no comfort in his mate's happiness.

Here is a wife forever set against her husband: the poor man must weigh the effect of his words a thousand times before uttering them, lest she burst out screaming. She found no way out but to explain her condition to the psychologist, who found that this hostility went back to her childhood and her resentment against her father — and she was using the same weapon against her husband. When husband and wife see their life threatened by such a situation, they must look for outside help, after grasping the basic cause of the anger.

There is another cause of conflict, and that is personal incompatibility — as when one is sensitive and shows his feelings, while the other is reserved. The one displays his love and the other shrinks into himself and will not discuss his problems with his companion, considering him emotionally immature.

This is the result of the marriage of two persons unmatched in inclination and temperament, who did not study each other's natures and married under social pressure, or for fear of loneliness, or because the attraction between them was purely physical, without regard to the sound foundation of a happy marriage.

The problems arising from children and the family are important as well. If the children come between husband and wife, the situation grows acute. The solution here is that the couple's problems be discussed out of the children's hearing, and that they preserve cheer and happiness in the family atmosphere so that their children may grow up naturally.

Material security is a difficult problem. The wife may go to extremes in spending while the man holds back from her, or the two may be equally at fault. Let us imagine a husband who gives his wife five liras for her personal expenses for a whole week, while he himself does not hesitate to spend two hundred liras. Or let us think of a wife who keeps postponing a dangerous operation because she dares not tell her husband of the expense.

This too is solved if the couple takes the natural position and follows the philosophy that the money coming into the house belongs to both equally. The sum of the matter is that marital happiness depends on the love between the two. They must therefore steer clear of rancor and hatred, which lead to evil consequences. When each seeks what will make the other happy, he has attained emotional maturity and true love; and when a person loves, he lays a firm foundation for a sound mind and body and becomes fit for an ideal marriage. And if we discover a fault in ourselves and work to correct it, we shall have taken a step forward — toward happiness!