marriage

Starting a marriage off right:

This week in family relations we talked about the start of marriages and how to achieve a healthy balance of involvement between families and with each other. A big part of what we discussed was wedding planning which was actually super interesting. We discussed how often times the man in a relationship takes on a smaller part of wedding planning and it is mostly done by the girl and her family. This may have become more popular and common but it isn’t necessarily the best way to do things. Planning the wedding is the first big thing that a couple does together and can set the tone for cooperation within the marriage. Instead, if couples planned and made decisions together it would help grow their love and admiration for each other and set them up as more effective partners in life. If they experience working through the financial responisbilites of the wedding and plan together how to compensate, they will be more prepared for actual financial decisions in the future. Getting to experience the color scheming together, the food, the invitations makes it so much more exciting and will improve the quality of the marriage.

Another thing we talked about was parent involvement in weddings and how much they should cost. I personally have always imagined y wedding day as the day I share with my best friend. The greatest day of my life where I celebrate the love we have and the family we are going to make together. It doesn’t need to be some huge elaborate party that exhausts us by the end of the night, but something fun that I can look forward to. Keeping it simple will also ensure that couples aren’t digging too deeply into their savings or their parents money in order to pay for a wedding. Having parents pay for it can lead to a sense of dependency and debt that can be detrimental to the marriage. The more it costs, statistically, the less chance a marriage has of working out. It makes it more of a show than something genuine. Okay-side note- I have always been a big fan of simple proposals as well. Ive never been the guy who wants to order a thousand balloons or make a public proposal. I have always imagined it as a sweet, simple moment shared by the two of us. Where I take the girl somewhere that has meaning to the both of us and proposing on one knee after rambling on a bit about how much she means to me and how our time together has been the best of my life. Doing it this way, a more meaningful way, will ensure first of all that you are marrying the right person and that your marriage will be more real.

Balancing the two families can be a struggle for many marriages. Going back and forth between two sides of a family can be tiresome and problematic. The solution is building closeness between both sides of the family. Marriage should be the combination of two families and not something that divides them. Ive always imagined big family reunions consisting of both sides of the family with lots of cousins. Building close relationships with both sides can make that a possibility. While closeness is important, financial independency is very important for this kind of relationship. You don’t want to be a burden at all on either set of parents. At that stage in life it is much better for them to be a friend and wise role model to you rather than having to take responsibility and monitor you. Marriage is an exciting step and doing the beginning right is important for a great one.