Love or... not?

Alright so I had fully planned on saving this post as a joint thing with a couple of my friends from college. I still REALLY want to do that but this subject has come up again a LOT and it's time I touch on it even a little bit.

It's no secret I'm a newlywed. 6 months into my marriage and I love my husband more every single day.

Do we fight? Of course! It would be unhealthy if we didn't!
Do we disagree? Honestly, we disagree MORE than we fight! lol
Do we have our problems? YES!

Do we let that get between us? NO.

If you think this is one of those marriage advice blog posts you are one of the few people that don't know me who read this. Keep reading, I promise it wont be that bad!

So I'm a newlywed, what do I know about seasoned, weathered marriages? A little more than you may think. I'm a proud people watcher, I'm also a proud learner from my own mistakes as well as the mistakes of others.

My dad used to say "There are too many mistakes to make in this life to make them all yourself. Learn from the mistakes of others as well as your own." I have taken that and run with it.

There is more. I went to a Christian University. Yeah, I know what some of you are thinking, but it was required that we take Marriage & Family. I learned a lot from that course.

But in my short time as a married person I've learned a lot more about love than I could ever imagine.

That brings me to this point, way too many people are getting divorced because they "fell out of love."

Love is not a cloud, or a staircase you can fall from. Love is LOVE. It's an action and a CHOICE.

Do you wake up one morning and say "well it's time for a divorce, I don't love my spouse anymore?" If so... there is a problem here.

What about the marriage vows? In sickness and health? Till Death do us part? Do ANY of these ring a bell? What do they mean?

They mean that it is a PREREQUISITE of marriage to love your spouse no matter what.

Okay, things happen, cheating, abuse... things that shouldn't happen. THOSE THINGS ARENT LOVE! Those things break the marriage vow as much as falling out of love does. Those things are also a whole lot harder to fix, since love IS a choice.

Are there times I want to yell and scream and just go off on my husband? If there wasn't I wouldn't be human. But what do I do instead? I choose to calmly tell him how I'm feeling, and we sit down and talk it out. There is closure and we are fine. I don't stop loving him, because we just fixed the issue.

Know what else I do? Every day I wake up and say "What kind thing can I do to show my husband how much I love him?" It could be something as simple as the dishes, cleaning a room in the house, making him a yummy meal or dessert (my husband likes to fix dinner), I may set up his favorite video game as I hear him come home or attack him with nerf darts. One time I had a candle lit dinner waiting for him, the house spotless, started throwing nerf darts at him when he came in, and had music playing so we could just dance.

And because I make these efforts, so does he. He'll leave me my favorite candy bar with a note where I can see it, he started getting things that I enjoy, as presents for the bad days, just to cheer me up. I was sad over the death of my grandma and he put in Ugly Betty (her favorite show) and watched it with me for like 4 hours!!

We choose to SHOW love every day and because of that we continue to love with a fierce awesomeness.

Please don't fall for the myth that falling out of love is way out of marriage. Sure it is, but is it a good idea?

Trials happen, trouble is around every corner, but you got married, you CHOSE to love that person, keep choosing it!

I hate hearing about divorce but I'm not going to say it shouldn't ever happen. I have known people that were abused for years, and they stayed with the person but it never got better, it only got worse and then they finally got that divorce. It was the best option at that point.

Even with cheating, that's a LACK OF RESPECT for your spouse.

There needs to be two BIG things in a marriage.

LOVE and RESPECT
With that love and respect there should be other big things.
Love and Respect should have communication, trust, kindness, understanding and PATIENCE. (yes faithfulness falls under the trust thing. To have trust there needs to be faithfulness)

There is a biblical scripture. It's said at many weddings and for the Christians reading this I will post it as a reminder but for the non-Christians. 

The recipe that I just gave you is a great thing for a healthy marriage. That being said... sit down with your spouse and make a list like the one above, of the qualities and values that are important to you in a marriage.


Okay so maybe there WAS a little advice. But I wanted this to be more about what I HOPE to see.

I want to see more marriages last. I want others to realize that love is a choice, that falling out of love is just a bad reason for divorce. It just is. If people keep up at this rate, and divorce every time they fall out of love.... pretty soon we'll ALL know 10-12+ friends and family that have been divorced 5+ times just because they fell out of love.

Give love time to grow, because it WILL.

This is love:

1 Corinthians 13
New American Standard Bible (NASB)

The Excellence of Love

13 If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. ² If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. ³ And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body ^[a]to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.

⁴ Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, ⁵ does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, ⁶ does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; ^7 [b]bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
⁸ Love never fails; but if there are gifts of ^[c]prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away. ⁹ For we know in part and we prophesy in part; ¹⁰ but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away. ¹¹ When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I ^[d]became a man, I did away with childish things. ¹² For now we see in a mirror ^[e]dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. ¹³ But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the ^[f]greatest of these is love.
^From BibleGateway

Hopefully my friends and I can join together. They have both been married longer than me so I'd like to get their takes on this all too important subject as well!