Day 9 - CMBA Blog Challenge
What counts in making a happy marriage is not so much how compatible you are, but how you deal with incompatibility.
What counts in making a happy marriage is not so much how compatible you are, but how you deal with incompatibility.
~ Leo Tolstoy
Dave and I are pretty much opposites in every way. I actually think it might be hard to find two people who are more opposite than we are.
- I'm an introvert and he's an extrovert.
- He loves people and people exhaust me.
- He's spontaneous and I'm a planner.
- He loves change and I love predictability.
- He loves soccer and I love to read.
- He loves soccer and I love to read.
- He never gets angry and I am quick to anger.
- He is a morning person and I absolutely despise the mornings.
- I have no problem stating my opinion or preference; his opinion sometimes changes based on his perception of my opinion.
- He is a morning person and I absolutely despise the mornings.
- I have no problem stating my opinion or preference; his opinion sometimes changes based on his perception of my opinion.
- I'm judgmental and Dave is accepting.
- Dave likes spicy food and I eat it because I have to.
- He's activity-oriented and I'm a homebody.
- I was a good student and he barely survived college.
- He can talk to anyone about anything, while I have a hard time initiating conversation with new people.
- He has a lot of friends, and I have a few close ones.
Initially, those differences are what drew us to each other. After we got married, it wasn't so attractive. It was just annoying. These differences quickly became major points of contention, leading us at some moments to seriously question whether or not we should even be together. The delight over our differences rapidly evolved into a desire to be married to our clone. Our way of being was the ONLY way of being. It was the ONLY RIGHT way of being. It became a war: My Way versus His Way. My Personality versus His Personality. My Priorities versus His Priorities. My Interests versus His Interests. At its core, it was essentially a War of Selfishness.
I wanted him to stop loving lots of people and just want to be around me and me alone. I wanted him to stop liking spicy foods because I didn't want to cook it. I wanted him to be a homebody because I didn't want to get out of my comfort zone and try new things. I wanted him to love predictability so that I would never feel the discomfort of change. I wanted him to be less spontaneous so that I could have more control over our life. I wanted him to stop liking mornings so that he would stop waking me up when he got up before me. All about me. All about what I wanted and about what would make me feel comfortable.
Initially, those differences are what drew us to each other. After we got married, it wasn't so attractive. It was just annoying. These differences quickly became major points of contention, leading us at some moments to seriously question whether or not we should even be together. The delight over our differences rapidly evolved into a desire to be married to our clone. Our way of being was the ONLY way of being. It was the ONLY RIGHT way of being. It became a war: My Way versus His Way. My Personality versus His Personality. My Priorities versus His Priorities. My Interests versus His Interests. At its core, it was essentially a War of Selfishness.
I wanted him to stop loving lots of people and just want to be around me and me alone. I wanted him to stop liking spicy foods because I didn't want to cook it. I wanted him to be a homebody because I didn't want to get out of my comfort zone and try new things. I wanted him to love predictability so that I would never feel the discomfort of change. I wanted him to be less spontaneous so that I could have more control over our life. I wanted him to stop liking mornings so that he would stop waking me up when he got up before me. All about me. All about what I wanted and about what would make me feel comfortable.
We've got to stop seeing our differences as a battleground. I can't totally pinpoint when our attitudes about our differences changed, but somewhere in there, we started realizing that one's strength built up the other's weakness. We stopped fighting the fact that we were different and started working with it. We stopped choosing to make every difference a battleground (is there really a point in fight over the fact that he wants me to buy the expensive soft toilet paper and I frugally want to buy only the cheapest?)And guess what? It is a much happier place to be. Tripp writes, "Unity in marriage is not the result of sameness. You will never ever be exactly the same as your spouse. God has designed that you will be married to someone different from you. Unity is, rather, the result of what husband and wife do in the face of the inevitable differences that exist in the lives of every married couple." (p.210)
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| Ignoring a difference and choosing to work with it...me choosing to dress up like a soccer player (his favorite sport) for Halloween, even though I hate sports. |
The really interesting thing is that when we stopped battling over differences, we started becoming like each other. My social circle has gotten bigger and his has gotten a little smaller. The more I cooked spicy food for him, the more I liked it. I've recently started getting up early with him in the morning and we both LOVE it; it's enabled both of us to be disciplined about having a regular devotional time. I'm more careful about expressing my opinion and he's better about being direct and honest about his opinion. When differences stop being a battleground, they can become blessings.
Sharing with: Time Warp Wife, Far Above Rubies, Growing Home, Soli Deo Gloria, NOBH
I think most couples would say they are unlike each other. My husband is the introvert; well, more so than I am. He's the spontaneous one, I'm the planner. He sounds a lot like Dave, except that he finds people exhausting. The good thing for us was that I find people occasionally exhausting as well. Our initial butting of heads came over reacting to problems. I wanted to fix them NOW, and he was content to wait and ponder. It was annoying at first, but when our kids became teenagers, it was invaluable. Your differences will be such a valuable tool when your kids get older, because sometimes, the balance is good. And on the upside, he found what he called my "intensity," very useful for when problems came up that NEEDED to be dealt with now, rather than waiting.
ReplyDeleteEnjoyed this post, Elizabeth.
Our differences either divide blessings or multiply them. Your post illustrated this perfectly. Love it! Thank you.
ReplyDeleteWe experienced this in a really uncomfortable way this weekend. And the differences we spent days arguing about were just small things. We are both trying to learn when to let things go and do them the way our spouse wants, just because that's what our spouse wants. It's such a spiritual struggle to learn to be loving rather than "right."
ReplyDeleteOh that all couples could learn there are usually multiple right ways of doing things!
ReplyDeleteI'm experiencing the same things with my husband. We're polar opposites in a number of things and I know we need to work out our differences. Thanks for sharing this. Hopefully, our differences will become blessings too like yours has come out to be.
ReplyDeleteI loved this post! My Husby and I have discovered in our many years together that we compliment each other. Two halves of a pair of shears. Together, we work well. Together, we're . . . happy.
ReplyDeleteOh, yes, my husband and I can totally relate! Having only been married for 3 months, we are definitely learning how opposite we really are. We joke that we'll create a list someday and submit it to the Guiness Book of World Records. ;) Every time we find an opposition, one of us will say "honey, add it to the list!". It's all said in a lighthearted manner, it's not seen as a bad thing. It's just who we are. He's an introvert. I love being social. He loves spicy food. My stomach kills me if I even look at it. He hates fruit. I crave fruit. He's extremely calm and laid back. I am....definitely not. I love to clean and keep things organized. His old bedroom looked like a tornado hit it. The list goes on and on. :)
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