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[Relationships] Three things that aren’t the end of the world.

Relationships. are. a. mess.

They’re a mess because they can be fun and hard and fulfilling and devastating and a privilege and torture, depending. They’re a mess because they can turn us into the best or worst versions of ourselves. (Maybe we are a mess?) They can make a day, a month, a year — or break it. They can inspire us to shout “I LOVE MY LIFE!” or to pout like whatever has happened in them is the end of the world.

But is it really?

Probably not, and particularly not when what has happened is as follows:

1. You were moody, boring, tired, or having a bad hair day the last time you talked to or saw him or her. If he or she is really marriage material and thinks you are, too, he or she will get over it. #justsayin.

2. He or she doesn’t intuitively meet your expectations. I’ve blogged before about the time a guy I dated ended a phone call with me by saying “I’ll call ya later.” He never did. And it irked me. He handed me an expectation that he didn’t fulfill. I was hesitant at first the next day to bring up how bothered by it I was because I worried I would come across as needy. But there’s a difference between being needy and communicating a need. It is not the end of the world if the guy or girl you date (or marry!) doesn’t intuitively meet your expectations because the guys and girls you date (or marry!) aren’t mind readers. If you expect somebody to meet all your expectations but you are unwilling to express your expectations, your relationship is, how shall we say… doomed. Dealing with unmet expectations is part of discerning a marriage with someone. It’s part of deciding whether there are some expectations somebody ought to meet intuitively. An unmet expectation is an opportunity to communicate with the person you date (and to learn how good he or she is at listening).

3. He or she’s just not that into you. Unrequited interest is a bummer, but it isn’t the end of the world. It isn’t the end of the world because “if our God is for us, then who could ever stop us?” — if you’re supposed to end up with somebody, you will, regardless of whether the interest is initially mutual. If you don’t end up with somebody you like, it isn’t the end of the world, either. A wise friend of mine reminded me once: if you think he or she is awesome (and he or she turns out to be some guy or girl you’re not even gonna marry), your actual future spouse will be even more awesome. #Legit.

What else isn’t the end of the world?

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Not all men are bullets.

A phone call is jarring when in it, your friend divulges the discovery she made of her husband’s infidelity. Of her boyfriend’s big lie. Of her crush’s double life. Or of his wife.
Whatever the breach of trust, the result — at first, at least — is devastating. One person’s choice pulls the path out from under somebody else, somebody who didn’t sign up for this. Somebody who promised to be true to him even in bad times after he promised infidelity would never be the source of them.Until it was.

“Until death,” as it turns out, is often code for “until I change my mind” — fidelity often only upheld when not inconvenient. She picks him as husband and intertwines her world with his, but has to peg him, when he leaves her, as a bullet.

You really dodged a bullet.

Fidelity is too often breached, too treated as impossible. I’ve received too many jarring phone calls.This isn’t a blame game. Relationships are systemic, and most marriages that end probably shouldn’t have started. But I’ve met enough women who are so disheartened by the men who used to walk life beside them to share this with all men on women’s behalf:

 
Some of us are giving up on you.Which doesn’t mean good single men will be single forever. It means women need good single men now more than ever.

We need you to step up and stand out.

To teach your brothers (biological or otherwise) how to make good choices.

To teach them to treat women first as sisters.

We need our male friends and our brothers and our dads to do what they say they are going to do. We need to meet men who use forethought before they pursue us, who pursue God before they pursue us. We need men whose choices inspire us to say “they do exist” (and not “is this some kind of a joke?”).

We need to know that men exist who want to love a woman like Christ loves the church. Who know love is a choice.

We need to know that not all men are bullets.

Because I know you aren’t, but I know a lot of ladies who need good men to prove it.

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Why I write what I write.

I sit tonight at a probably 10′ long table alone, along a wall in Starbucks, because when I got here, it was the only available table close to an outlet. I haven’t plugged my computer in yet, distracted so far by the patrons to my right — a stepmother and adult stepdaughters, who sip seasonal beverages and discuss the family’s patriarch.

Who they suspect is involved in infidelity.

Who has been unfaithful before.

Who isn’t happy.

“I can’t say I’m in it for the long haul,” stepmother warned. Stepdaughters understood. I understand, too.

This — a real life representation of relationships at nearly their worst (It could be worse.) — hurts my heart. And my soul. And my head.

This is why I write what I write: Not solely because marriages disintegrate, but because marriages still start that are going to disintegrate. Because marriages that are going to disintegrate don’t actually have to start. I write what I write because “marriage is the new ‘going steady'” and isn’t designed to be. I write what I write because love is far greater than our culture says it is, and somebody has to say it.

When I write it is with the hope and prayer that readers who are married receive whatever they need to start to rebuild or reinforce a marriage’s foundation; with the hope and prayer that readers who are single and mingling receive what they need to discern when to stop or start a relationship; with the hope and prayer that readers who discern marriage don’t do it if disintegration is likely, or an option; with the hope and prayer that readers who are single for good will know it doesn’t mean life for them is loveless.

And your prayers while I write are appreciated.

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Calling the case for early marriage into question: Part 2 of 2.

In a post last week, I called the case for early marriage into question. One proponent of early marriage – Mark Regnerus – proposed in a 2009 Christianity Today column that early marriage is ideal because marriage is formative. I agree that marriage is formative, but I do not believe we postpone formation by postponing marriage.

Because marriage might mature us is not the sole reason proponents of marrying young encourage it. Another reason is sex.

“Many (young adults) plan to marry in their mid-20s. Yet waiting for sex until then feels far too long to most of them,” Regnerus wrote. “…when people wait until their mid-to-late 20s to marry, it is unreasonable to expect them to refrain from sex. It’s battling our Creator’s reproductive designs.”

Unreasonable? I beg to differ. Here’s why:

None of us are spared God’s “reproductive designs,” but not all of us are going to get married. Whether we marry isn’t always within our control, but what we can control is ourselves. To push a person toward early marriage in order to avoid experiencing the sexual urge outside it is to tell a person dominion over our urges isn’t worth it or possible (and for a person who believes it’s impossible, it will be). A person who says it creates and perpetuates, then, the very reason he or she says we ought to marry early.

And that, I think, is unreasonable.

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Click here to read part 1 of this post.

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Calling the case for early marriage into question: Part 1 of 2.

I crack me up as I car-shop.

I crack me up because I like the coupe but I think the sedan is smarter. This is because my current car has been my car for 10 years, which implies my next car could be my car for 10 years, too.

If it is, I imagine (hope, pray, doubt, depending on the day) I’ll be single when I sign the title and married by the time I trade it in. Which implies I feasibly could have a kid while my next car is my car, and it’s harder to get a kid in and out of a coupe.

This exposes two truths: First, that I think a lot, and second, that I didn’t marry early. I am 27 and single with no obvious prospects. Depending on a person’s school of thought, how old I’ll be before I’m married, if I do marry, is one of the following: a good idea or not as good an idea as early marriage.

Lately – mostly online – I have encountered a couple of people who aren’t in the good idea camp. On the side of proponents of early marriage has been Mark Regnerus, who made a case for early marriage in popular articles in Christianity Today and the Washington Post in 2009.

His point is that marriage is designed to be formative as opposed to an institution into which you enter once you you are “fully formed.” Secondary to that point is this one: “A key developmental institution for men – marriage – is the very thing being postponed, thus perpetuating their adolescence.” Parents of young adults, he implied, encourage their kids to finish school first. Attain financial independence. Grow up, then get married.

In other words, Regnerus said, people – particularly men – mature by being married. To postpone marriage to the part of life post-age 25, then, is to prolong immaturity. If he is right, we create a catch 22; we wait to get married until after we’ve attained what we’re supposed to attain by being married.

But I’m not convinced that’s what we’re actually doing, or that we are disadvantaged by marrying later. Here’s why:

We don’t necessarily choose not to marry young. I am not single at 27 because I decided not to marry young. I’m single at 27 because I didn’t happen to marry young. I, like Regnerus, believe marriage is designed to be formative. But I do not believe we postpone formation by postponing marriage. Marriage is formative, but so are our families of origin, our educations and lines of work, our religious affiliations, circles of friends, communities, and life experiences. Marrying early does not mean marriage alone will form us. Marrying late does not mean we’re not going to grow.

We don’t completely control how mature we are. Rumor at work has it that the latest research says the male brain isn’t done developing until the male turns 29. For females, it’s 24 or 25. Marriage doesn’t make a prefrontal cortex grow faster. Regardless of by what we’re being formed (marriage, school, friends, or all three), if we haven’t hit our mid-to-late 20s, we generally aren’t our best at solving problems, foreseeing consequences, creating strategies, or knowing what to do with intense emotions. It is not impossible for a marriage to last when the wedding happens before the bride’s and groom’s brains are done. But it doesn’t hurt to start a marriage with a fully developed one.

How mature we are before we get married might affect how receptive we are to formation. A proponent of early marriage once told me it’s easier to marry early and establish one life than it is to marry late and merge two established lives. While each is different from the other, both strike me as difficult and formative. Both require us to solve problems, foresee consequences, create strategies, and experience intense emotions. We can do this when we’re young, but we can do it better when we’re older. We also probably expect it when we’re older, more than we do when we’re young, perhaps rendering us more receptive to working through it.

“How old we are when we marry” and “how prepared for marriage we are” are not synonymous. People exist my age and older who objectively are not ready for marriage. There are people younger than I who probably are. This means age is probably not as relevant to this conversation as we traditionally have made it, which is part of why I’m not opposed to early marriage. What I do oppose is this: pitying the people who push 30 (and beyond) and aren’t married, putting early marriage on a pedestal, and encouraging it widely without preparing young people for marriage — which our culture won’t do and our churches generally haven’t done enough.

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Click here to read what Mark Regnerus wrote about early marriage. Part 2 of this post will appear on the blog on July 28.