Forever After!!!!

     Now that we have talked about dating, let's move on to engagement and marriages. Now I’m not going to tell you when you should get engaged or get married. That is way above my pay grade but I am going to throw some thoughts out there for things that should be done during these two times in your life. For example, have you ever considered how your engagement period can help you to prepare for married life, and how much influence God should have in your marriage. 

After you finally have that beautiful ring, or woman life might seem to be at a standstill. You may find yourself wondering, what next? There is no simple solution to this question. One thing you should continue to do is regularly spend time together and still go on dates. Even though you already caught the perfect person, your relationship might start to wane if you never see each other or spend time together. It’s like coming home after a long semester of college and feeling like you don’t really fit in any more. People change. It’s as plain as that. Now, one of the next steps of life is to prepare for your wedding. I’m sure you have seen all of the typical stereotypes with bridezilla, or over planning, or really anything. The truth is planning a wedding is hard work. I have had 4 older siblings get married and 3 of them did it within a year and a week of each other. My poor parents were stuck planning wedding after wedding with very little time in between. I definitely didn’t see all the work put into the weddings but I remember some of it. Now think how much more stressful it will be when it is your wedding!!!! You’ve got to find a dress, tux, plan a reception, send out invitations and so much more! Now think how much more stressful this could be if it is just you doing all this work, not the two of you together. This is why it is super important to both plan the wedding. That way you are both involved in the future of your life, and you get practice making decisions together. I’m sure we’ve all seen people who when you ask them what they want they can’t make up their minds (ME). Well, that is very frustrating, and you don’t want a future of frustration. While all of this is going on, you should also have a basic outline of what you want your married life to look like.

Marriage isn't easy. You are merging two different backgrounds and cultures all into one itty bitty house. Maybe one of you really likes video games, but the other one doesn’t or one of you eats with your mouth open and the other one doesn’t. There are all sorts of things that you need to compromise on. One person can’t be right all the time and take all the things that make the other happy away. It is a practice of give and take. With video games you might compromise on only playing the video games after the homework is done and only for about 4-6 hours a week, while also being willing to give up something you do too much like maybe reading books. There are so many choices to make and it is most likely going to be easier on you if you tackle some of them before they come up and turn into an argument.

The last thing I wanted to mention is making sure  you keep God in your relationship. Building and keeping lasting relationships is really difficult. It is always easier when you have someone willing to be a mediator and help to encourage both of you to see the other side. That is what Heavenly Father can do for you. As you rely on him for strength and guidance he can give you patience and a clear perspective so you can understand your significant other in a different way.You also can make promises or covenants with God that help you both to stay on track and be strengthened during difficult times in your lives. As I said, marriage isn’t easy, but with God it can be easier! When you turn to him in prayer you can rest assured that even though life won't be easy, it will be easier without him!

The Dating Game!!!!!!

 When you hear the word date, what does it bring to your mind? Maybe it is the really awkward last date you went on, or your high school prom. The truth is, there are lots of different things that you can do on dates. The sad thing is, nowadays people don’t go on dates, the “Hang Out.” There is a big difference between going on a date and hanging out. Dating actually has a couple of different steps to them while hanging out can be playing Xbox as a group of friends.

The definition of dating has changed a lot over the years. It used to be common to go on dates with a lot of different people and try to get to know them. Now… it isn’t. In order for something to be considered  a date you need to have reached these qualifications. It needs to be planned, paid for, and paired off. It is important that every party knows what is happening on the date, or you may be overdressed, or under-dressed. Also, when you have a specific idea for your date you are more comfortable and not as likely to run into awkward situations. This has definitely happened to me. I didn’t know what we were doing until my date showed up. Let me just say, this was the most awkward experience of my entire life! I couldn’t even look at the guy for a day or two after because I was stuck on the date. Oftentimes when someone pays for the date, it is a guy. It doesn’t always have to be that way though. It should be that whoever does the asking, pays for the date. Now it does seem quite a daunting task to pay for all aspects of a date, but the truth is it doesn’t need to be expensive. You don’t have to go on a day date with fancy restaurants, you don’t have to pay $40 to get into an escape room or something else. It could be as simple as playing laser tag and spending $8, or even just covering the gas it takes to get to a hike. It could even be as simple as McDonald's. Sometimes the best dates are the ones that don’t cost anything. The last step is paired off. This may seem super simple but is crucial. If you are on a group date but never talk to your date, how can you say you got to know him or her. You can’t!!!! You don’t have to only talk to your date, but you should spend time getting to know your date. 

Something else that is new with relationships and dating in the world we currently live in deals with the Relationship Attachment Model. This is a model scientists came up with that shows the ideal way of how we form relationships with people. It comes in 5 steps; know, trust, rely, commit, and touch. First, we have step of know, once you know someone you can trust them because you know how they will treat you, and just who they are as a person. Then you can start to rely on them to help you with problems, and with life in general. Then commit, and after you are committed to the person comes trust. It is kinda like a step ladder down into your relationship. Nowadays we don’t know someone very well, and immediately turn to trust, then rely, commit, and touch. This messes the whole system up sadly, and then you grow and become better. 

Now, you know some ways to improve your dating life, don’t be afraid to go on dates with many people. It is super important to get to know lots of different people. Go on simple dates, don’t just hang out, and make sure you really know someone before you start to trust them with every intimate detail of your life. This might just help you avoid roadblocks in life like so many other people throughout the world. Well, talk to you later!!!!!

What are we made up of?

 There are many things going on in today’s society that people either agree with or they don’t. There are many delicate topics people can discuss and get angry about or argue. My topic for today definitely is one of those. I am not the most eloquent or good at phrasing my thoughts, but I do not mean to cause offence with any of the things I voice tonight. These were things I learned in my class and through my own experiences in life. Tonight I am talking about Gender and how that affects each and every one of us in different ways. We tend to be very stereotypical with the things we believe are male and female tendencies and because of this we can cause offense and suffering where there does not need to be any. We are all different from each other for a reason and life would be very boring if we were all named Karen and had brown hair, green eyes, were 6’2” and any other things that can be used to describe the human body. 

I am going to start by mentioning some of the things that are considered female in today’s society. Normally women are more socially oriented. They desire to have connections with other people and will go out of their way to make those connections happen. Have you ever seen a woman run across the room squealing with excitement as they see an old friend? I’m gonna be honest… I've definitely done that. Women also tend to be more prone to things like cyberbullying and hurting someone emotionally. This shouldn’t happen but is definitely something I have seen in my own life. You don’t need to be punched in order for something to hurt and make you cry. One last thing I am going to share, women normally will use landmarks in order to give directions. I can tell you exactly how to get to my house using trees, buildings, dirt roads etc, but I can’t tell you how to get there with directions like north, south, 1 mile. Or ½ mile. It just doesn’t work. A lot of other women are similar to me in this way.

Now that we have talked about the woman, let's compare things that we generally associate with men. In contrast to women being social, men normally are very physical. They like to tear things apart and put them back together. They also really enjoy doing sports, or building something from scratch.  Men also tend to be more likely to be physically violent. Often you will hear stories of young men who got into a fight at school and punched each other or something like that. While this may seem like a bad quality, there definitely is some good that comes from it. Lastly men are normally really good telling you how to get somewhere saying things like, “Go 5 miles to the Northeast and then turn left. Continue like that for 10 minutes and the house will be on your right. This is good. Lots of people’s minds process things like this and it is very precise and helpful.

Now as I said earlier, these are all general things that people assume belong to men and women personalities. However, I am sure we all know people where this is different. In my life, my father is one. As I mentioned before, people look to the women to be social, but my dad will talk to more people than my mom and I combined in one day. It is very impressive and slightly shocking. Whenever we go to a track meet, it is rare to see my father because he is off visiting with all of his track buddies. He knows so many people and will spend all day with them. My mom on the other hand tends to stick back and let others come to her. I do this as well. The people who we tend to view as different and we kinda ostracize them. This is terrible, but hopefully as we all work together that bullying will be stopped.

As I said in the beginning. We are all built unique with different perspectives and talents to share with each other. If we lock them up then we will never see some of the blessings available to each and every one of us.

Money. What is the affect of it?

Have you ever stopped to consider the effects your monetary status has on your family? It truly is quite interesting to come to understand. It isn’t necessarily better to have a ton of money, but it also isn’t wonderful to be poor. In each circumstance you have different trials that come your way. For today’s example we are going to look a little more in depth to see what these issues are!

First, if you are very wealthy, it seems like a dream. You always want to win the lottery big so you can have a lot of money but sometimes this can be more of a curse than a blessing. When you have the money to go anywhere you want and do anything you want it isn’t always good for your relationships with your families. It has been observed that a lot of the well off families hire Nanny’s to take care of their children while they work or go have fun around town. This seems really nice. You get to enjoy your time around town without the trials of crying or screaming children, but what effect does this really have on your kids. Think back to your childhood. Who was your childhood. Who was your favorite person to be around. In my case it was definitely my mother. My siblings still tell stories of my crying if my mom left the room and frantically trying to find her. She would have just left to change the laundry or get some food out of our storeroom but I panicked every time. This was because mom was my best friend. She kissed my scratches better and always made me laugh and smile. She was around me constantly. If you are never around your children, who will they turn to for comfort when they are sad? Most often it is the Nanny, or a teacher. This is because the kids are comfortable with them. They know they will be taken care of and protected from the monsters under their beds. This puts strain on your relationship, and you don’t know what to do. The best thing is to make sure you are a part of their lives. Put away some of the distractions that interrupt family time and focus on them. Watch them grow up and change. There also are good things that come from having money. Your kids will have amazing opportunities and schooling which will help with their life when they move out.

Now, what happens when you are in the bottom of the class with money? Honestly, it can be pretty similar to those with lots of money with a few changes. The parents have to work and so they don’t get to spend very much time with their children. The kids also look out to others for feelings of affection and help, but it often is other kids going through situations similar to theirs and they lose some respect for their parents. This isn’t intentional but they are oftentimes basically raising themselves at home alone and don’t feel like they need any help. They also will often run into problems with their education. They won’t have the means to go to college and are generally stuck with a high school diploma as the highest amount of schooling they will get. It can be pretty frustrating to feel stuck like this. They often will follow the path that their parents made despite desires to progress and have a better life.



These examples I gave are generalizations. They aren’t necessarily true for each family because as we all know each family situation is unique with unique individuals. This is the basic pattern for both situations but of course will change due to each circumstance.

Rules! Why are they there?

 During my studies this week I have pondered a lot on the families and the different things that can affect them. For example, did you know that basically everything we do is shaped by the interactions we have with people? I didn’t until last Monday. This is something called symbolic interaction. Things as simple as a hug, or how we speak or even the facial expressions we use are symbolic and can often be misread. For example, has someone in your family ever said or done something that makes you really mad, but you find out later that wasn’t what they meant. I have. One distinct memory I have with this deals with my younger sister. We played basketball together and one day I was feeling targeted by her and her friends. I am not a saint and I kinda threw a fit. I yelled at her for quite a while and she was so confused. Later my parents talked to me and helped me understand the situation better. Let's just say that the situation got way out of hand. Now that I look back on it I can see how I completely misinterpreted everything my Sister did that day, but it taught me a very useful lesson.

This is supported by the conflict theory which states that if you have 2 intelligent capable individuals you will eventually have conflict. Conflict is natural and can happen in many different ways. It can all end very friendly or it can end up with screaming and throwing things. If you try to resolve your conflicts with others in the way that I did, it isn’t a very pretty sight complete with tears, anger and so much more. In order for it to end more amiably you should have a good way to resolve the issue. There are many things you can do for this, talking to the other person is huge, you can try to observe what they are doing and change your mindset or of course run away from the whole situation. Just kidding, do not do that last one. In many instances if you talk to the other person after you have given yourself some time to not be so heated you will be able to see the situation from their side and not be so angry. Being able to have a conversation with someone without anger is often the best way to resolve conflict. The other option I mentioned is to try and observe the other individual. Oftentimes if you watch them long enough you will understand how they work and it will help you to look back through your memories and resolve the issue. I know it has helped me, and while it may not look like the best solution, when you add it to the first solution they become splendid!

The last thing that I would like to touch base on deals with family therapy. Have been to a family therapy session? I sure haven’t but I recently practiced what it would be like to be in a family therapy session. The lessons I took from this were incredible!!!! Did you know that often when there are issues in the family it deals with how close each individual is? Well, it does. There are different boundaries we can build around us and the people we associate with. These boundaries are called rigid, open, clear. When you have rigid boundaries you don’t really talk or have any sort of intimate conversation. It is kinda like you have built a brick wall between the two of you and is very hard to get through.  Open boundaries means that you are close and share lots of things with each other, but you still have your secrets. Wow! You don’t have to tell someone everything in order to be close to them. Isn’t it incredible! Clear boundaries mean you basically have no boundary. You spend so much time together and share everything. While these can all be good in their own ways it is always better to have more open boundaries. When this is the case you are more likely to understand the symbolism of why someone does something without being annoyed because you can repeat what is going on in their head to make that decision. In the mock therapy session I participated in, the mother and daughter were super close and were best friends. The poor father wanted to be close to them as well but was working very hard in order to provide for his family. He wanted to have a good relationship with his daughter but just didn’t know how to develop it. The therapist helped with this by focusing on their similarities and making bridges over the walls. This helped to resolve the problem and they were able to go on with their lives paying more attention to each other's needs. This is essential because family relationships can guide you in all that you do and provide a cushion of protection during your hard times. I hope this helps you in your focus on your family this week. See you next time!