I read on this board a lot, and the pattern I notice in the stories is that it takes an affair for the couple to start practicing the marriage builders principles. I also notice that in our society when somebody has a dream to accomplish something, they will work for it and are willing to pay the price. However, when it comes to marriage these same people expect the relationship just to happen with no effort. Thus, here are my questions:
1. Why don't most married couples buy into the principles of marriage builders from the start before an affair even comes to mind?
2. Why is there such a reluctance amond couples who are dating to apply these principles?
3. If you have been affected by an affair, then this question is for you. If, before the issue of the affair, your spouse brought up the marriage builders principles, would you have been open to implementing them?
4. Why does our society expect to work hard for professional success, but not for marital success?
Thank you.

MB Principles are not taught or understood. I sure never heard of them till I came here.


Because they have never heard of them.

Folks who are dating generally do them instinctively which is why they fell in love.


Probably not unless I fully understood what I do now.


Well for some reason, they expect when you are in love it all comes naturally.

So why are you here anyway?

In answer to number 3:

If, for one moment, my husband had indicated that he was even remotely considering having sex with another woman, I would have moved heaven and earth to change our marriage.

I would have painted myself purple, stood upside-down naked in Times Square, and fed peanuts to mice on parade if that's what he needed to meet his emotional needs and if it would have made our marriage improve.


Of course, he NEVER spoke a single word about having any problem whatsoever with our marriage.

He NEVER said anything about a desire for different sexual experiences.

He NEVER said anything about being unhappy in the marriage. He still insists he was NOT UNHAPPY IN THE MARRIAGE, but just wanted some extracurricular sex.


Sometimes, people are just stupid. In my case, my H had a sudden spasm of stupidity hit his brain.


And his pants.



So, I think that given the information prior to the event, sure, we would have utilized it. But, then again, given the capacity of some people to exercise the least amount of integrity possible at a given point in time, we might not have after all.

SB

i would not have given it the time of day all those years ago when i got married because, of course, i knew everything, more than my parents and of course more than marriage experts. I WAS YOUNG & FOOLISH

as said by School Bus, would have moved a mountain and yes learned MB if i had known what was in store

but we take our marriage for granted, we take our spouse for granted
i always made sure the kids were happy and well cared for, crap even the dogs were on my radar as far as their well being

in my world....MB should be a mandatory course taken every 5 years and if it was gov't subsidided the country would still be ahead since i believe there would be less of a need for social programs if people stayed married...happily of course!

I absolutely would have been receptive to the principles. I was starving for communication and intimacy in both my marriages. Both wives were conflict avoiders and did the silent treatment big time. There was no breaking through as they had disdain for counseling.

The MB principles were an ODDITY to me. The first time I heard about the emotional need of "sexual fulfillment" I BURST OUT LAUGHING and could not stop laughing because I had never heard a man actually ADMIT he was such a shallow PERV! The notion of treating men with respect was completely foreign to me.

So, for me, I would not have listened because the concepts seemed NUTS to me. The only reason I accepted them is because the more I understood, the more amazed I was at how LOGICAL they were. They made perfect sense.

Not to thread-jack, but a question for Mel.

What was the exact turning point for you?? The "AHA!moment" ?

KIR, back in 2003-2004 my DH bought a motorcycle and asked me to go with him on rides. I didn't really want to but I did. To my amazement, my DH became super warm and passionate once I started riding with him. He was more passionate than I ever imagined he could be. I figured out that his top EN must be RC and I was meeting that need in the way he liked best. [he had not identified this as his top need previously]

Before that, I had read the books and was reading on this site, but people mostly didn't even talk about the MB concepts here in a way that made any sense to me. In fact, many of the so called "old timers" never talked about it. I don't even know if they possessed a MB book.

It was just little things like this that had a huge impact that showed me that Dr Harley really knew what he was talking about. The man is a genius, IMO.

That's really neat, Mel! I recently noticed that Flick and Lil are bonding over motorbikes too!

Maybe I should get H a motorbike for Christmas!

I think for both questions, its part ignorance, part reinforcement, and part wishful thinking. Face it, people are raised to expect "love" to be a magical thing that occurs when the "right" people find each other. And they are raised to believe that "magic" will take care of everything else. Further still, if the magic doesn't work, they are raised to believe they are just not "right" for each other.

What's one of the first questions people normally ask when you tell them you are going to marry someone? Usually, its "do you love them?" What's one of the first questions people ask when you tell them you are going to divorce someone? Usually it's "do you love them?"


Yes, absolutely. But to be clear, it would have had to have been brought up correctly. All I mean is that I would not have been receptive if it was brought up in a way that required me to be a "mind reader" or pick up some "signals".


I commented about this on another thread. People seem to just want intimate relationships to be a matter of random chance. People like "magic".

1. Why don't most married couples buy into the principles of marriage builders from the start before an affair even comes to mind?They don't know about MB principles. "From the start" implies a new relationship when everything is happiness and cheesecake. Why would anyone be thinking of building/strengthening/repairing their marriage then? It simply doesn't occur to them.

2. Why is there such a reluctance amond couples who are dating to apply these principles?
I don't know if it's a reluctance, exactly. More a blissful lack of awareness. Things are going great, it wouldn't occur to them to "build" the relationship.

3. If you have been affected by an affair, then this question is for you. If, before the issue of the affair, your spouse brought up the marriage builders principles, would you have been open to implementing them?
YES YES YES!!! My first marriage ended because of unmet needs over a very long time. I told him and told him and told him but either I didn't know HOW to tell him or he didn't want to/couldn't listen. The divorce was very painful, even though I initiated it. We had young children. It was heartbreaking. I did not know about MB back then.

If my spouse today were to say "Things are not working for me" then I would do back flips through a flaming hoop if he told me it would help.

4. Why does our society expect to work hard for professional success, but not for marital success?
I think you hit on a key point when you said "Why does our society expect..."? Commercials, movies, and novels tell us that professional success is glamorous. In our society we are judged/valued based on our corner office, our car and clothes, our house, and our credentials - publications, letters after our title, etc. We are taught from a young age that professional success is glamorous. We are taught to work for professional success - you reap what you sow, no pain no gain, the little red hen, and so on.

On the other hand, our society teaches us, through novels, movies, commercials, and other media, that love is mysterious, magical, and full of fireworks. It happens when you least expect it. It is filled with "signs" and "omens". Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, and any romance movie all "prove" that love happens mysteriously and magically when the time is right, and you live happily ever after.

I have heard hearsay - but not verified through a search for studies - that countries with arranged marriages have a much higher success rate. I would imagine (just guessing) that in those cultures, they grow up thinking they will have to make the best of the situation, be the good wife, be the good husband, adjust to whoever their parents pick for them.

IMO our culture promotes a sickening degree of selfishness and entitlement in many aspects of our lives, not just marriage.

Bit of a tangent here, but I've read the same thing about arranged marriages. However, I don't know that you can directly compare the marriages to ours. It's more of a societal thing. Cultures that have arranged marriages are often patriarchal, and the only means for a woman's success in life is to marry well. A good husband is "chosen" by her parents according to criteria that likely don't make anyone's EN list. Duties of both husband and wife are clearly spelt out and usually divorce is not an option, so many stick together no matter what happens.

This isn't true for all arranged marriages - I work with someone who is in an arranged marriage. The first few years were good but things have been going downhill over the past year or so. The main problem is that she is a professional with a career - which is fine with her DH but not his family. They were here for over a month last year and made her life a living h3!! - ordering her around, berating her and making her do all kidns of unreasonable chores. After they left, her DH's attitude towards her had changed as well. Since then she has contemplated leaving him - to the point that she is taking a month long trip back to her home country alone to spend with her own family. They oppose her leaving him (there was a lot of wealth exchanged in the arrangement), but she feels she needs to be away from him and get in touch with her roots before she makes any decision. She has been in Canada for a long time, so her adherence to her cultural background is probably much weaker than if she had stayed in her home country.

I think this pardox also has to do with the illusion of control and personal responsibility.

All I mean is professional success and marital success will both have a part due to hard work and part due to luck (or chance, etc.). Whatever part of the current state one ascribes to luck, will inversely change how much one feels personally responsible.

As a society we teach people that they are personally responsible for their careers, and thus they assume their is no luck involved and conclude hard work is the answer.

But with respect to relationships, we tend to teach people they are not personally responsible, thus they conclude it is all a matter of luck and no work is neccessary.

Very few parents would "blame" anyone but their child for poor grades, and very few parents would ever blame their child for other kids not liking them.

I suppose society needs hard workers more than it needs people with good relationships.

Because I (like a lot of others) found this site when searching for coping with infidelity.


they don't need them until after they are married and the honeymoon phase has wore off.


i would have tried. if i was told this is how to prevent an affiar, he77 yea!

Couples starting out have the "it will never happen to me/us" attitude. Who dives into a relationship with the thinking that himself or his partner will selfishly hurt or neglect their relationship one day? Unless people hear of other people's situations or have experienced the fallout out of a bad M (as a child, spouse, etc.) directly that might give them pause to take step in advance, it won't occur to most people.

That is because, statistically 90% of the couple live in a "giving up" relationship. (Not mine but is quoted elsewhere). Only 4% actually strive for true or what is called vintage love. Again I could quote the source but I am not sure if mods are ok with it or not. With other cultures, they give up and live with what they have however painful it could get. Ofcourse long term i believe it "works out" even though i dont quite agree with that approach.

In this country, we tend to take the easy way out. Bad marraige, affair, divorce. Yes there is a extremely high degree of selfishness in doing that but then i dont know if i ever want to go back to "giving up" relationship either.

Thanks to websites like this one, it makes you so much more knowledgeable in identifying what was/is missing in your relationship and what it could take to fix it. I think i prefer this option even though it is extremely difficult for me to go through it right now.