Make it work even when you have nothing in common
What you need to know:
Relationships will present you with perfect opportunities for differences, disappointments, and disagreements, but also opportunities to learn to be patient with one another. Hold your horses with your words and actions.
“I met Jennifer in the Bible School. We fell in love and wedded nine months later. A few months into the marriage, we started to bicker and fight. In fact, we sought help from friends, family and pastors. Many times we tumbled on the verge of quitting. I am extroverted; she is introverted. I like to read and write; she doesn’t.
I am spontaneous; she is predictable. I can tolerate all manner of people that’s why I have many friends; she cannot. I am fast; she is slow-paced. We have a multitude of differences.” So how do we manage the differences that threaten to divide couples?
Keep up with the change
As you both grow, you change mentally and emotionally. You need to keep up with the new person that your spouse is becoming. Like onion scales that when peeled off reveal a new layer, people change every day and it is important that the other partner keeps in touch with the “new” spouse.
The interests your spouse had 10 years ago may be different from what they have now. Be a student of your spouse. It is legitimate to engage them often to know where they are at mentally and emotionally.
Make your spouse a priority
It is so easy to become engrossed in work, raising children, church projects, philanthropy, and social activities and forget to take care of your spouse. And because they are there with you all the time, it becomes easy for us to take them for granted.
“After all, they see what I am doing”, you reason with yourself unaware you are out of touch with the reality. Create uninterrupted time for them alone with you. Go walking, hiking, dancing, movie watching, and gardening, anything that is an excuse for your time alone with them.
Love them as they are
Some things are obvious to you by reason of your upbringing and environment; same for your spouse. You will never understand why they do the things they do and vice versa. This tension is healthy and rewarding if it is used well for the relationship. “If both of you were the same, then one of you would be unnecessary.
You have to love your partner for who they are and accept their differences. You can choose to look for the bad and ugly about your mismatches, warts and all or you can choose to look for the good and celebrate them as your counterweights.
Create shared experiences
Jennifer likes to cook; I don’t. But once in a while (thanks to Covid-19, I work from home often), I will go to the kitchen and help her sort rice or beans or do something there. I will change the baby’s diaper while she is tending to other chores.
In these moments, I choose to do the dandiest things. There is enough pain and hurt everywhere and I want my home to be a fun place to hang around. These are important couple bonding moments. A small change in work schedule to be with your spouse might make all the difference in your relationship.
Support them in their gifted areas
Your partner is gifted in certain areas; most likely you are opposite. These may be the reason why you may have fallen in love with them in the first place. Why not show them support and encourage them along those lines?
If they are good with children, let them know. If their skillset puts food on your table, appreciate them. Praise instead of complaining. Grumbling does not endear them to you and may be the difference between what you have in common and what you don’t.
Compromise on issues
Not every situation should be a battle ground for you to win and them to lose. Protracted marital conflicts are when couples garrison their minds for their selfish interests. But if you are willing to find a compromise, mix and meet in the middle that would be one dependable way to keep harmony.
You can choose to think your relationship has nothing in common and decide to quit or you can choose to think you do not have everything in common and choose to take the common and work it out.
Patience
Relationships will present you with perfect opportunities for differences, disappointments, and disagreements, but also opportunities to learn to be patient with one another. Rita DeMaria and Sari Harrar present seven stages of marriage life in their book; The 7 stages of Marriage: Laughter, Intimacy and Passion Today, Tomorrow and Forever (2006): Passion, Realisation, Rebellion, Cooperation, Reunion, Explosion, and Completion. Some of these times can be deal-breakers in marriage, if you short shrift the relationship with impatience. You have got to learn to hold your horses with your words and actions.
Forgiveness and counselling
We are all imperfect. We hurt one another. Unless you want to live at perennial war akin to slapstick comedy Tom and Jerry, we all need to forgive and be forgiven so we can live in harmony, free from guilt and condemnation. Find a counsellor
There will be frustrations in any relationship. You will be tempted to vent out to anybody who cares to listen. Seek another ear; a trusted and mature person, a pastor or a marriage counsellor to talk to.