Choices

CHOICES

This week I have thought a lot about choice.  We have choices in nearly everything we do.  We can choose to wake up at 6:30 and clean the house before heading to the Library to get ahead in our homework, or we can lounge in our leggings and over sized T-shirt, drinking diet Dr. Pepper and hoping the Diet will be forgiving on our waistline…since we haven’t made it to the gym in over three weeks!  I have been taking 14 credits of online classes for the last two months and unfortunately my life is looking a bit more like choice number two right now! 

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Choices don’t only affect our personal life and our waistline!  Choices affect every part of our waking life.  Our choices range anywhere from a bagel or a pop-tart to a divorce or a long lasting marriage.  That brings me to my point here today.  You may be wondering on the second choice I mentioned.  Is it really a choice whether or not we get a divorce?  Isn’t divorce just what you do when a marriage doesn’t work?  I am here to firmly say that it IS a choice! John M. Gottman teaches that every marriage has both solvable and perpetual problems, both of which are manageable without divorce!! 

THERE IS NOT ONE MARRIAGE WITHOUT PROBLEMS!!!

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The defining aspect in a marriage is how the couple addresses their problems.  If they choose to yell and scream and force their way, the marriage is not likely to work out.  Elder Lyn G. Robbins says in his talk Agency and Anger that anger is a choice! But there is another choice. Proverbs 15:1 states, “A soft answer turneth away wrath.”  We can CHOOSE to avoid anger.  We can choose a deep breath and a quick count from one to ten.  I know that those 20 second can mean a world of difference!

Elder Richard G. Scott says, “True love elevates, protects, respects, and enriches another.  It motivates you to make sacrifices for the girl/guy you love.”  Maybe our sacrifice is forgetting our own personal desires and looking for the desires our spouse had.  Maybe it is giving in just to see your fiancé smile.  Maybe it is even saying that you like their sunglasses even though you would never choose that color. 

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Support and absence of anger are key choices in our married lives.  It was our choice to get married, so it is our choice to stay that way.  Don’t get frustrated if you struggle at first.  No one is perfect. But if you view anger as a choice, you will be less likely to choose such a harsh way of expressing yourself.  Whenever my siblings or I would yell, my mom would say. “I cannot hear you when you talk like that.”  Let’s say the same thing to ourselves and remember that we cannot hear ourselves thinking clearly if we are yelling! 

IT IS A CHOICE!

Resources:

*http://www.intentionallypursuing.com/category/marriage-monday/page/6/

**https://www.popexpert.com/content/relationships/marriage-is-a-choice-and-a-lot-of-hard-work/marriage-is-a-choice-and-a-lot-of-hard-work

***https://www.etsy.com/listing/192972244/choose-your-love-love-your-choice

https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1998/04/agency-and-anger?lang=eng

Gottman, John Mordechai., and Nan Silver.  The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work. New York: Crown, 1999. Print\