Strengthening Spousal Relationship Survey Comments
Updated 6.12.03
In my own words. These are the ingredients that I believe are important to strengthen the spousal relationship.
- Love, being Godliness, respect, and faithfulness.
- It is important to grow together. In the course of marriage, personalities change, so it is important to keep that connection so we do not grow apart.
- Love, understanding, being considerate, and promote strong faith together.
- I think it is understanding each other, sacrificing, and taking care of one another.
- Trust, cooperation, faith on God.
- Understanding, compassion, forgiving., growth, and unconditional love. Having God's presence and every family.
- 1st is belief in Christ; 2nd fidelity; 3rd communication.
- Love, being faithful, and having faith in God.
- Communicating with each other.
- When you are first married, you worry. But then gradually you become comfortable and not worry. Understanding, put yourself in the other person's shoes. It's not just you, you, you, or me, me, me, you have to think about the other's feeling. Have respect, and always take care of yourself.
* * * * *
Observations. Here are some initial observations about the survey responses.
- It is clear that the respondents
believe that two factors are equally necessary to strengthen a marriage: The
presence of God and the effort of both spouses to make the marriage work, and
both carry a value of 98%.
First, this reiterates the fact that spirituality, 'God's
presence,' is an important part of the Armenian spousal relationship, and must
be visible in order to marriage work.
Second, the couple's efforts must also be concurrently
visible. It is not sufficient to say that one believes in God or attends Church
and expect a marriage to work. The couple must expend their own efforts,
understand each other, and keep the commitment to the marital relationship.
- It is extremely interesting that these couples did not believe that two people need to be in love from the beginning in order to make a marriage work. This finding also affirms a survey conducted separately with a different group of people. It is discussed in the article What Attracted them in the First Place?. In both these cases, the respondents, anonymous in the case of the Internet survey but in person for the other survey, indicated that it is more important that the couple learn to love one another after they marry. In fact, being in love at the beginning carries a value of 62% as opposed to the 95% for learning to love one another after marriage.
- These couples pointed out that a spouse cannot stop worrying in the sense of not caring about the spousal relationship, as evidenced by a value of 25%. This relationship always needs work. One of the respondents however had eluded to the reality that this worry is not the anxiety that a spouse may leave. Instead, it is more of an involvement to assure that each spouse places himself or herself in the other's shoes.
- Perhaps it is the attitude of these respondents who are married that a marriage can be worked out no matter what. In fact, the idea that a marital relationship cannot be worked out had a value of only 8%.
- Interestingly, perhaps reflecting the pride within the Armenian community, the respondents said they would go to counseling (64%) in case of marital difficulty rather than ask for help from Armenian community members (46%). In fact, asking help from the community had the lowest value among sources for support.
(Not
all participants provide comments.
More
comments will be added as they are received.)