Self Commitment

Divorce has turned into such a convenient thing, a door in the back of a closet as soon as you need a way out, growing up I was blind to this fact. I came from a family where two religions were present in our everyday lives.  The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, where these marriages seemed to look like such a fairytale and The Catholic church where cohabiting was common and in my family preferred. When I entered high school I told myself that I wanted to be married in the temple, because I didn't think people married in the temple ever got divorced. My first semester at BYU-Idaho opened my eyes to a culture that I hadn't really known, and I realized that divorce is such a sneaky trickster in any religion, state, culture, he tries to find you wherever you are. 

We are taught that a lot of times divorce comes because individuals have "fallen out of love" with each other; We are taught that marriage is about being selfless, so if this is the case then why is divorce so common? Do we struggle being selfless? Is it humanly impossible? We hear all the time that divorce doesn't just hurt the two people involved "children are the first victims" they are put through so much heartache because of the decisions of their parents. If by getting divorce we hurt our children, then why is divorce still so accepted? 

I used to think that the only thing that would ruin my marriage is infidelity or abuse, I used to tell myself that if my husband were to do any of these things to me then I would leave in a heartbeat. That was my closet door, hidden for when I needed a quick out. When talking to an individual about marriage I repeated my "conditions" about marriage and how I would run at the first sight of these. This sweet girl looked at me and asked "then why are you promising to this man and to your Father in Heaven to work your hardest for a marriage if you're only going to put conditions on it?" 

I soon learned that if I wanted to have a marriage with no divorce then I needed to realize that as Dallin H.  Oaks stated: "A good marriage does not require a perfect man or a perfect woman. It only requires a man and a woman committed to strive together towards perfection." If I wanted to insure to never have a divorce I needed to commit to myself that I will never have a divorce. I promised my husband, God, and myself that no matter the hardships that we go through, we'll go through it together. I had to commit to myself that not only will I try my best to stay selfless in my marriage, but when things go wrong, I'll still continue to try my best. I know I will sometimes come up short, but that's okay! I wasn't meant to be perfect right now, but instead to keep practicing and working towards perfection. I know when I mess up, and I know I mess up a lot, I can repent and try again tomorrow to keep working on a perfect knowledge. It all starts with the commitment I make to myself every morning to work on my marriage.