Stress, and Opportunity

There is a lot of stress that comes with marriage and family life. You no longer are just responsible for your own well being, you also are looking after your spouse and children. It can be easy to feel overwhelmed and stressed. There are so many things to be stressed about, whether that be health problems, financial, or even sexual problems between you and your spouse. On the other hand all the loads that you take on in marriage and family life can be an extraordinary opportunity and blessing in life if you let it. My basis for this claim is a quote by James Thurber that is often quoted by apostle Jeffery R. Holland which says "Love is what you go through together". 

I believe with all my heart that "love is what you go through together", and that includes stressful and hard times in life. In Marriage you can choose how the circumstances you are facing will affect the most important relationship on this earth, your spouse and then children. In my own life I have witnessed those who had a crisis occur, and this event destroyed this married couple, but I have also seen how a similar event brought a separate married couple closer together then I could imagine. Life is always so much easier when you have someone right next to you to help you and support you in every way, and that should be your spouse and family. I would hope that you would look forward to the hardships you will share with you spouse and family and embrace it and let it bring you closer than ever before. 

In marriage we should seek to have the true love that Christ had, charity, love that never fails not even once. That means that no matter what happens, or what comes your way, your love should never fail. Christ never fails us and will never will, and we should try to emulate him and his love more than anything else in marriage and family. We can only achieve this love through him who was the only one to get it all right.

Be grateful for all that you do have. One of the greatest ways to help in hard and stressful times is to be grateful and positive, trusting in your marriage and in the Lord that all will be well. The Hardships won't last forever and good times will always come, so don't ever give up. Joseph B. Wirthlin gave a wonderful message on trusting that better times are ahead, and he explained it in this way. "Each of us will have our own Fridays -- those days when the universe itself seems shattered and the shards of our world lie littered about us in pieces. We all will experience those broken times when it seems we can never be put together again. We will all have our Fridays. But I testify to you in the name of the One who conquered death -- Sunday will come. In the darkness of our sorrow, Sunday will come. No matter our desperation, no matter our grief, Sunday will come. In this life or the next, Sunday will come." Believe in the things that matter most, believe in the lord, believe in marriage, believe in those you love and hold on to them for dear life.

The greatest joys in life come from the eternal blessings of marriage and family. Do everything you can to make your marriage and family the most important aspect of your life and sacrifice and give it your all. I promise that it will be more worth it and you will end up getting more in return in love and joy.