You know, the more I live with him, the more I grow to truly value and love my husband – not just as the cute hunk that made my heart go pitter patter 
– but as a great individual. Our first year together was a pretty tough one for me. I grew up as an only child, so as you can imagine, I was pretty use to things being “my way”. I didn’t fully realize this until marriage.
Before marriage, everyone talks about “oh you must learn to compromise”, but no one truly knows the meaning to that word until they’ve gone through a period of being married. Everyone thinks they understand this, but somehow, in the back of our heads and in our subconcious, we still fight for “our side” and what we think is correct.
Does the following statements sound familiar?
“Well, I didn’t know he/she was like that”
“Why can’t he just…”
“Doesn’t he understand that I…”
“Why would she do sucha thing?”
“He left the seat up again!”
“I came home and nothing was done.”
“But my dad use to….”
“That’s not the way my mom….”
….Those are all subconcious statementes of non-compromise. Those are the subtle areas that have us trapped into thinking our way is the right way. Many times we really don’t even know we believe a certain way – we just tend to get annoyed at things our husband or wife does without bothering to examine the core reason of why it bothers us.
In every relationship, we bring along our own expectations and core beliefs about how life with a certain person “should be”. It is when we are unwilling to let go of our expectations that we end up with conflict.
For example, many women develop expectations growing up that their mate will be like the men in their family. If the men in her childhood were handymen and great with every tool they touched, a conflict will arise if her chosen mate does not meet up to the handyman level that her prior male role models did. This conflict will spiral out of hand if the woman does not realize her expectation and work to control her thoughts over it. Imagine this woman, sitting in her home, watching the faucet exploding from water pressure. “My husband will fix it” she thinks. What if he can’t? She’ll become agitated, annoyed…and may even belittle him. In her mind, if she has not realized her core expectatation of “All Men are Handymen”, she will assume something is wrong with her husband.
The same example can apply to men who come into marriages with hidden expectations that all women are like their mothers (or at least “the woman I marry will be like mom”). Imagine a son who is use to a multitude of wonderful foods from a woman who has been cooking for 30 years – then imagine his growing annoyance if his wife is unable to produce gourmet meals after the 1st…2nd…3rd year of marriage.
Other hidden expectation and beliefs apply to a person’s parenting as well. A woman might have a hidden belief that the father is supposed be the one to get up at night with the child. Perhaps this stems from her own father tenderly rocking her after her own childhood nightmares. While this woman’s husband may have a hidden belief that a mother’s role is to tend to her child’s need – even during the night. These hidden expectations from both parties may never be revealed to one another. In fact, the woman or man may never even realize fully that this is what their core being truly believes. Their mind may even conjure up a more politcally correct version of what “should be” – while their heart (and nerves) react to what their hidden core belief is.
In my own marriage, it took me months to fully realize that I had no idea what compromise truly meant. In my head, I knew all the verbiage…all the rules. Oh, I had attended all of the marriage counseling and seminars to “prepare” me for marriage, but none of those rules prepared me for the eye opening shock of what it’s like to truly learn to live with another human being. It also took a year of marriage to discover many of my hidden expectations that I had brought into this marriage – and I realized, quite shockingly, that 95% of every argument my husband and I had stemmed from him “breaking” one of my hidden expectations. That little voice in my head, the train of thoughts that flowed with my feelings, became negative towards my husband, villifying him, when in fact, it was my own expectations that was making him “appear bad” – not his true actions. Is a man that leaves his socks at the foot of his bed “bad”? Is it truly worth arguing over again and again? No, it’s not – but the hidden expectations we all have can turn a simple act such as forgetting to call one time or leaving a dish out of place into a nightmare of angry feelings.
Once I caught on to the fact that I had brought hidden expectations into this marriage, I worked harder to discover my core self and what I truly believed. I realized that many, many, many of my little expectations – things I had assumed I was compromising on, but wasn’t! – was a result of NON-ESSENTIAL expectations! Many of the things that were angering me and annoying me were things that, in reality, truly had no bearing on the person that my husband truly is – a good, hardworking, God-loving, gorgeous man that truly loves me.
After this breakthrough, it was amazing at how much peace entered into our relationship. I truly believe that a woman holds the key to the atmophere of a household – and my own experiences show that to be true as well. For many months after marriage, I believed it was my husband who needed to change. When that didn’t work, my focus shifted towards “Well, maybe it’s me who needs to change”. Once the Lord changed MY heart, and helped me sort through my hidden expectations about husbands, our marriage atmosphere shifted 180 degrees.
Here is an interesting word study I did about the word “Compromise”.
Compromise – an accommodation in which both sides make concessions, to settle by concession
Concession – Something, such as a point previously claimed in argument, that is later conceded
Concede – To admit to be true; to acknowledge.
Acknowledge – To admit the existence, reality, or truth of.
From compromise we find detailings of concession, conceding, and acknowledging. All of these words reflect an inner act where the person has to reflect upon their own beliefs. It involves thought, submission, humility, and truthfulness to not only one’s partner, but to one’s self as well. To me, compromise now takes on a whole new meaning. Compromise no longer superficially means “I’ll give up my favorite thing but you have to give up your favorite thing”. It is no longer a dirty word, evoking feelings of deprivation or denial of self.
Instead, compromise is an inner act – a conceding of wills, based on our abillity to find, and prioritize, our hidden expectations about life, friends, families, children, and spouses. It is something to strive for in every relationship!
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I think the problem with marriages and compromises is that both parties are not at the same page at the same time. And it’s unlikely they ever will be. When one is realizing that compromise is necessary, the other is thinking about the way things shoulod be. Then by the time the other party realizes this, the one who knew it in the beginning is so fed up with waiting for compromise from the other that the bridges have been burned. It’s a viscious cycle.
jess » Hi Jess! I think you just summed it up beautifully…. that’s EXACTLY what happens for the most part. Sometimes no matter how hard you try, you can’t get things to work because you’re both not on the same page. It’s those precious moments when you become “on the same page” that makes it worth striving for though, i believe.
I know this is an old post, but I was surfing the web on some ways I can learn to better appreciate my husband, when I stumbled on your blog. Today is our two year anniversary, and I have spent alot of time blaming my husband for most of the problems in our relationship. I would look at people and wonder why they were so content with the person they married. But as I read your log today, I understand the true meaning of compromise. Thank you so much for writing this; you have truly changed my perspective today on my marriage.