Divorce

Divorce has gone wild through our world in the last 50 years. Divorce before then was really not an option and if it did happen was kept very secret. Now divorce is publicized and thought of as no big deal. Divorce has become an easy way out and has ruined many peoples lives. When divorce occurs it not only hurts the parents, but the children. Divorce is not something to be taken lightly and often times most marriages can, and should, be worked through which almost always result in happiness later. There are few reasons to get a divorce and very careful consideration should be put into it before deciding. Here are some quotes about divorce.

“Though our actions often fall short, the celestial law treats the bonds of marriage as permanent.”

“What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.” (Mark 10:6-9)

The effects of divorce on Children:

- - Feelings of loneliness

- - Less likely to graduate high school or go onto college, or graduate school

- - More likely to doubt parents beliefs

- - Less likely to attend church

- - More likely to be sexually active earlier in life

- - More likely to experience divorce themselves

“In the celestial law of marriage, God has commanded us to remain together and keep our marriages strong, even when that means we must partake of some of the bitter fruits of life together.” (Insight from Moses 4:18)

“There is now and again a legitimate cause for divorce. I am not one to say that it is never justified. But I say without hesitation that this plague among us…is not of God.” President Gordon B. Hinckley

“In my opinion a ‘just cause’ should be nothing less than a prolonged and apparently irredeemable relationship which is destructive of a person’s dignity as a human being…Surely it is not simply ‘mental distress’ nor ‘personality differences,’ nor ‘having grown apart,’ nor ‘having fallen out of love.’ This is especially so where there are children.” President James E. Faust

1. Prolonged difficulties

- Spouses should not seek a divorce without a lengthy period of time to attempt to repair or reduce serious problems (although if there are safety issues, then a separation is likely necessary while assessing whether change can occur).

- Most unhappy marriages become happy again if couples hang on and work to resolve their problems.

- Unfortunately many people divorce after a short period of problems and make their decisions quickly, based almost solely on emotion.

2. Apparently irredeemable relationship

- If one spouse is unwilling or unable to make such an effort, this does not excuse the other spouse from determining his or her part in any problems and making needed change.

- The Lord will “consecrate [our] afflictions for [our] gain.” (2 Nephi 2:1-2)

- Seek counseling before a divorce, church leaders and marriage counselors can help see the problems from a different perspective.

- Long-lasting marital unhappiness is uncommon; unhappy marriages often improve significantly over time for those who are patient and keep trying to work things out.

- Patience and perseverance and effort will fix almost any problem in marriage

3. Destruction of human dignity

- The marital problems have become serious enough over a period of time that an individual begins to lose his or her sense of worth.

- Feeling unhappy or unfulfilled in the marriage does not meet this standard

- Life is full of problems; it is in dealing with those problems that is the central purpose of marriage.

- We need to make sure that divorce is the only answer, because divorce can end up making us even more unhappy for a longer amount of time, if it is not absolutely necessary.

- Most times family and friends should encourage a marriage to stay together, but there may be times when a family member or close friend will need to prayerfully and carefully intervene to help a loved one see that the marriage has become destructive or unsafe and strengthen them to make a difficult decision to divorce.

“Circumstances surrounding each marital breakdown are unique and perhaps cannot be fully understood by others. Thus only the individuals involved-and an omniscient and all-loving God can determine ‘just cause.’”

“We do not believe that a spouse’s spiritual wanderings are just cause for divorce…Instead we should offer compassion, love, and patience as a light to attract our spouse back onto the path of full righteousness.”

“For most marriage problems, the remedy is not divorce but repentance. Often the cause is not incompatibility but selfishness.”

“Personal and couple prayer and the faith that motivates it can soften hearts and help strengthen marital relationships.”

Three recommended books for those who are at the crossroads of divorce:

The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work (Gottman & Silver, 1999), The Divorce Remedy (Davis, 2001), Covenant Hearts (Hafen, 2005).

Parenting

Parents should:
- listen to their children
- listen for feelings
- check for understanding

When your child get's to be a teenager your commands and punishments will have no ruling over them, the thing that will help them most is their relationship with you. If there is mutual respect then they are more likely to listen to you.

How to ask tell your child something:
- Politely ask them to do it
- Send an I message... When you ________, I feel ____________. Because __________. and I would like ______________.
The I message should be used rarely.
If these two thing don't work then
- Reprove betimes with sharpness meaning be direct and firm but not mean.
Do not use personal attacks ex: you're such a slob would you just pick up your socks?
instead say: Could you please pick up your socks?

There is no need for punishments in parenting. Punishment is something done to inferiors to show that you are superior. This can destroy the self-esteem of a child. There should be logical consequences instead of punishment

Irritating behavior usually means the child needs attention and physical touch. Just making eye contact and talking to them can fix this problem.

Keep a Budget

"The American Bar association has indicated that 89% of all divorces can be traced to quarrels and accusations over money." It's important that we budget our money carefully so we don't become part of this statistic. It is possible to keep a budget and it will be of great value to us. In the pamphlet One for the Money: A guide to family finance by Elder Marvin J. Ashton, he proposed 11 ideas that will help us better manage our finances.
1. Pay an Honest Tithing
2. Learn to Manage Money Before it Manages You
3. Learn Self-Discipline and Self-Restraint in Money Matters
4. Use a Budget
5. Teach Family Members Early the Importance of Working and Earning
6. Teach Children to Make Money Decisions in keeping with their Capacities to Comprehend
7. Teach each family member to contribute to the total family welfare
8. Make Education a Continuing Process
9. Work Toward Home Ownership
10. Appropriately Involve Yourself in an Insurance Program
11. Understand the Influence of External Forces on Family Finances and Investments
12. Appropriately Involve Yourself in a Food Storage and Emergency Preparedness Program

I believe that just by trying to keep a better budget and really focusing on your finances is going to help tremendously, we can live off of less than we already are. We are all natural men, and believe that we need more than we actually do, with the Lord's help we can live within our means.

Why Mom's should stay home

Mother's are so important to growing children, even teenagers need their mothers. Something that I never told my mother, but that had a great impact on me is my memories of her being home when i got home from school. I remember my siblings and I would run to her and talk her ear off all at the same time, then we would go play. We talked about this fact in class, there is a 15 minute window of time right after children get home from school that they will tell you anything and everything that happened in their day. This is a crucial time for parents to figure out what's happening in their children's lives. Just have a snack ready for them and have them eat a snack while they tell you about their day, this can be precious time for you and your children, if you make it. When I got into high school, my littlest brother went to Kindergarten and my mother went to work, I hated coming home to an empty house. I wanted to tell me mom everything, but wouldn't feel like talking once she got home an hour later. Now that she has a job she is rushing to get dinner made, clean the house, and do all the tasks that she couldn't do while she was working. This, although isn't a bad thing, really had an impact on my life.
I think sometimes mothers feel like they have to work to afford their lives, but mothers working usually only make $1 or less an hour because of the cost of gas to get to work, childcare, and other extra expenses that come because mom is at work.
Having a mom at home makes all the difference. This work as a stay at home mom is not degrading, but is the most rewarding work, no other job can give the happiness that being a mom does.
Who do you want to be raising your children? A stranger who could be teaching your child great things, but will never be able to teach them the same things that mom can?
We have a responsibility to go against what the world says is appropriate and do what we know is best. To be at home with our family, this will bring the most help to the world, because greater stability in the nation first starts in the home.

How to Help Someone Overcome the Affects of Abuse

One must need to know these things when trying to over come the affects of abuse especially sexual abuse:

1. Evil is always stupid
- The brain tries to make sense of things, but evil doesn't make sense it's always stupid. You have to understand that what happened isn't going to make sense.

2. Abuse Hurts Spirits
- You're going to feel tarnished, dirty, and upset that these things happened, but know that these events don't break our spirits it just hurts them, but they can be healed.

3. Limited time...
- Realize that these things that happened to you are only a small portion of your life.
- Dwell on the good things that have happened in your life, not on the bad.
- Stay positive
- Write in your journal your feelings and the things that you have learned from your experiences. Don't just write the bad things, but the good things too. This will help you to remember all the good times when your having a bad day.

A random thought that isn't directly related to this, but is still related is that there is a difference between an apology and asking for forgiveness. Forgiveness is asking you to change how someone is reacting to a situation. Whereas an apology is changing yourself and really being sorry for your actions.

Organized Time Makes for a Happy Family

For students and mothers who have to work this may be helpful information to you.
We need to learn how to value our time, organize it, and prioritize it. Every person has 168 hours per week, to figure out how much extra time per week we have we have to subtract from 168 hours the time we need for sleep every day, the time we spend at work, preparing for class, going to class, taking care of children, all of the important every day tasks that cannot be avoided. The total number of hours left is the time we have to work with. This is the time we have to organize it. I would encourage filling out a 3 day chart, documenting how you spend every half hour of those days to see where your time is going. Once you know where you time is going make a priority list of things that have to get done, should get done, and aren't as important, but would be nice to get done you could label these as categories A, B, and C. After you have accomplished this make a daily chart of every hour the things you'd like to do, first fill in the unavoidable things, the fill in the category "A" things, the things that need to be done. Then put in the B and C things. It is important that once we make this chart to stick to it. By doing this we will actually create more free time for ourselves and in the end be happier.

Now for stay at home mothers, I know we have a busy schedule and that we are always on duty, there is not very many hours a day in which we get to leave the house, and this way of organizing your life may not work because for you every minute of the day is full of these little distractions called children and that is our job, but for stay at home mothers instead of figuring out and prioritizing your lives, try figuring out how much time a day you waste on social media, blogs, facebook, and other things and then try to incorperate in your day more productive things. Don't take away complelty from the social media, but have control over how long you spend there. I think you'll be surprised how much time there really is to get things done.

Clearly Define the Boundaries

If we wish to have an increase in marital satisfaction we have to be prepared for it. We have to clearly define boundaries and be prepared and mature enough to move to the next step. We cannot start dating someone and then slide into courting then slide into engagement then one day wake up married to that person, it has to be clearly marked milestones in our progression towards finidng that one special someone to marry. A few tips for learning how to do this is:


1. Take your time


- People rush into relationships all the time we no longer feel comfortable just being friends and getting to know each other we feel like we have to be something more than that.


2. Clealy define the boudaries between Dating, Courting, Engagement, and marriage.


- There are important events and conversations that must take place in each of these catagories, when we finally feel like we are ready then we can move forward to the next step.


3. Know the difference between dating and courting


- Dating= going on lots of dates and getting to know each other, but still dating other people. You are not a couple and should not act as a couple, which means to keep the physical intamacy to a minimum, keeping the phyiscal intimacy out of your relationship longer will help your friendship grow stronger and allow for a strong foundation for an eventual courtship, emgagement, and marriage


- Courtship= Paired off, clearly together as a couple, still going on dates and trying to keep the physical affection to a minimum. You must talk openly about marriage and the things that you expect, you have to work through things together and experience conflict.


4. Remember not to slide through this stages, that is critical to the success of this formula. Clearly define and talk about your relationship and where it is going and then make the decision together to move forward, not becuase you have to but because you are both ready for the greater commitment.

Dating is important all through your life

This week in all of my classes we talked a lot about dating. The big issue we discussed in class is how much dating has changed over the past 50 years. It is apparent that dating has a much different meaning than it did 50 years ago, but something I hadn't thought about was that after marriage you should still go on dates to nurture the relationship and keep it alive. Is this maybe a reason why divorce is so eminent? I believe that by going on creative dates that no matter how old or young, you or the relationship is there is always new things to learn about that person, there is always a deeper love to be found. I don't know if any of my ideas can help you, but for about a year now, I've been working on a list of dating ideas that I have heard around and I thought I'd share them with you.

- Way back when party: Have chicken nuggets and French fries while you watch hey Arnold, Doug, Arthur, Recess and other shows from the past.

- Indexing: Bring your computers and index together as you try to figure out what everything says. It’s fun and it’s serving

- Sleigh Ride: Through the school you can go on a sleigh ride.

- Water Color Painting- Paint a portrait of each other, a landscape, our home, our favorite place

- Ice Skating

- Rock museum in Romney building

- Dinosaur exhibit in Benson

- Watch youtube videos like Stewart, Kid History, or Can I have your number

- Watch mormon messages

- Share stories and pictures from your past.

- Go to a concert

- Go on a walk through the buildings

- Go on a service scavenger hunt.

- Go to a dance

- Read scripture stories and modernize them, act them out, or read them in a modern day tone, then for a more serious time talk about how they are truly applicable to our time.

- Library- Go to the library and read children’s stories or try to find a certain random topic.

- Go on a scavenger hunt for something in random books throughout the library. Like we have to find a story about a dinosaur, whoever finds the best book wins.

- Go to the library and pick out two of the most dramatic, adventurous, or mysterious exciting books you can find turn to a random page in each book and take turns reading random lines out of them and see what kind of story you get.

- Skiing, Snowboarding, Cross-Country Skiing, or other outdoor activities through the school.

- Make up a dance to a song and record it as a music video

- Make a movie and get random people to be in it

- Take random pictures throughout different buildings then make a movie of all the pictures together with subtitles underneath telling a fantasy tale about our adventures.

- Make a silent movie

- Have a picnic inside

- Tell scary stories to each other

- Most embarrassing moments night

- Share something you’ve never told anyone before

- Ask each other 3 questions every time you see each other, just to get to know each other

- Play basketball game

- Play card games (uno, skip-bo, phase 10, dutch blitz)

- Go to the mall in Idaho falls and pick out the ugliest things for each other then go try them on and take pictures

- For dinner one day go to different restaurants for something different each time you go get just one thing. When you have everything go ahead and eat.

- Museum in Idaho Falls

- Teton Flood museum

- A-Z game at Brolum’s

- Dress formal for a random concert, just for fun

- Make a sit down formal dinner for everyone in the apartment and then be their waiters. Afterwards then you two can sit and eat.

- Just make dinner together

- Go to the sand dunes and walk around or look at the stars

- Hike “R” mountain and have a picnic up there

- Study the Scriptures together and apply them to our lives

- Charity opportunities share stories of when you were charitable and then find people to help around campus or just do any act of kindness.

- Participate in a school or church service committee.

- Go shopping together.

- Attend an athletic event as spectators.

- Go for a car or bus ride.

- Visit or play with younger siblings, nieces, nephews, or other young children

- Do homework or read together

- Make pizza from scratch together.

The Differences of Men and Women

There are many differences between men and women, we watched an ABC special on Monday about these differences if was called Men, Women and Sex differences. In this special they talked about many different views on how men and women are different. I found these to be very interesting, but helpful when thinking about why men do certain things.
Before I start I just want to make sure that I state my opinion that I do believe that in marriage men and women have the ability to bond as no other friends really can, because of the differences between men and women. They each bring different aspects of life and can help to create a lasting bond and help each other during hard times.

Some of the differences that were states were:
Generally speaking, Females: Give directions and best understand directions when given based off of landmarks, they are more creative in their thinking and ability to create and be artistic, they pay attention to detail and have good memories, they are more relationship oriented and nurturing they are communication oriented and start off conversations usually by asking questions.
Generally speaking, Men: have spatial orientation meaning they have a good sense of direction, they are more aggressive, and task oriented (meaning they are terrific at focusing on one thing and only that 1 task), they are competitive, and have a hard time communicating.

These differences can really strengthen us as individuals and help us to strengthen our relationship with one another, if we can realize that we are here to help each other and know that these differences are not supposed to be changed but learned to work with, we can experience a relationship unlike any other.

Enduring Principals of Lasting Happiness in Marriage

Okay, so this week in all of my family classes we talked alot about marriage and how it really takes hard work to get marriage where it should be and keep it there. I am using a book called "Successful Marriages and Families" I'm taking a bunch of quotes and points from different chapters so this is going to be more of random thoughts all about the same topic.

"While marriage is difficult, and discordant and frustrated marriages are common, yet real, lasting happiness is possible, and marriage can be more an exultant ecstasy than the human mind can conceive. This is within the reach of every couple, every person." - Spencer W. Kimball delivered in a BYU devotional in September 1976.

Happiness is something that we decide to be. If we choose to be happy then we will be. The same is in marriage if we choose to be happily married and each give 100% all the time then we will be.

"You sacrifice for [the relationship], invest in it, link it to personal goals, and seek the partner's welfare not just your own." When in marriage we have to eliminate everything else in our lives to cleave unto our spouses and none else. None else meaning not just no one else or nothing else. Our Heavenly Father wants our hearts to be knit together.

I believe that everyone, with the exception of very rare cases, if they work hard enough, can make their marriage last forever, but it is amazing that the gospel not only gives a purpose in life, but all of the principles make for a mentally, physically, and spiritually healthy life. Marriage is a wonderful thing that can really make one more happy than anything else.

An Eternal Perspective Enriches our Dating Experiences

Dating is so important, yet it is taken so casually and lightly that it worries me. It makes me not want to date because I fear that I will make the wrong decision. If a boy can’t show me that he knows how to take initiative and come up with something more than group dates and movie watching then I don’t want to date him, however, not very many show that anymore so now I feel like I’ll never find someone that meets my standards. And that I’ll never be brave enough to date many people to find one that does meet my standards, because more often than not I find myself in bad situations because the guy doesn’t know how to communicate.
In this day in age there is too much hanging out and not enough 1 on 1 dating. There is too much movies and TV watching and not enough getting to know each other. There is too much kissing and other physical pleasure going on and not enough talking and building and emotional relationship. There is too much texting and not enough calling or in person conversations.
It is no wonder that we are in such times where divorce seems so eminent; we have forgotten how to date and court properly. People aren’t spending the time and energy that relationships need to flourish, or communicating properly because they haven’t changed any of their habits that they formed while dating/hanging out and as a result their marriages fail. However, if someone were too date properly and really get to know and spend time with their dating partner then they wouldn’t have to change any of those habits upon marriage because good habits will already be in place.
There was an activity that we did in class. We had to match up different dating ideas with certain qualities that might come out in doing that specific activity. This is important becuase if you don't get to knwo qualities like how they communicate with others, how they react around children, or how they trat their mothers. The list also has on there what their spiritual drive is, and how commited they are to the Lord, do they serve, are they emotionally stable, and have financial maturity. These are all things that one would want to see come out before you married this person. I truly believe that by doing creative, but meaningful acitivites that are for a purpose other than to just have fun it will be build incredibly strong, righteous relationships that I wouldn’t have to be scared of because I would know the other so well that there would be no need to worry. The Lord can see everything and we can only see a little bit, trust in the Lord with all thine heart and lean not unto thine own understanding in all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall direct thy paths (Proverbs 3:5-6).