I recently re-watched the movie titled, Why did I Get Married? This article is not related to the movie, but the question you really must ask is, ‘Why did I get married to my spouse?’ Take a moment to ponder on this.
Was it because you thought they would become a better person once you got married? Did you absolutely accept them as they were then, and do you accept them as they have grown to be, or are you disillusioned by who they continue to be?
One gentleman asked me to give him tips on how to go about ‘changing’ his wife to a better version. He needed her to ‘style up now that they had moved up the money ladder. She still kept her natural hair and did not do make-up nor wear expensive jewellery and was not interested in passing time at an exclusive club that cost him an arm and leg in membership fees.
“I even give her a ‘beauty’ allowance and expect her to get herself expensive hair, nails and do facials and stuff,” he said, pointing out that she also has not changed her dressing style either.
“So, you want her to become someone else?” I asked him.
“No…she’s smart, but she needs to grow from the girl she was decades ago to a modern woman living in a mansion, not a servants quarter.”
“You seem to have a vision on your end regarding how your wife should look and be. How about you consider who she is and has always been?”
“That’s the problem. I don’t like the current version!” he retorted.
So, that assertion that men always marry a woman hoping that she will never change is not true? What seems truer, from experience, is the pronouncement by a psychologist, Dr William Alanson White, who said, “It’s foolish to marry for the person you think you can make out of the person you know.”
That is like the classic tale of the carpenter who saw a piece of wood and in his mind’s eye, saw a beautiful carving off it. For sure, women see potential in a man, and we are so convinced that our love will transform him. The reality though is that his character remains unchanged.
I also know that Hubby married his dream girl, but she did not turn out like he had imagined. She got love hurdles, (curves, thank you very much), and a sharp tongue that did not always massage his ego but, in fact, reminded him that he was not a god but a fallible human being.
We come into a marriage with unspoken expectations, and for sure, we get disappointed. The truth is that marriage changes us. You cannot remain unscathed by life, leave alone a married one.
Marriage is so transformative that Warren Buffet, the American investor asserts, “The biggest decision of your life is who you choose to marry.” Trust me, your spouse can take you through character development that not even a decade in school can achieve. They can build you or break you so deeply that it will take years of therapy to recover.
The biggest hindrance to a joyous married life is the lack of acceptance of who your spouse truly is. So, you married for functional reasons, such as procreation, and conformity to what society expects of a 30-something-year-old, heck, even got a plot in Kamulu and put up a four-bedroom maisonette with a flat roof.
But then, when these functions are met, you realised mediocrity has set in. You are lonely because you do not view your spouse as a friend, confidant, lover and life companion. Marriage has become a chore.
Your spouse has not turned out or transformed into what you had imagined. You feel short-changed. The busyness, the hustling, what is the value of that if you do not laugh together? You keep asking yourself, ‘why did we get married?’ ‘Why did I choose this person?’
You question your life choices. You wonder how the other couples hack it. But you are a Kenyan. You toe the line, never question the norms, do not fix that which is not broken and never go off script. Meanwhile, you keep dreaming, haranguing your spouse so that he or she can magically transform into the one you have in mind.
