The Cheating Question

What would you do it if you spouse cheated on you? What would be your sequence of actions? How would you want to be dealt with if you are the one that cheated?


Cheating… I asked this question because people’s first reaction to being cheated on is to get angry and from that emotion nothing good actually happens. I never understood why women automatically resort to violence in the situation of being cheated on. Finding out that your spouse has been unfaithful is not something to shrug off either. It is a very serious issue, but I don’t believe for one second that it deserves to be met with violence. The two actions don’t add up. The crazy thing is that women support the violent reaction, like that’s ok. He cheated on you; caused you emotional harm, humiliation and shame, but he did not cause you physical harm. Then there is that “all men cheat” stereotype. Well apparently we aren’t all gay so if all men cheat all women help them cheat.


The main reason I asked this question last week was to see how forgiving some people are willing to be when it comes to marriage. I chose this question because most people will agree that cheating is crossing the line in any relationship. To most people it is an unforgivable act that is grounds to end that relationship. I just don’t believe that. I think when people cheat they instantly feel regret for their actions and for the most part are ashamed to confess to their actions when they first do it. I think the reason people continue to cheat is because they guilt themselves into doing it. They fail to forgive themselves and fear that their spouse is not willing to forgive them. In many cases they are right. Why are we not willing to forgive someone that is really seeking forgiveness? If we were in a situation where we felt regret and remorse then we would want forgiveness but then we’ll hang things over people’s head who wrong us.


I believe in forgiveness. When people get married they promised to love and cherish each other through thick and thin, sickness and health, for richer or poorer. We as people don’t make the best decisions in life either. We are tempted on a regular basis, and we don’t pass every temptation test. Every temptation comes with at least two options. Either give in or walk away. When you give in to your temptations you have a moment of weakness. Just because you gave in doesn’t mean you have to give up either. So cheating doesn’t necessarily mean that you are willing to walk away from that relationship, just means that you made a stupid decision, now you can forgive yourself and ask for forgiveness or hide in your own shame and continue to cheat.


I don’t believe that forgiving people is handing them a free pass for their actions either. You reap what you sow, and every action has its proper response. I just don’t think that just because someone cheats on you that you should necessarily end the relationship. Every one has a selfish moment in a relationship. You have to decide whether the relationship is larger than that moment of weakness. The question isn’t really about cheating its how invested are you in your relationship? Are you that sure that you want to be with your spouse that you are willing to stick it out with them and help them through their problems and weaknesses? Some people really aren’t that invested in their relationships. Some people look for even the smallest excuse to give up on people. When it comes to marriage it’s bigger than that, especially if children are in the picture. Maintaining a healthy relationship isn’t a cake walk and I can only imagine how challenging it is to raise children and maintain a relationship. I just know that you can’t be invested in only the things you want to do.


Again, I’m not giving cheaters a pass, because cheating is a very selfish act. You are in a committed relationship but you are only worried about what you want and how you feel at that moment. You aren’t even thinking about how your actions are going to affect your life and the life of your spouse, how they will view you, the example you are showing. But if you have cheated you have to be willing to forgive yourself and hope that your spouse loves you enough to forgive you and rebuild the relationship that you damaged. I just don’t see how people believe that they are over forgiving someone for the things they did. Who are you to deny someone forgiveness? I promise you that when you find yourself on the wrong side of a decision you’ll want forgiveness. I know I would want it.


Let’s look at the situations that Kobe Bryant and Tiger Woods found themselves in. Both incidents of them cheating went public. When Kobe did it every wanted his wife to divorce him and take all his money, why? Cause people are selfish and dumb. He asked his wife forgiveness and there hasn’t been another incident to this day that we know of. He is always talking about his family and shows how much he loves them everyday. Asked for forgiveness, was given forgiveness and everything is how it should be. Tiger on the other hand, had an affair with several different women and it blew up in his face. Both men were shameful for their actions but Tiger’s shame lead him down the wrong path. I don’t know if his ex wife forgave him or not, but her divorcing him was the right thing to do in my eyes because it was just too much. His infidelity was outrageous. You have to handle each situation differently. I’m sure Tiger loves his ex wife, but that was just messed up, and I think she made a sound decision.


I believe that no action is above redemption in my eyes. Every negative thing we do in life has a chance to be redeemed. I believe that redemption is possible for all who seek redemption and to make amends of the negative things they do in life. If these people are sincerely seeking redemption I believe we should support them. Meaning, that we need to be able to forgive people and not hang things over their head. So I don’t believe that once a cheater always a cheater - VP

The Prenuptial Agreement Question

Would you create a prenuptial agreement or sign one? How do you feel about prenuptial agreements? 

Before anyone tries to bite my head off for saying what I’m about to say, I believe in protecting your assets as well as you can. If you work hard to achieve something I do not feel it is right to have that taken away from you or that you should have to share that with someone. Now there are certain things that were designed for you to share and you purposely intended to share those things with someone. Those things are understandable to me. When it comes to prenuptial agreements, I have no objection or ill will for them.




A lot of people feel like a prenuptial agreement is like being married with one foot out of the door, but I don’t feel that way. I look at it as an insurance policy. If this marriage were to end then MY assets are protected. I don’t have to forfeit the plans I have for those assets just because my spouse wants to be greedy and get her hands on things that don’t belong to her. Yes when you are married you share things, but some things just don’t belong to you, they mean nothing to you and the only reason that these people want these things is because they believe they hold some form of monetary value, and its kind of like stabbing some one with a knife and leaving it in the wound (which is ideal because that’s what you are suppose to do when it comes to a puncture womb, you know so you don’t further worsen the wound… I digress).

We cannot ignore the fact that people are greedy. It doesn’t matter how much you love someone or claim you love them; you have limited control in how they act or will act. The tricky thing about making this statement is that I’m insinuating that you guard yourself in a relationship. However when it comes to marriage you can’t be guarded. Before you get married you have to be willing to be committed and trusting to one another. Saying this basically crushes my prenuptial agreement support. With divorce rates so high, it’s a little hard to ignore the fact that you may need some insurance. No one sees insurance as a bad thing. Having insurance is not saying that you are going to have an accident, and some people never have vehicle accidents. It’s saying that in case you do find yourself in an unfavorable situation you are protected. You are covered just in case something happens that you did not account for. In marriage most people don’t account for the fact that they may get divorced, why should you. Who goes into a relationship constantly thinking about the possible eventual break up?

I just think prenuptial agreements are highly misunderstood. For one it’s an agreement. It’s documentation (to me similar to a will, a marriage will) that says if this marriage were to fail I would like these assets to be protected under my care. With people so caught up in material possessions nowadays I don’t think that’s such a bad idea. Look at all the people that thought they were in love and when it went bad their former spouse gutted their assets and now this person is a miserable wreck because everything they earned has been taken away from them. Everything they planned for is ruined because of someone’s greed. Who wants to be that person?

I think if your spouse-to-be wants you to sign a prenuptial agreement, you need to read over it and sign it. ONLY IF IT APPEARS TO BE APPROPRIATE!!!!! They already want to be married to you, but they are just having you sign insurance papers. That’s not necessarily saying that you are walking into a failed relationship. The reason I don’t see it as a failure is because the best way to protect yourself is to stay married. As long as the two of you are married then you are going to be taken care of. I do not believe that a person should be financially supporting someone after a divorce, I don’t care what you claim to be use to or have grown accustom to. You were accustomed to be married but now you aren’t so deal with that decision. Now I understand there are many factors as to why people get divorced, I’m not talking about the super serious reasons (abuse, etc.). I’m talking about the petty reasons as why people get divorced. I believe if your spouse abuses you in any way that they need to be sued. However all of these things can be stipulated in the prenuptial agreement. To wrap it all up, the prenuptial agreement is basically legally documenting the act of putting all your cards on the table, in my opinion. I may be wrong, but at the same time I’m not against signing one or creating one if I see fit to do so. I’m not going to ignore the fact that things can go wrong and in the event that something can go wrong I don’t want me or my spouse being left out in the cold. If you really loved someone you wouldn’t want to harm them in any way. You wouldn’t want to take anything that belongs to them for your own selfish greed. You wouldn’t be petty or selfish period.


VP  
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

The Traditional Marriage Question

Would you still want to marry your spouse to be if he or she didn't want a traditional wedding?







I'm a very simple person... a traditional marriage to me is between a man and a woman, how they want to be married doesn’t really bother me. Reasons being, I’m not the one getting married and I’m not paying for their marriage. That being said I want things to be as smooth as possible when it comes to holy matrimony. I personally want a simple wedding with my family and close friends in attendance. That's as close to traditional as I'm getting. I'm just not that big on huge events that cause people to lose sight of what's important. If my wife-to-be wants some huge meaningless ceremony, then I obviously made some mistake along the lines of me dating her…







Tradition is not a bad thing, but we can tend to focus more on the act of tradition and not its original meaning. We don't necessarily put any real thought into why we actually do some things. Tradition actually varies from group to group, family to family and person to person. So if everyone has their own tradition, what is truly traditional? Tradition basically boils down to what we are use to doing. I know when it comes to marriage traditional basically means marrying in a church in front of friends and family but like I said tradition varies from group to group. Always keep in mind that what's traditional to you isn't traditional to your spouse to be. Should that necessarily kill the relationship because the two of you have two different perceptions of what is traditional? I don't think so. Tradition can be a huge thing to people. Just like engagement rings. It’s a custom to give the woman a ring when you propose to her. There isn’t anything wrong with engagement rings but we can all agree that the whole engagement ring thing can be blown out of proportion. That can be said about tradition. You can go to church every Sunday for the rest of your life and that won’t make you a better person. Tradition really does mean a hill of beans. It’s just something we are use to do and don’t want to deviate from. It really comes down to you willing to spend the rest of you life with this one person, and if you are then you’ll realize how much the outside things really don’t matter.







The great thing about marriage is that once the two of you are married you start creating your own traditions whether you realize it or not. So you really shouldn’t get caught up on the act of keeping tradition. Focus on the meaning of why the tradition was started. - Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

The Engagement Ring Question

Are engagement rings important to have in the evolution of the relationship or just a waste of money?

In my personal honest opinion, engagement rings are pointless, which to me makes them a waste of money. I've heard why people think rings are so important but in the grand scheme of it all the ring holds as much importance as you put into it. At the end of each day the ring will be nothing more than metal and rock. Then again my opinion is bias because I don’t wear jewelry of any sort. I never understood the fascination of wearing jewelry. In fact, I didn’t buy my two college conference championship rings because I knew I was never going to wear the rings (plus I didn’t like the color and shape they chose), I digress slightly. I asked this question to see what people initially cared about and how they view the traditional engagement process. To all the men I've asked this question to 90% don't put that much importance in the ring. The only reason the man puts his energy into the ring is because his concern usually stops at the woman's desire.

Women fantasize and crave engagement rings a lot more than men do. In fact, some women will go as far as to not agree to marry a man just because he didn’t propose with a ring. They want a ring so bad that they refuse to marry the guy… The craziest thing about it is that the desire to have a ring is so much more than having the desire to be with the "man of their dreams". They have more affection for an inanimate object which feels nothing than the man who wants to spend the rest of his life with her. Before your marriage even begins her focus is completely off.



Of course the ladies would disagree with me because they feel like the ring is a symbol of commitment. It is suppose to be some constant reminder that they are in a committed relationship. It’s some bright shinny object that wards off men and makes her friends' and coworkers' jealous. My question is why should any of this matter? Sure a ring is a symbol of "eternal never ending love", just a forever loop of affection and blah, blah, blah. The thing about symbols is that we often find ourselves putting more energy and focus into the actual symbol than what they are suppose to stand for. A symbol is just that an image. Christians don’t worship crosses over Jesus Christ… well Christians that have a clue.



I personally think that the majority of females out there think they deserve a ring. It’s entitled to them. The reality of it all is that you don't have to be presented with or present a ring to advance your relationship. It really bothers me to hear females say that they would not marry a man just because he didn't get them a ring. Why is it so important to have one? The ring is just reinforcement to the proposal. It’s a visual symbol that helps persuade you into saying yes. That being said that visual symbol can be anything. It can be a boat, a car, a house, a slap bracelet, her favorite flower, etc. It doesn’t have to be anything, because the only thing that should matter is that this dude has made a decision in his heart and mind to want to spend the rest of his life with you. He wants to cherish and love you for the rest of his natural life. The only thing left for the two of you to do after he gets off his knee is to sign some papers to make it official. No ring can take the place of that. You don’t need a ring to remind you that you are married. You don’t need a ring to ward off people because they find you attractive, that’s why you have a mouth. If you are incapable of verbally telling someone that you are in a committed relationship then chances are you are looking for some excuse to step out of the relationship. If you are desperate for attention outside of your relationship well I don’t know what to tell you.

To me rings are extremely overly hyped and that’s our fault as people. We lose sight of the things that really matter. I’m not saying that I would not get a ring; I just don’t want the person I’m with to lose sight of what really matters in our relationship. How much you spend on a ring will never equal how much you care about a person. Never has and never will. I just hope we keep our relationships in perspective.

-VP

Intro to Evaluating the Next Step in Relationships

The older I get the more I think about marriage and relationships. To me relationship is the only thing that really matters in this world. It's the beginning and the ending of almost everything if you really think about. With my friends and family taking their relationships to the next level I could help but to ask myself questions. They were pretty interesting questions if i should say so myself, so I shared them with my friends just to see what their opinions and thought processes were.

Some people think I think to much, and that may be in the case in certain situations but I believe that these questions are important. They way you answer a question actually says more about you than a lot of people think. Your answers can show where your focus is when it comes to certain issues. They can even tell you what kind of person you are. Of course you all know this. So I've asked myself and my friends these following questions and I will be answering them throughout the week:
- Are engagement rings important to have in the evolution of the relationship or just a waste of money?


- Would/Could you marry a man if he didn't give you a marriage/engagement ring?


- Would you still want to marry your spouse-to-be if he or she didn't want a traditional wedding?


- Would you create a prenuptial agreement or sign one? How do you feel about prenuptial agreements?


- What would you do if your spouse cheated on you? what would be your sequence of actions?


- How would you want to be dealt with if you are the one that cheated?

 Pretty interesting questions huh? Maybe not, but I recieved some interesting responses. So I'm taking over the blog this week. That being said it will mainly be my opinion being expressed so feel free to argue or discuss your viewpoint. I welcome it.
I hoe you guys enjoy

-VP