Fifty percent!
That’s how many marriages they say end up in divorce.
And you know what?
It doesn’t surprise me.
And it’s not because I have so little faith in marriage.
No, of course not.
We’re married.
It’s because of the most common reason people choose to get married for… happiness.
In this video, we’re going to talk about why it’s not a good idea to marry for happiness.
Number one: if you marry for happiness, unhappiness can be a threat to your marriage.
Recently, Daniel released a video on why not to live for happiness and shared why unhappiness
is a normal part of life.
No matter how much control you think you have over your happiness, it's still bound to go
up and down.
Sometimes, we feel down for a long time.
If we base marriage on happiness then it's a really unstable foundation to build marriage
on.
Perhaps you’ve already thought about the possibility of these unhappy times and figured
that you and your partner would work together to bring that happiness back.
But how?
Well, if you’re all about happiness, you probably care a lot about things being fair
too.
Which brings us to number two: if you marry for happiness, unfairness can also be a threat
to your marriage.
Unfairness is a normal part of life, but it really doesn't feel good when it happens to
you.
As a way to control fairness, people who marry for happiness are often more likely to want
everything to be 50/50 or 100% equal.
Nice idea, but you won’t be able to keep things perfectly fair.
All of us have our own set of challenges that hold us back from performing at our best and
there’s really no way of objectively measuring people’s challenges and effort.
And, one day, after you've done all your mental calculations around how much you’ve put
in versus how much your partner’s put in, you might very likely find yourself looking
at your marriage and thinking “this is unacceptably unfair.”
Number three: if you marry for happiness, you limit the love that you and your partner
get to experience in marriage.
There is a greater love than just going along with your feelings, the greatest form of love,
unconditional love.
One example of that is how parents love their children no matter how lovable or unlovable
they can be at times, they still love them so much.
Number four: if you marry for happiness, you’re more likely to limit your growth as a person.
Think about this…
What’s more closely connected to feeling good?
Having an easy life?
Or having a difficult life?
Having an easy life, right?
Some of you just want the benefits of companionship that you can just go to anytime you want and
you just don’t want to bother with all the hard work that goes into a successful relationship
that promotes self mastery.
You know, you just want live your life going to work and then coming back home to feel
good and not have to work on anything else, right?
Well, the right partner for you sounds like someone who’d just stay quiet about your
weaknesses and demand the least amount of change in you.
After all, if you're comfortable with all your weaknesses, that’s all that matters,
right?
No.
Number five: if you marry for happiness, happier alternatives can be a threat to your marriage.
If you approach marriage from a consumerist attitude, making it all about you, your needs
or how perfectly some external thing checks off all the boxes on your checklist, then
it's really no different than shopping for... say... a car.
It only makes sense to switch over to a new car with better specs as long as there’s
positive net happiness after you deduct all the switching costs.
But perhaps you only want to make one transaction for that one “best” car.
I mean, if you’ve got the best one, then you’ll know with certainty for the rest
of your life that there’s no better car out there on the market, right?
No buyer’s remorse for you, right?
Well, that then puts a great deal of pressure on you to test-drive as many cars as you can.
...Which brings us to number six: if you marry for happiness, you're more likely to waste
more time and more energy of others as you test them out on all the ways that probably
don’t add up to a solid marriage anyways.
Some people have no idea what they want out of marriage.
They just know that they want to feel happy.
So, with every hiccup in their relationship, their confidence in their partner gets tossed
back and forth.
And, in their attempt to gain more certainty, they stretch out time testing out their partner.
Until...5, 8, 10 years have gone by.
So that’s our top six reasons why it’s not a good idea to marry for happiness: one,
unhappiness can be a threat; two, unfairness can be a threat; three, you’ll limit the
love that you and your partner get to experience; four, you’re more likely to limit your growth
as a person; five, happier alternatives can be a threat; and six, you're more likely to
waste more of the time and energy of others.
What do you think about our list?
Do you agree?
Do you disagree?
Let us know in the comments below.
And to follow up on this video, we're going to be making a video on why we chose to get
married.
So, keep an eye out for that or hit the subscribe button and we'll see you next time.
Thanks so much.