Marriage is a lifelong relationship that requires adequate preparedness and purpose. This is why it’s necessary that people intending to go into such exciting but demanding relationship get themselves acquainted with all the necessary knowledge to guarantee its success.
Here I’m going to share with you some essential factors you need to consider before getting married in order to ensure the success of a marriage union.
As one with over six years marriage experience, and a relationship counselor, my passion is to guide you through some important considerations before getting married. I am confident that acquainting yourself with these important factors will help enjoy healthy and lasting relationship. Let’s get started.
10 Essential Factors to Consider Before Getting Married
1. Effective Communication
Effective communication is one of the essential factors to consider before going into marriage, and it involves understanding and being understood. Effective communication is at the top of the list of other factors, because it opens the door for other factors to be known and considered.
Partners in a relationship should be free to express themselves and allow the other person to express themselves, too, for them to understand themselves better. None should feel bashful to communicate his or her emotions, feelings, thought, pains or ideas.
Effective communication is an important factor in relationship and marriage without which none can work. The workability, health and longevity of any relationship depends on the ability of the parties to effectively communicate, understand each other’s perspective, feelings and thought.
So it’s important intending couple communicate effectively to ensure they are compatible for such an exciting but demanding journey.
Read Also: 10 Effective Ways to Communicate in Your Relationship
2. Love
Love is a crucial factor to be considered before going into marriage. You must be sure you truly love your partner and that your partner loves you totally (for who you are) before considering taking the relationship further into marriage.
Though love may be transient, yet it matters most in the beginning of the relationship and marriage. You must be sure of what you feel for your partner and what he or she feels, too.
Any marriage devoid of love is like a mixture of concrete of cement, gravel and sand without water. Love is, therefore, the water that holds the concrete of marriage together.
3. Commitment
No marriage can stand the test of time without commitment. Thus, commitment is one of the fundamental factors to be considered before dabbling into marriage.
Love is just an emotion and it’s transient. Commitment is an assurance that you will be by your spouse’s side, no matter what happens. It’s a promise to stay with your partner through good and difficult times.
The uncertainty and unpredictability of life make commitment an important factor to be considered before getting married.
4. Importance of Friendship
Friendship is very vital before going into marriage. It’s important to know that the secret of long-lasting marriages is friendship.
Couple who build the foundation of their marriage on friendship has the chance to be successful than those who just got married without first starting with friendship. Friendship provides an opportunity for partners to understand each other better through effective communication, interaction and other engagements that give them chance to study each other better, for understanding.
Couple who got married to people whom they don’t know or don’t like, may likely be in love with the fact that they’re married and not really with their spouse.
5. Compatibility
Compatibility is one of the vital factors to be considered before getting married to your partner. Ensure you are compatible with your intending spouse in vital areas. You have to be sure that you are sexually compatible. Sexual compatibility is crucial because sex is an integral part of marriage. A marriage that lacks sexual compatibility is bound to collapse.
Ensure that you both are also compatible in terms of genotype, blood group, desire, purpose, feelings and more. Knowing these things will help eliminates every obstacle that may stand in the way of your union.
6. Trust
No relationship devoid of trust can last, including marriage. Trust binds partners together. If partners can do what they say and say what they do, there will be trust and the marriage is bound to last.
7. Mutual Respect
Mutual respect is another crucial element to be considered before you tie the knot. It determines the health and durability of the marriage. In marriage where couple have mutual respect for each, there is a chance that they will last.
Mutual respect helps couple to handle their disagreement with care and understanding. It helps couple to develop empathy and see things from each other’s perspective in the face of misunderstanding.
8. Willingness to Forgive
Patience and forgiveness are fundamental factors to consider before going into marriage. There’s no perfect human being. All of us have our weaknesses just like we have our strengths. Disagreement is inevitable in relationship and marriage, but how we manage this disagreement is what count.
Couple should be willing to be patient and forgive when offended. They should be eager to communicate effectively for mutual understanding and empathy.
So it’s important for intending couple to consider this important virtue before saying “l do.”
9. Finance
This is another essential factor that must not be left untouched because it’s as important as the survival of the marriage itself.
Intending couple must engage in financial discussion to discuss how they will be generating money, pay bills, sharing of the property they acquired together etc. Here it’s important that couple decides whether one of them will go into business and take care of the family or continue to work. Every financial discussion should be made beforehand to avoid conflict in the future. If a man wants a housewife who can only take care of the family, it’s important to discuss it here and so on.
10. Parenthood
While some people want to get married and raise children, some do not want to give birth and raise children. Your partner may be one of those people who not want to raise children. This is why it’s crucial you discuss this with your partner to know his or her view. It’s also necessary you discuss the number of children to give birth to and the standard to raise them.
Conclusion
The success of your marriage is determined by your ability to take cognizance of the essential factors that can guarantee a lasting marriage. Not considering those factor may spell doom on your marriage union. Maintaining a successful relationship is not easy, but knowing what to do will help you go through it successfully.