John N. N. Ng'ang'a

A Long-Term View of Marriage

Marriage is for the long haul, more of a marathon than a hundred-metre dash. However, many tendencies in modern marriages suggest that many people have a short-term view of marriage. 

There are several symptoms to suggest that this is the case. 

Over investment in modern weddings is one of the symptoms. A wedding ceremony is a one-day affair, while marriage is for a lifetime, yet so much investment is made into the wedding ceremony. People glorify weddings to the extent of taking loans to finance a wedding ceremony, not understanding that there will be living expenses after the wedding. That is only one symptom, where people forget that a wedding is one-day ceremony while marriage is for a lifetime.

It is important to understand that the type of wedding you have has very little contribution to the quality of your marriage. Those who have been married for long know, from experience, that what happens on the wedding day contributes very little to the quality of marriage. But any person waiting to marry doesn’t think that this can be true. If a bridegroom gets to know, while his wedding is going on, that the food that had been prepared was not enough for the guests who showed up for his wedding, he will think that the whole ceremony was a flop. But the truth is, not even such a terrible occurrence can affect marriage in the long-term – unless the groom and the bride blame each other for the mishap and make it a point of conflict later in their marriage. Weddings, without exception, experience setbacks of one kind or another, which might not be known to the guests, but the couple knows that things didn’t go exactly as they wanted.

Any couple that doesn’t have a long-term view of marriage risks heart-breaking frustrations.

I grew up in the village, so I know about people hiring farms for commercial purposes. If weather conditions that season turn unfavourable, you might suffer huge losses after you had hired land for farming. If you had taken a bank loan to finance the venture, you might face major challenges when it comes to paying the loan. But, if you are the owner of the farm, you will have a long-term view, in spite of making a loss that season. You will plant the following season again, and if the weather favours you, you can make a profit that will cancel the losses of the previous season. That is why the farmers get back to the farms even after making losses because they understand that farming has both good seasons and bad seasons, and eventually, you get a good return.

Somebody told me something about poultry keeping; he said that the venture usually is very profitable. What happens is, many people get to hear that people are making a lot of money from the venture, so they too invest in poultry rearing, hoping to make a lot of money quickly. After a few months, hotels get flooded with eggs and chicken. And, as it always happens, when supply exceeds demand, the price drops. People make losses, and a significant number of those who had invested in the venture quit. But those who hold make a profit the following season, because by then, supply will have dropped. Thus, the investor who makes money is the one who was there before the price drop, during the price drop, and still continues to see the prices pick up again. 

Survive Challenges

If you have a long-term view of marriage, you can survive the challenges that come your way. When you look back ten years later, you see a positive net cash flow for the business called marriage.

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