Common Reasons Why Marriages Fail

Wasn't marriage, like life, unstimulating and unprofitable and somewhat empty when too well ordered and protected and guarded. Wasn't it finer, more splendid, more nourishing...

...when it was, like life itself, a mixture of the sordid and the magnificent; of mud and stars; of earth and flowers; of love and hate and laughter and tears and ugliness and beauty and hurt. ― Edna Ferber, Show Boat, 1926

Marriage is more like an adventure trip that two people decide to experience together. This journey is more like a roller coaster ride, full of ups and downs. Sometimes you'll be smiling and sometimes you'll be crying! The answer to why this union breaks, lies in how we handle the ups and downs of our married life.

As mentioned in the aforementioned quote, the real beauty of marriage is when you take it as life. Because even life gives you a lot of reasons to cry and feel shattered, many times you think that life ain't working for you ...

What do you do then? Leave life? No, you continue to live, hoping that sooner or later things will fall into place. The same is the kind of attitude that you need to adopt when it comes to marriage. Sadly, that's not the case, and that's the reason why most marriages fail.

The number of divorces have been increasing day by day, and the rate has almost gone up by 50% or more. With the modern generation being so open-minded, understanding, and independent, these numbers are really shocking!

What can one make out from this? Why do marriages fail more now as compared to the past generations? Has the modern approach and independent mindset got to do something with it?

Here are the phrases, or to be more specific, the mindsets that develop in couples, which, if not mended in time, lead to a distorted relationship, often resulting in separation, or divorce.

Lack of trust and understanding is the most common reason for a failed marriage! Being adamant to look from the same perspective and avoiding to put yourself in your partner's shoes, is why people drift away from each other. What you need to remember is that although united as one, you still have an individual mind, and it's natural to face conflict.

If you have this mindset that every clarification that comes from your spouse's end, is a lie, then you really need to come across the meaning of TRUST. Trust is the basis of all relationships. If you think you can sustain a happy relationship without trust, that's like swimming in a pool without water!

Just judging your spouse based on assumptions derived from the past is so very wrong. Even in the Bible, in 1 Cor. 4:5 Paul has warned against attempting to judge the thoughts and motives of others.

When we find that special person to spend the rest of our lives with, there are a great deal of expectations that we tend to have from our spouse. Unlike olden days, where only the man used to work and the woman took care of the house, today things have changed.

With both spouses working and having an independent social and professional life, it becomes difficult to be with your partner every time he/she needs you, physically or emotionally.

Both the man and wife should understand this and try to give time to each other. At the same time, there should be a mutual understanding as to why is one not able to meet one's expectations in certain circumstances.

Independent thinking to some extent is alright, but when you are married, the prime focus should be on united thinking. Even the Bible quotes, "In the Lord, however, woman is not independent of man, nor is man independent of woman. For as woman came from man, so also man is born of woman. But everything comes from God." ― I Corinthians 11:3-12

Instead of thinking that he/she has changed, most people fail to think what made them change! Deciding to get married is a mature decision and you need to show that maturity in your relationship too. We all are well aware of the fact, that with marriage comes great responsibilities, you need to be stable to be secure.

The casual attitude turns into serious commitments in life, thereby making the person more responsible. Sadly, the pressure may tend to overcome the romance. The inability to understand the reason and causes behind the "changed demeanor", leads to differences in married couples.

This attitude is another step which takes you closer to a failed marriage. By saying that you don't need to go through all this, you're implying that you are willing to escape from the person, and eventually from the marriage.

Instead, the attitude that one should develop, is to work on how to make things better and not to consider "running away" as an option. In life too, no one wants to go through the lows and difficulties, but working them out and not letting go is what makes life worth living.

When people have more options, the determination to stick around fades away. That's one of the reasons why 90% of the divorces take place due to infidelity! It is obvious that we want to see only the best of our spouse, but then it's not completely accepting the person, right?

It's rightly said, "Always marry a person who understands that you are not perfect and still wants to spend the rest of his/her life with you." When taking vows in front of the alter, and uniting in the holy matrimony, most of the couples fail to realize that they are united with the person forever.

The Bible quotes the instance when Jesus was confronted by the scribes and Pharisees about the divorce issue. Jesus said, "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate." ― Matt. 19:5-6

If the 'other options' were eliminated from the world, and people had the mindset of only 1 person in their lives, they would choose to stick around and work it out instead of letting go.

Aaahh... the never ending blame game! Things go wrong for a couple, when instead of showing their mature side to team up and work things out, they are busy blaming each other for their miseries. If blaming ever solved the problem, go ahead, blame all the more!

But then, we all know it never lessens the problem, in fact, it makes the matter worse! The couples end up saying mean and hurtful things to each other. Gentle words bring life and health; a deceitful tongue crushes the spirit. ― Proverbs 15:4

Unlike olden days where sex was saved until marriage, these days people indulge in sexual activities beforehand. Many of you won't accept it, but knowing your spouse too much before marriage results in creating a sense of boredom and lack of sexual attraction.

Until both, or at least one of the partners makes conscious efforts to do something interesting and experimenting in the bedroom, this lack of interest can lead to serious issues, such as having an extramarital affair.

Eventually, after all the aforementioned aspects of marital problems, a thinking develops in the mind that the marriage was a mistake, that these two people don't fit into each others life! When this mindset sinks in, all you would do is find ways to get out of the relationship, instead of taking conscious efforts to work it out.

The reasons behind a failed matrimony lie in small issues and high egos. How can you hate the person you once loved, to such an extent that you want to get separated? Or maybe, you never loved the person? To conclude this, we would like to quote an amazing verse from the Bible:

Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. Love doesn't demand its own way. Love is not irritable and it keeps no record of when it has been wronged. So, learn to love the person you married and know how blissful the unity is.