Pride in Marriage

This week we got to study a talk by president Ezra Taft Benson entitled “Beware of Pride” given in a General Conference for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. As I read through the talk the first time, I started to realize that I am very guilty of pride in my life and it was things that I did not even associate with pride to begin with. How many of us are guilty of pride and not even aware of it?

          “Pride is a very misunderstood sin, and many are sinning in ignorance…

Most of us think of pride as self-centeredness, conceit, boastfulness, arrogance, or haughtiness. All of these are elements of the sin, but the heart, or core, is still missing.

The central feature of pride is enmity—enmity toward God and enmity toward our fellowmen. Enmity means “hatred toward, hostility to, or a state of opposition.” It is the power by which Satan wishes to reign over us.”

Wow, I found that I have enmity towards people without even meaning to a lot of the time. How many times do I find myself upset with the other drivers on the road, or the people at the grocery store?  In my own home, how many times a day do I get upset over clothes left on the floor, the toilet seat not being put down, crumbs on the counter and so on?  I am guilty of letting these things get to me every day and some of these reoccurring things can become enmity. There is pride rearing its ugly head in my home and life.

In marriage we can see this pride and enmity happening in so many couples. The little things start to bother us and over time we allow them to turn into big things. This can eventually turn into a wedge that drives us further and further apart.  For one of our assignments they asked us about the pride games that we are playing in our marriage relationships. I am going to include the list here so that each of us can see if we are playing these games.

          Common pride games played in marriage:

•    Ignore spouse, or give spouse the "cold shoulder” •    Impatient with impatience •    Caught up in who’s right and who’s wrong •    Blaming, defensiveness •    Attack, counterattack •    Scorekeeping, with intentions of noting who is winning or losing •    Refusal to apologize first •    Holding the other hostage by refusing to forgive •    Proving superiority by bringing up spouse’s faults •    Holding grudges •    The “silent treatment”

•    Sharing spouse’s weaknesses with others •    Intentionally trying to create jealousies in spouse •    Get others to create an alliance with you against your spouse •    Putting words in spouse’s mouth to manipulate •    Displaying an attitude of entitlement in the marriage •    Stubbornness or unwillingness to change •    Selfishness, thinking only of your needs •    Unwillingness to learn from spouse •    Fault finding •    Withholding love and affection

I hope this week as we are able to look over this list that we can each pick one or two things that we can work on not doing anymore. Then in the next several weeks hopefully we can eliminate these games from our lives all together. If you find that you do not participate in any of these games, then you are so much better than I am and I want to talk to you to find out your secret. I hope that as we strive to work towards eliminating these games that we can all have more fulfilling marriages.