Cookies!

When my husband and I were in engaged, just a few weeks before we were married, I experienced my most memorable lesson about learning from a [future] spouse. We were driving on the backroads of our little farm town, talking about the plans for the wedding reception. Some of his family, who were not yet used to thinking of us as adults, were struggling to come-to-terms with some of the plans. As a natural people-pleaser, this was really hard for me. I remember they wanted to change things I had picked out, and even though I had had my heart set on them, I was contemplating the change. I just couldn’t handle the thought of them being upset by me!

My sweet and amazing husband, then just my fiancé, put his foot down. He explained to me that if people have a problem with something that I love, that it is their problem. If I was kind and didn’t do anything wrong, then I shouldn’t feel bad. And if they still were annoyed, then it was their fault for choosing to be annoyed.

This was just so entirely different than anything that I had ever believed. My husband called these people and told them no, that they were stressing me out and to leave me alone about it all. And they did! And they didn’t hate me! Weird!

I remember this occasion not just for the lesson that he taught me about how to handle my people-pleasing tendencies, but for how different we were. For the first time I really understood that we were distinctive people, who reacted differently, but that we worked together.

This is perfectly explained by Elder Henry B. Eyring, at the end of his talk “That We May Be One:”

“A man and his wife learn to be one by using their similarities to understand each other and their differences to complement each other in serving one another and those around them.”

Since then, we have obviously had more differences pop up. I think they really work together to balance us out. I am a bit more bossy, while my husband usually has an along-for-the-ride attitude. I love to bake, and my husband loves to eat cookies. I stress about people seeing our house when it looks messy, while my husband doesn’t care if guests know that people actually live in our house. Those things can sometimes cause a little friction, but usually they work to even out our craziness to normal levels. And isn’t that balance what it is really all about? Finding what makes us one?

Being “one,” doesn’t necessarily mean being the same. It means that we are united. You can be united in purpose, in love, in goals...in so many things without being exactly the same. My husband and I work to be united, and because of that, our home can feel united. We work together to raise our children, to perform our callings, to be with our families, to love our neighborhood neighbors and to get through school. It starts in our marriage and works its way into everything that we do. The opposite thing happens, unfortunately, when we are not as united as we should be.

I am grateful for our differences, and I love our similarities. I love that both parts of our relationship work to bring us together as “one.” We fit each other. And…it is kind of nice that he is there to make sure no cookies go to waste.