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  • A mentor for my marriage will matter more

    August 4, 2008

    Posted in: church, marriage, reflecting on self, relationships

    I suck at finding mentors.  I hate asking people to mentor me.  I don’t know how to do it without it becoming awkward.  And I secretly fear that the person I’m asking will laugh and say no.

     

    When I was in college, it was so much easier.  The theatre association I joined assigned every new member a mentor, it was just up to you to maintain the relationship.  When I joined my sorority, you picked your big and your big then mentored you through out your Greek Life experience (and I still go to my big when I’m mulling over major life decisions, Thanks Michelle!).  When I was elected president of my chapter, there was an alumnae member just waiting to be my advisor.  Everything was provided for me.

     

    But now, I have to find my own mentors.  And I don’t know where to begin.  I really don’t have a mentor for my career or a mentor for blogging. 

     

    I’m more concerned though about finding a mentor for my marriage.  Because, at the end of the day, I will only be married once.  Making this work, and in a healthy way, is so important.  I won’t get another shot at a happy marriage but there will always be a second chance with my career.

     

    There are a few reasons why finding a couple to mentor my marriage is so hard.

    1. So many marriages end in divorce.  And so many marriages end after the kids have already grown and left the house.  I don’t want to be mentored by someone whose marriage is falling apart but at the same time, you don’t really know if a marriage is successful until one of its partners has died.
    2. We would have to find a couple that would be beneficial for both of us. This mentoring relationship wouldn’t just be about me and the mentor but me, my husband and the mentoring couple.  Just thinking about establishing a relationship makes me realize just how different Brian and I truly are.
    3. My husband and I are Christians.  Brian has a Pentecostal upbringing whereas I have a Presbyterian past.  But here’s where it gets complicated: I broke away from the church for years (hello sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll). It took a long time for me to come back to the church and when I did, I discovered it was really difficult for me to relate to other Christians.  Brian, on the other hand, has no past like that to deal with and address.  My past is just as much a part of my marriage as the present we now share.  We encounter very few Christian couples who understand what that sort of past really means.

     

    With that being said, not having a mentor is just not a good idea.  But I’m not quite sure where I am supposed to go next.  And when something is so important, how do you establish criteria without crippling yourself in the process?  It almost feels more difficult than the decision to become a married couple. 

     

    Where do you find your best mentors?  And how do you establish that relationship once you have realized the potential?

    • Recent Comments

    • carm said...

      1

      i agree. it’s awkward, tough to find a good match… where do we go from here? my husband and i are in the same boat… and i find myself wanting to approach people and not doing so out of fear of rejection.

      08/5/08 7:49 PM | Comment Link

    • Rebecca said...

      2

      I’m not married, but I enjoyed this post and I’m happy to have discovered your blog.

      08/5/08 11:59 PM | Comment Link

    • Dorie said...

      3

      @carm – So how do you process the fear of rejection? And what type of people do you want to approach?

      @Rebecca – I’m happy you discovered my blog too. Esp. because I am so inspired by your blog. :)

      08/8/08 8:06 AM | Comment Link

    • Christien said...

      4

      Great post!

      Unfortunately, it’s one of those things that you can’t get in a day. The one thing I try to keep in mind is that not everything is black and white. Whomever you get help from will have some issue in their marriage, and that doesn’t make them a failure. You just have to listen to experience and filter what is relevant to your marriage.

      08/15/08 11:21 AM | Comment Link

    • Dorie said...

      5

      @Christien – On some level, I expect that all marriages will have struggles and issues but I’m fearful of the marriages that fall apart quietly with no one noticing from the outside.

      08/18/08 10:51 AM | Comment Link

    • christian said...

      6

      sup guys
      I whole heartedly love the look of http://www.dorieannmorgan.com. Looks good, keep it up!
      anyways..
      Im a very “strong” christian and I guess I have a couple questions on my mind..
      I’ve been thinking a lot about dating.. but im not sure where to get going.
      My brothers have been telling me christian dating is the way to go.. so I’ve done a little studying on Christian Match Making and found some stuff on google
      Would be sweet to listen to your input.

      08/22/08 4:30 AM | Comment Link

    • christian said...

      7

      I would like to say that i love your blog http://www.dorieannmorgan.com a lot
      now.. back to the post lol
      I cant say that fully agree with what you typed up… care to clear things up for me?

      08/24/08 10:53 PM | Comment Link

    • Dorie Morgan’s Rising Up » Did blogging change anything? » Navigating Twenty-Something Suburban Life said...

      8

      [...] I can’t share a romantic story about how a man once commented on my blog and lo and behold we fell in love. Instead I can tell you about meeting my husband at church through his sister and deciding to get married without ever dating. I never meant to find true love on the internet but I’ve been blessed to have a blog that gives my husband and me something to talk about at night. [...]

      12/16/08 12:23 PM | Comment Link

    • Valentina said...

      9

      Great post! And nice to know that there are more married couples my age around ;) For my own marriage it helped a lot to have other couples (married or not) with the same peculiar situation, which in my case is European women married to Latin American guy living in Europe. Traditionally the woman goes along to live where her husband comes from and well, in Europe usually the women is the Latina. So having found two or three couples with the same setup has been enormously helpful for both me and the husband. Just sharing stories with somebody who kind of understands the situation is already helpful. For both of us.
      Good luck in finding somebody!

      12/14/09 1:37 AM | Comment Link

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