To Date or Not to Date

 What even is dating? Why am I struggling to find someone to date? Why are so many kids in middle school and high school going around telling their friends, "Oh yeah, me and June have been dating each other for three weeks," or "Aren't Josh and Lena dating now?" Are these kids actually dating? First, I want to help answer that first question. What even is dating?

When a young teen boy finds a young teen girl he likes, he'll probably try to hold their hand or if he's gutsy he might even cuddle with her. If he's real brave he'll even work up the nerve to kiss her. Soon after, someone might ask the question, "so what are we now? Are we dating?" According to some, yes they might be dating. But where is this going to lead to? After a few weeks they might get bored of each other and move on. The boy will hold another girls hand, kiss her, "date" her for a maybe a couple months and move on to yet another girl. This is not dating! At least, not in the way it's laid out by certain therapists.

Dating in a proper way might be described by some as "playing around." A boy will find a girl, ask her out and spend quality time with her and then do the same with another girl. The next week he will do the same thing with a couple other girls. As I said, this type of dating might label a boy or girl as a player, but this allows the individual to gain experience and figure out what they want in a relationship. Eventually, this individual will find someone that they want to spend more time with and may ask them out again. After a few more dates they might move into the courtship phase. This may be what those high school teenagers are more familiar with. In the courtship phase, the boy and girl are essentially a designated couple. They hold hands in public and all that other fun stuff. However, I want to add, it is still vital to a healthy relationship to keep going on quality dates with the chosen person. Quality time is irreplaceable. As the couple's relationship builds, they might start talking more and more about engagement and marriage.

Engagement is the next and third stage of choosing to marry someone, followed soon thereafter, of course, by the fourth stage; marriage. Again, I would like to emphasis that it is still important for the couple to date. They need to go on dates with each other and spend that quality time with each other.

To help answer the second question, why am I struggling with finding someone, I would like to make known how important it is to include God with our decisions. God should not be excluded from any aspect of our life, even our dating life.

God wants to answer our prayers and wants us to be happy. So why, then, are there so many people who struggle to date or get married? God sometimes let's us make the wrong decision so that later on we will know what the right one is.

A story is told by a religious leader of how he was driving back from a hike and came to a fork in the road. After praying to know which fork to take, he felt he should take the right one. It was a dead end. He turned around and took the left road which of course, was the correct road that led him home. Why had God let him go down the right road? The church leader would know, for a certainty, that the other road was the one that would lead him home. The same principle sometimes applies with dating. We will date around and think we found the perfect girl or the most handsome man, only to realize after a few weeks, or months, or even years that they are not the correct one to marry. God will help guide you to a person that will work with you. I am not saying there is one specific person for you to be guided to, but that God will help you make someone work if He sees fit.

Dating in the way of going on dates with multiple girls will help you find someone who will work out and may even help you find that someone faster. There is security in not getting too close until you feel you are right for each other. Once you do find someone who is willing to work with you, don't stop going on dates. Keep having experiences with each other, whether they're boring or exciting, and trust that God will help you in your journey.

It's Not About Battle of the Sexes

 Have you ever wondered why we are the way that we are? Why do women tend to be more gentle and caring? Have you noticed that boys seem to be more aggressive and competitive? I want to focus on the difference between the two genders, male and female, and their corresponding roles in the family. 

There are several memes and videos on social media that depict a male finding anything that resembles a gun, a stick, a chunk of metal, and then they proceed to shout "bang" as they shoot the new-found gun. Turns out, this goes a little deeper than just a little social media humor. There are have been various experiments done to help explain the difference between boys and girls. In one such study many types of toys were laid out. Little boys and girls were released to play with the toys. What do you think happened? For the most part the boys went to toys such as cars, a blue teddy bear and a ball. The girls played with pink teddy bears and a cooking pan. These were children from the ages nine months to 32 months! They didn't have much time to be influenced by the ways of the world, they just naturally went to those preferred toys. This goes to show that boys and girls really are different! What is impactful about these differences, especially when male and female come together to raise a family? 

Other studies have shown that girls tend to be more cooperative, gentle and connect well. Boys are competitive, aggressive, and compartmentalize relatively well. As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I believe God has blessed each gender with these differences so that they may better fulfill their roles as mother and father. In the "Family; a Proclamation to the World" (a document released by church leaders from God) reaffirms the role of a mother is to nurture, and a father is to protect, preside and provide. Perhaps you might already be seeing how the differing traits can help each gender fulfill their role. 

Mothers are the primary nurturers, especially in the first part of a newborn's life. The infant constantly needs the mother. Women are great at forming relationships and perhaps one of the most important relationships to build is between mother and child. A child needs to be treated gently, they need to feel connected. Their mother, with these traits, provides these necessities, almost throughout her entire life. A woman also tends to be aware of multiple things at once, which can be very useful when raising multiple kids that require almost constant attention!

A father, while he too can be gentle, needs to provide, protect and preside over the family. There are many dangers in the world. If a father is not aggressive enough during appropriate times, he may not be able to adequately protect his family. Males are shown to be more competitive, which may lead them to compete for higher paying jobs, bettering their ability to provide for their family. A father is also able to compartmentalize well, hopefully meaning that they can leave the stress of work at work and focus on his family when he is with them, helping him preside more effectively.

These are just a few general examples of how differing gender traits can help parents fulfill their responsibilities better, but we know not every male is aggressive, nor is every female cooperative. Individuals, no matter what gender, are unique. We do all have unique traits that can either be strengths or weaknesses. It is important that when we join together in marriage, that we do our best to compliment our strengths and weaknesses. God has outlined roles for mothers and fathers, and it is in our best interest to fulfill those roles to the best of our abilities. We will not be perfect at it and there will be times when the mother will have to step into the father's role and vice versa. What matters is striving to follow God and raising our family using the gifts and traits God has blessed each of us with. 

The Difference Between Cultures; How Moving Affects Family

 

 How much does culture affect a family? Each family is different, even families from the same town, in the same state, of the same ethnicity. Of course, each person is unique, meaning that each family will be unique. Though each family unit can be different from their neighbors, there is a general culture that surrounds each town, in different countries. We all know about the different types of cultures that exist, but what happens to the family when that culture is changed? I would like to share, essentially, the pros and cons a change in culture can have on a family. 

 To start off, I would like to mention the huge cultural change an immigrant family goes through and how that might alter the family dynamics. A study was done in North Carolina following ten different immigrant families from Mexico (https://www.jstor.org/stable/4541647). For the most part, the parents of each family wanted their children to have a better future, which would be achieved by gaining a US education and learning English. After the move, however, relationships were altered and for some the end goal of moving back to Mexico may have changed as well. To move the whole family from Mexico often took three years. The father would usually leave first, who would bring the rest of his family years later. This time gap typically decreased the quality of relationship between the father and the rest of the family. This is just one con from this change in culture, or rather in the process of changing cultures. Once in the states, the families would learn English which the kids picked up faster than the adults. Instead of relying on the adults for communication, the adults would have to rely on the kids. This could either be a pro or a con depending on the perspective. The children typically stayed loyal to their families, and this would strengthen that, but it might also be embarrassing to rely on their child so much. The family that moved to the States also most likely left behind extended family, which was a huge support in Mexico. The children often missed their extended family so much they felt lonely and depressed. This is why the immigrant families would still celebrate cultural rituals, which led to a greater feeling of loyalty to each other. These families, while struggling, are not less than the other families around them, they just are getting used to the cultural changes required to achieve their goals of a better future. 

 While there are so many other changes that may happen when a family changes culture by moving to a different country, I want to take some time to focus on what might happen to a family that just moves from one state to another, within the US. I feel like a few more people might be able to relate to this cultural change a little more. I would like to share some experiences I had from moving around different states. When I was six, my family left the place that had been home for my ancestors for 120 plus years. We moved eight hours away from the rest of my extended family, which was hard on all of us. Two years later, we moved again, this time about two hours from homes. Three years after that, we again moved eight away hours from extended family. Finally, we made one more move that again led us to live two hours away from most of our extended family. Each move became slightly easier than the one previously, I think because our family system was getting used to the changes.

Each individual may have suffered in slightly different ways, but essentially we all pulled through. Now, our family is well bonded. We don't rely on constant extended family support. I feel like we all became slightly more self-reliant. Each person in the family would have to get used to making new friends, get used to new schools and just dealing with a lot of "newness." Depending on how we reacted to the new things, we were either strengthened or weakened. I've gained and lost so many friends, I've started and stopped different sports, and I've had to deal with lots of other changes, but one thing has remained constant in my life; my family. 

 While we don't go through the drastic changes immigrant families go through we still had to get used to differences in with each town we moved to. We are not better than other families around us, nor are they better than us. We just simply have had different experiences that taught us different lessons. The same constant can apply to all families if they look at and deal with different challenges with the right mindset. Those immigrant families could give up, and many do, but that lessens the chances of achieving their goals. With the right mindset, any family could go through any cultural change and become stronger from it. 

https://www.jstor.org/stable/4541647

What Happens When We Assume Things in Relationships... Not a Whole Lot of Good

    How many of us have assumed things before? I'm pretty sure all us have and I'm equally sure that most of us can finish the saying about assuming and what it does to both parties involved. It doesn't usually end up good depending on the situation, especially in relationships. There are too many issues that can arise from simply thinking you know everything about your partner and what they're thinking. 

    Let me provide a couple of examples of how assuming things in a relationship can turns things bad too soon. 

    A boy, let's call him Kevin, really likes this girl. Let's call her Izzy. After a few days of talking Kevin finally gets up the nerve to ask Izzy on a date. When she says yes, Kevin's brain starts to churn. His hopes start to rise. Maybe she does like him. He gets her number and later that night he texts her. She responds! His hopes get even higher. On the date Izzy laughs a little at his weird jokes and maintains eye contact when she is talking to him. Looking in her eyes, Kevin is sure she likes him. See where this might be going? Later during the date he is walking her home and tries grabbing her hand, which she pulls away, leading to an awkward conversation where Izzy essentially friend-zones Kevin. At least she wants to get to know him better. Notice what happened when Kevin made an assumption about Izzy liking him. He thought she liked him though she was just doing nice, normal things. This certain situation is simple, but it gets a certain point across. While it might be helpful to look for signs of attraction, assuming things can complicate things. 

    Another example, perhaps a little more serious involves a married couple. Let's call them Nick and Katrina. For most of the first year of their marriage they were relatively happy and argument free. Just a few weeks before their anniversary Nick started coming home from work later and always seemed to be smiling at the texts sent to him by someone, but Katrina didn't want to be nosy and ask who Nick was talking to. After a couple of weeks of  this they were watching a movie, Nick's phone dinged, he looked at it and a grin grew onto his face. Katrina, who had had enough of this, asked who had texted him. Nick hastily put his phone down and said it was just a friend. Katrina asked what their name was and if she knew them. Nick said their name was Bella (It was a woman's name!) and that Katrina didn't know her. Katrina assumed the worse and started to get frustrated and extremely concerned. She began to pester Nick and an argument ensued. Katrina didn't give Nick a chance to explain himself until she had yelled at him and tensions were high. Finally Nick blurted out that he was planning her an anniversary gift. He had wanted to surprise her with a thoughtful gift and had been working with an artist named Bella who had been sending him updates of the gift she was working on for Izzy. Katrina felt horrible but they were able to talk it out. Nick could trust that Katrina really did love him and was loyal to him and Izzy trusted that Nick loved her too and was thoughtful with that love. 

    These two examples describe a form of symbolic interaction, a theory about the family and issues that might arise from not getting the full or proper perspective of the other parties involved. A key to avoiding situations like these is communication. Give it time and talk it out. Be understanding and open minded. Don't automatically assume the worse if you think you recognize a problem in your relationship. Of course there should be nothing wrong with asking questions and being concerned, but starting to interrogate your partner thinking that you know they are in the wrong will most likely create tension right off the bat. Trust and communication should be integrated into a relationship, whether budding or established, and will decrease assumptions in that relationship, thus strengthening the partnership and unity of both partners.