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One of the biggest marriage traps is comparing your spouse to other husbands or wives. Comparing is the precursor of coveting. And God was concerned enough about coveting that it made His Top Ten list. So yeah, it’s a bad idea.
One of the problems with comparing is you don’t know how life really is for the other couple. You see their curated life, and a curated life will always look better than your reality.
Let me illustrate with a tale, based on a true story
George and Jane have been married for years. Jane has a midlife sexual awakening. She is suddenly all about sex with George, and she lets everyone at church know all about it. Other husbands are jealous of George, and wish their wives were more like Jane. Wives who struggle with sex are jealous of Jane, while wives who want sex to go away find her annoying.
What most folks don’t know is that Jane has more than her share of problems. High maintenance and selfishness are just the start. And as much as George is enjoying all the sex he can handle, it doesn’t make all the other problems go away. As Jane gets worse, George has to make hard choices, which cost him. The story took a tragic turn when Jane decided she wanted to experience sex with another man, and the marriage ended in divorce.
It’s an extreme example, but it makes the point well. Like all women, Jane was a package deal: the good, the bad, and the ugly. And men are the same way. That trait or habit you wish your spouse had is bundled with a lot of other things, including some you would not like. Possibly including some you would hate.
What’s even trickier is that some of what you like about your spouse is rooted in something that also grows something you don’t like. For example, being determined and goal-orientated comes from being strong-willed and persistent. But it can also lead to stubbornness and an inability to adapt. Attention to detail is great, but a tendency to micromanage is the other side of the same coin. Being highly sensitive means deep empathy, which is a blessing to any spouse. But it can also result in being easily overwhelmed or more prone to depression.
Your spouse is a complex person who is both beautiful and broken, and some of the beautiful parts are linked to broken parts. The same is true for all the spouses you wish your spouse were more like.
When you compare your spouse to another man or woman, you are comparing a whole person to an incomplete lie. You see more of the beautiful than the broken in others because we all hide our brokenness, and many hide their spouse’s brokenness.
~ This is Paul, and comparing is not Doing Marriage Well.
Image Credit: © Paul H Byerly created with ideogram.ai & Paul Byerly
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