Concept: Types of Marriage

The text describes six types of marriage in our society.  The six types of marriage consist of vital, total, passive-congenial, devitalized and conflict-habituated marriage.  Vital portrays a close bond in the categories of emotion and sexual closeness.  This makes both parties involved satisfied with the relationship, and in turn creates a stable relationship.  A total relationship shows similarities as vital does, but the major difference is each person still has their independence from one another.  This is shown by giving each other space and separation.  Passive-congenial has qualities of low passion in the relationship.  Rather than finding happiness and satisfaction within the relationship it is found in activities that are outside of it.  Devitalized marriages are a potential reasoning on why many marriages end up in divorce.  This is when couples that are in a marriage become bored with each other, and have no passion to continue on with it.  Finally, in a conflict-habituated marriage there are traces that lead to showing the couple having no compatibility at all.  I feel that many marriages that involve younger people share this type of marriages since young couples tend to rush into marriage without knowing if they are fully compatible or not.

Marriage in 50 Years

     One thing that I have noticed in past five years is how much younger people are getting married.  It seems like a lot of young adults, even at the age of eighteen get married right away.  Normally I wouldn't really care or think anything of it, but divorce rates have drastically gone up in recent years as well.  This leads me to believe that it's only going to get worse as the years roll on until people make changes.  The problem is everyone is free to make whatever decisions they want to make, and that is completely their decision to make.  Yet I believe that divorce rates are going to be insanely high in the next fifty years. 
     I feel that young adults rush into a marriage these days with not knowing what they are really getting themselves into.  You have to really know how life is going to change for you, and your significant other.  I have had friends that were younger than me already get married and then only last no more a year before they decided separate and get a divorce since it wasn't working.  It's things like this that make marriage seem like it means nothing to people, and it makes me wonder if marriage is even special anymore with people taking advantage of it.  It needs to stop before marriage is just seen as one big joke in our society.

Families

Family is everything to me.  Normally you would think that family means a father, mother, and children.  You could also put cousins, aunts, uncles,  and grandparents into that category as well.  These are great examples of what a family would consist of.  However, even though I do believe in family like the examples above it's not the only way that I define family.  My family doesn't stop at blood, but it connects to my closest friends as well.  This includes my best friends, girlfriend, and my girlfriends family.  All of these people are a part of my family outside of my blood family.  This especially means a lot to me when it comes to my girlfriend as someday our two families will be connected once we get married after I graduate.  Two separate families will become one because of this.  With this being known my girlfriend and I would have to say that we have a total marriage even though we're not married yet.  We enjoy each others company for entertainment, but we also have our separate interests that that we want to individually pursue at the same time.  

Chapter Concept: Trust

I chose the concept of trust since trust means a lot to me in my morals and values that I hold.  Trust can be defined as two different things that are both very important: 1. To assume emotional reliability with the other, 2. showing that there is confidence in others when it comes to dependability.  The person that I can say I have the utmost trust in is my girlfriend.  She has always been there for me when I needed her, and she has never judged me for choices that I have made for the last three years.  Trust is something that I don't have come naturally with others.  They have to earn my trust by showing me that they want me to be a more open person.  If they show me that they want to have my trust then I know that they are a true friend.  I know they will be there for me when I need them, and I will be there for them if they need me.  It revolves around dependability and reliability for me among other factors.

My Best Friend

The person that is my true best friend is my girlfriend who I plan on proposing to sometime soon once I graduate.  That is how much I trust her in life since marriage is a big step in life.  However, I have decided to talk about my long term best friend that I have known since my junior year of high school.  We met through a mutual friend have pretty much been inseparable since then.  We clicked right away since we had a lot in common.  To this day I can say that I can trust him with anything that I have to disclose to someone when I need to vent or get something off my mind.  I know that he is a person that will always be there for me when I need him, and vice verse.  Qualities like this are hard to find with someone since it's hard to find trust and loyalty with another.  It takes believing in another person to make strides in building a relationship like this, and I feel that it does co-exist with what the book was trying to explain.

Forum Post

What's up everyone!  First off I hope everyone had a great spring like I did.  Nothing beats Vegas!  Anyway I went and explored the forums page to see what it was like.  One thing stood out to me that made me feel that it didn't truly agree with my morals and values I hold with my friends.  It was the section that dealt with dealing and solving issues between friends.  I cannot really agree the advice and suggestions that the forum recommends.  This is because that they don't put into factor individual personalities, and more specifically mine and my friends.  The friendships I have with my friends is unique and different from others just like everyone else is with their own friends.  No one is similar and that is what makes each person and their friends different from one another.  Only I and my friends can really understand and know how to handle a disagreement or argument between us since we know each other well enough to know how to handle the situation.