“This can’t go on,” Louise told Wes at their State of our Union meeting. “I know you feel betrayed, and frustrated, and angry with what’s happened to your career, and I share those feelings. But you are bringing that anger and frustration into our marriage and shutting me out. I feel lonely and abandoned. It hurts that you aren’t here for me and you won’t let me be here for you.”
Life had done a number on Wes. After a decade of rising through the ranks of his company and being made head of engineering, Wes was sent by the management to law school to prepare him for a new management position that required a thorough knowledge of both engineering and law. But in his final semester, his company was bought by another company with a different vision. The new position was eliminated and Wes found himself without a job.
He felt betrayed; he was devastated and depressed. For several weeks he obsessively called colleagues and e-mailed resumes in pursuit of a job, but the years he’d spent in management and studying law had put him out of touch with his engineering specialties, and he could find no positions commensurate with his odd combination of degrees or the salaries he’d previously had. He was either overqualified or underqualified for every job. He felt like a failure.
After three weeks, his wife told him at their State of our Union meeting that while she sympathized with his anger and depression over his job loss, she was feeling abandoned in their marriage. She felt he’d withdrawn into himself, and when he had any time for her at all, she heard only repetitious tales of his woes.
Wes assured her it was temporary, just until he found a new job.
Three months later, there was still no job, and their marriage was still on hold. Wes was depressed. Flooded with shame, humiliation, and anxiety, he continued to disengage from his marriage. He and Louise didn’t fight, but they also didn’t talk much. He ignored his household obligations until reminded, then silently took care of them. He spent hours in front of the television or on the computer trying to distract himself from his anxieties.
Wes received a wake up call when his wife asked him if he wanted a separation. “You’ve already separated from me emotionally,” she told him. “This might make it easier on both of us until you get over this slump.”
Instead, Wes took a hiatus from his job hunt. He took over all the household and yard chores, cooked their meals and maintained their cars. As he worked, he prayed and meditated.
After six months he went back on the job hunt but this time seeking part-time work. He found a part-time job helping manage web sites making a small salary supplemented by commissions. Eventually the job went full time, but he was able to work from home and continue covering most of the house and yard work.
Once he realized how badly he was hurting himself and, as a result, his marriage, Wes exhibited all the aspects of fortitude.
Fortitude is the mental and spiritual strength to face and deal with obstacles--not only those that the world puts in your way, or that your loved ones create for you, but especially the obstacles that you create for yourself. Fortitude is the virtue of strength in times of difficulty. It is doing the right thing, even if we have strong feelings of fear or anger holding us back. Fortitude sees to it that we do not succumb to the vice of cowardice--nor of its evil twin, excessive boldness.
There are three important ways fortitude plays a crucial role in your marriage: dealing with worldly woes, overcoming spouse-inflicted pain, and managing self-inflicted pain. And there are three keys to fortitude in these situations: persistence, patience, and magnanimity.
Instead of becoming hurt and angry with his wife, Wes stepped out of his own hurt to see what the marriage looked like from her point of view.
Wes abandoned his efforts to hold on to his career goals and salary requirements. He took over the household chores not only to demonstrate his commitment to his wife but to keep himself productive while he patiently developed a new life plan in which he was no longer the primary breadwinner. Instead, he made a new plan based on the principle that the purpose of his work was to earn enough to support his vocation: being a good husband.
Marriage takes courage.
This week’s Gospel reading draws our attention for the need for fortitude. When Peter expresses fear and dismay at Jesus’ explanation that the Son of Man must suffer and die, Jesus tells us that we are all called to similar courage: "Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.”
Perhaps the most obvious form of fortitude in marriage is our capacity to stand firm in the face of the obstacles that the world throws at us: economic downturns and the need to leave our homes and travel to new places and rebuild our lives; dealing with serious illness and pain; recovering from the violations of our car being stolen, our house vandalized or burgled; getting through the sense of loss brought on by the death of a child.
In such cases, those in a healthy marriage often draw fortitude and courage from the marriage itself: “you and me against the world” is no empty phrase for a suffering couple.
This post is adapted from a chapter of our book Climbing the Seven Story Mountain. Click to read the entire chapter.
Photo by manu mangalassery
Comments