MY good friend and fellow political and social commentator Sishuwa Sishuwa gave me a courtesy call this past week. We had not being in physical contact for over a year so we had a lot of stuff to share and talk about.
We talked about politics, our country's economy, school and for the first in a very long while, we touched the subject of love and relationships. And we didn't just end there. We also explored the reasons why despite couples tying knots every weekend, marriages are getting dissolved in courts nearly every week.
Now, I know someone somewhere might be wondering what two single young adults who have never been married before could possibly know about marriage let alone why some marriages fail.
Well, it seems kind of self-righteous and arrogant to suggest that anyone who isn't married can't understand concepts like commitment, imperfection as a powerful life teacher and the value of personal space in a relationship or marriage if you wish.
I don't think the ability to understand fundamental truths about human connection has anything to do with whether you're married or not. It has to do with the state of your mind, your heart and your emotional investment in relating to yourself and other human beings.
Personally, I'm not going to wait until I'm married to understand what makes a marriage fail. Yes you read it right. I said, what makes a marriage fail.
From what I have observed, a lot of marriages fail to work because people are not really taught what causes marriages to fail in the first place. Society seem to concentrate much on what makes marriage successful.
Perhaps it's because the Originator and Designer of marriage never intended it to end in divorce. And let's face it, I doubt if there's any honest being out there who would get married with divorce in mind. Even those who sign prenuptials still hope their marriage would last forever.
However, inasmuch as it is important to know what makes marriage work, I think it is just as important to know what makes it not to work. I think couples should go through serious and intense counselling before marriage so they understand what to expect, but better yet, what not to expect in marriage.
People need to know about the tell-tale signs of a union doomed for failure. Just because two individuals have agreed to wed doesn't mean they should go ahead and tie the knot.
Most marriages out there are like forced careers. Anyone in formal employment has probably come across a workmate who told them they never liked their job and if it weren't perhaps for their parents or circumstances, they would have gone for a career of their choice.
This is the case with some of the marriages out there. There are people who are in marriages because of pressure from either family or society. People have ended up marrying partners they never truly loved just to appease their families or society.
Such marriages are bound to fail and no amount of teaching from bana chimbusa or alangizi will make it work.
Another thing why most marriages fail is the misconception in our society that marriage is for everyone.
It's only a month ago when I refuted through this paper the remarks by a named PF member of parliament who claimed that men are useless without women.
People need to understand that marriage is not for everyone. I've met young men and women who want to "get married" and not "be married." And these people don't seem to necessarily understand that distinction.
I feel such people have no business going into marriage because anyone who choose to settle down with someone should be willing to give up some privileges.
Honestly, why should a married man or woman befriend strange people of the opposite sex on social networks like Facebook?
On the other hand, I feel our society hasn't been kind or rather fair to people who choose not to marry if their reasons are anything but religious.
We should accept the reality that there are people out there who just want to lead a footloose and fancy-free type of life.
This reminds me of a sad story that was reported in the media a few years ago. A man in Nakonde killed himself after he failed to reconcile or rather tame his estranged wife. Apparently the two met in a bar and later got married. However, his wife would always go clubbing whenever he was out of town.
Today, the woman who has returned to her home town on the Copperbelt has never remarried but still patronise bars. The bemba say uwakalema takaleka. It's folly for anyone to go into a union with someone who has serious behavioural and social flaws.
I'm aware that nobody is perfect, but it is foolish for a woman to marry a man she knows is a womaniser and expect him to change once they get married.
The other reason I feel divorce cases are quite common nowadays is that there is no stigma associated with divorce like there used to be back in the day. So people don't value marriage as much, in my opinion. It's something fun to be used for awhile and then thrown away when they feel it has stopped working.
The older folks had a lot more respect for the institution of marriage. A ton of middle aged couples today get married and then start divorce proceedings at the first sight of hardship in their marriage.
Furthermore, some people go into marriage expecting perfection and have unrealistic expectations. There are people who think that after 10 plus years, they are gonna have that fuzzy feeling that they had when they first got married. That isn't the reality.
High expectations in marriage only lead to great disappointment, frustration and disillusionment.
Marriage is not a wedding. It's not sunshine and lollipops. It's not a 50/50 but 100/100 affair.
Marriage is not we watch in Hollywood movies or read about in silly novelettes.
Marriage isn't supposed to be a fairy tale. It's a deeper commitment from "dating". It takes hard work. It's not giving up. It's fixing things when they bend, before they break. It's understanding that people do change but you can change and grow with them.
People need to understand that in marriage there will be days and moments when you will hit the point of not wanting to be around each other. But instead of giving up or resign in frustration, you fight hard to make it work.
Marriage is about understanding, communication, being loyal and loving your spouse and accepting the person they are and not what you think or feel they should be.
Marriage is not about sharing all things in common or having to like all the same things. You can be a book/intellectual geek and your spouse a video game/comic.
And marriage shouldn't be like what my friend Sishuwa referred to as a colony where one partner colonises the other.
And don't get me wrong, I'm not one of those liberals who think a woman can take the role of a man in a holy matrimony. I'm an old-fashioned guy who still believe that a man should be the provider, protector, leader and teacher in a marriage.
However, if there's no room for silliness and being yourself-ness, then something isn't right.
Marriage is not for the faint-hearted or easily offended. As humans, we can't be at our best behaviour all the time. No one is immune from making silly mistakes. But there should always be mutual respect between a man and his wife even in such times.
I remember the days when I was still on facebook reading angry updates from married men and woman that seemed to be targeted at their better half. It's not only inappropriate but quite childish to vent one's marital frustrations on social media. As as the late great PK Chishala nicely put it in his song "Ichupo Ninsansa", marriage is a private affair.
I don't subscribe to the notion that marriage is "shipikisha club" because if you nurture love delicately, through all its faults and rarity, it can be a wonderful experience of your lifetime.
With the right person by your side and someone you truly love, divorce can never be an option .
