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Of all the things I have learned, one has made a difference in my life.
After 53 years of marriage, I have discovered that true happiness boils down to one thing. Discovering that one thing is a treasure of gold. Most people have never discovered this one thing, which is why their lives are not happy.
It all boils down to one point: how many married couples are happy? If only one is happy, it is not a good marriage. If both are happy, well, you know the answer.
The explanation of what happy means will help us understand this whole scenario.
For some people, being happy means they are always right and always get what they want, when they want it.
My mother used to say when I would ask her if she was all right. “No, son,” she would say with a smile, “I’m half left.”
Then she would say, “If we were to be right all the time, why did God give us a left hand?”
So, to be happy, I don’t necessarily have to be right all the time. I don’t always have to have everything my way. Sometimes I do need that left hand for balance.
The important aspect of marriage is discovering what makes the other person happy.
The only rocky point in our marriage had to do with “broccoli.” She has a fascinating love for broccoli, I have a deplorable hatred for broccoli, and we shall never meet on the same dinner table.
When we were first married, I did not know this about her and broccoli. But it wasn’t long after we were married that I discovered this. Up to that point, I had never tasted broccoli, and I wasn’t about to start tasting it then; with deep respect to my tongue.
When we were married, she didn’t know about my fascination with apple fritters. I grew up in Pennsylvania Dutch country where apple fritters were king of the hill. We just love our apple fritters.
The Gracious Mistress of the Parsonage was happy when she was eating broccoli and I was happy when I was eating apple fritters. These two things cannot be done on the same table, if you know what I mean.
At that point, it all boiled down to one thing. Are we going to determine what the other person likes? Or will we accept them as long as it makes them happy?
That’s so critical that I don’t know anything more important.
If I can master this one thing, then there will be nothing but happiness in our marriage. I don’t demand that she likes what I like, and she doesn’t demand that I like what she likes. We just put up with certain things and don’t make an issue of them.
My secret is, if she passes before me, I’ll make sure there is broccoli in her casket that she can take with her.
The key to marriage is agreement. I like what it says in Amos 3:3, “Can two walk together, except they be agreed?”
If you walk down a path going in a certain destination, although you both are going in the same direction, one can look to the left and the other to the right. It is the destination that is important.
