Dynamic Marriage: Reconstruction of a Marriage Concept

Abstract

People believe that if love and romance in courtship can be retained, marriages can be a life-long engagement. However, increasing numbers of divorces, extramarital relationships, marital conflicts, family violence and family tragedies suggest that as marital life goes on, the couple relationship cannot always be maintained as it was. Two people who enter a marriage will change and their relationship will also change. A personal change for one partner interactively affects the equilibrium of the marital relationship. Marital couples need to recognise that a marriage is not a static state but a dynamic relationship. This paper is an attempt to challenge some of the popular myths of marriage and to present a new paradigm which is termed Dynamic Marriage. This new paradigm is a reconstruction of the marriage concept from a static view to a dynamic perspective, with emphases on the following seven areas: (i) maintenance versus development; (ii) decrease in love versus increase in commitment; (Hi) depending on fate versus a need to learn; (iv) demanding the partner to change versus developing shared goals; (v) problem-conscious versus enrichment- oriented; (vi) security versus new way of life; (vii) private matters versus sharing with others.