I’m Finally Stuck

I look at baring your spiritual soul a lot like talking about salary at a job interview. You don’t bring it up early. You wait until you are far into the interviewing process, after everyone knows they are committed to the idea of you working for the company. Or, in this case, knowing you are both serious about the relationship. The fundamentals need to be in place of chemistry and meeting each others’ needs before you go talking about the really personal things like your individual beliefs etcetera, particularly the thorny ones.

For the first girl, I would likely not go much further with that one as you’ve already said you don’t see it working out over the next while. Don’t lead her on. As far as the second girl goes — it’s hard to reject someone and then ask for them back again. Much trust has been lost at that point, and they have moved on again. I would hesitate to go that route.

I would keep looking for someone. Preferably someone on the fringe a bit who is perhaps not fully TBM, or for you, and intellectual who is not threatened by philosophical questions of the kind you comment on here (very well, I might add).

Also, please don’t ignore this bit of advice like many YSA’s I have shared it with — go to http://www.marriagebuilders.com and read about what is REALLY important in marriage. What is really important is that each person naturally meets the emotional needs of the other person. And to assess whether someone meets your emotional needs, you need to know what they are. And you need to know what your “future spouse’s” emotional needs are. There is a quesionnaire you can do eventually to determine this.

When I met my wife, I was taken with her personna, her body, he voice, the way she made me feel. She was strong in the church and wanted temple marriage, kids on missions, etcetera. After marriage, I found she met none of my top emotional needs. Not one of them. Meanwhile I’d made covenants before God and Holy Angels which made me feel trapped into staying.

And when I share the fact that she doesn’t meet my needs, she fights me about whether I even talk to her about my needing them. It leads to an argument or testy conversation so I live with a gaping whole in my heart when it comes to the fulfilment I should be getting from marriage. Kind of like when you say “please, give me oxygen — I can’t breathe” and your spouse says “you don’t need oxygen” and then moves on.

It’s maddening, hard on the relationship, and makes for eternal silent conflict in my soul. Make sure meeting each others’ emotional needs is part of the DNA of your relationship as the foundation at the start — and church is only a part of that. In my case, I meet her needs very well, and so, I am able to be a non-TR unorthodox intellectual fringe Mormon and yet our marriage survives very well. She leaves me alone about my unorthodoxy, intermittent garment-wearing and non-tithing status. Occasionally there is noise to get me to change, but not very often.

Because you can’t live together and have sex before marriage and experience the whole relationship in advance…look at other signs and build time-intensive experiences together. First, take the Emotional Needs Questionnaire yourself off the marriagebuilders.com site and figure out what your emotional needs are. Then, spend time with your girlfriends family and learn about how their family dynamic works. Have conversations about it with your “intended” as well, and go on a vacation with her family or live with them for a while so you can get to know them for real. This’ll answer a lot of questions.

At some point, have her take the Emotional Needs Questionnaire when it gets serious and see if you can meet her needs without having to change who you are. I believe that a solid marriage founded on meeting emotional needs can withstand faith crises and unorthodoxy, as mine has. I meet my wife’s needs very well and that provides me with a strong buffer when my church-orientation bothers my wife. She has so much else good in the relationship she doesn’t leave.

Me, well, I white knuckle my way thought my marriage because I don’t want the hassles of divorce and there is still some love, as well as the fact that she shares my need for strong financial security — the thing that has largely kept my marriage together all these years. I have a strong need for Financial security (a marriagebuilders need) and that is the only one she meets since she doesn’t demand much from me in that regard. I stay out of a sense of loyalty, endurance, and the fact that there is still some love. Also out of responsiblity to my children who need me.

You need to find out what the needs are of the person you are marrying and see how they line up. Also, eventually consider taking the PREPARE inventory, which will highlight the points of conflict in your marriage when you get to that point. It doesn’t tell you who to marry, but it tells you on what kinds of matters you will not agree. you can then decide how bad those areas of conflict will be –before marriage.

Good luck from a battle-scarred veteren in the marriage department of over 20 years or trying to make it work, and roughly succeeding — worn out and hunchbacked, but succeeding for now.

It sounds like you have some assumptions about yourself and these girls that may or may not be right. Look for someone who thinks like you do. If you mean by TBM that she has never given any real thought to her faith or questioned any of he assumptions, you will probably have issues in any kind of long term relationship anyway. How would you really find such a person interesting? What would you have to talk about? Find a person you find interesting and who makes you laugh and whose company you enjoy. That’s what matters most. If you feel that way, you will be accepted and loved as you are because she will see you for who you are. Honestly I never saw the basis for so many couples I saw at BYU where they were basically interchangeable so long as they were “worthy” or whatever. How is that the basis for a life long relationship?!

I agree that you are in a tough spot and you have already received quality advice here thus far.

That being said I can somewhat relate to you. When I first dated my wife I dumped her for a fairly superficial reason. Then over the following months and a couple of minor relationships later I came to the realization that I had messed up. So I went back, apologized, and asked her if we could start seeing each other again. I let her know that I understood if she didn’t want to and that the decision was her’s.

Well a day or two later we were back together. Later we were engaged and married.

I don’t know what to do regarding sharing you faith crisis but sincerly apologizing and asking for a second chance is worth a shot.

Just my 2 cents

SD, I’ll check out the link.

The point is, if she dates you assuming that you have the same beliefs that she does, then when she does know your true feelings she will either feel very betrayed or she will need to experience a profound shift in her own beliefs in order to accept you. Such a shift may be a good thing, but it is not a fair expectation.

Yeah, the general understanding I have always had and observed is that everyone who attends church meetings and ward activities is assumed to be a TBM. In fact, it never even occurred to me that other approaches to Mormonism existed until I had my crisis of faith. If someone went to Church, everyone assumed that they believed all of it, or at least that seemed to be the general understanding. I would venture to say that Mormons who have deviant behavioral views are much more common than Mormons who have deviant theological views. Deviant theological views are viewed as apostate (and thus unacceptable,) while deviant behavioral views are viewed as a lack of understanding or poor morals and poor discipline (deviant behavioral views combined with orthodox theological views are epitomized by one of my roommates who was from Orem who told me that people would say, “I’m Mormon and I do it.”) I once told a girl that I had been on a date with that I had some religious concerns, and that was the end of that potential relationship.

There is certainly a chance that she is not totally TBM…

I confess that this is my ideal scenario at this point. I’d like to meet a girl who has either had (or is having) a major crisis of faith herself or is very “liberal” in her TBM views, but I’m not sure how realistic that is. Fowler says that only 3% of people under age 30 have reached Stage 5. I admit that I’d love to be on a date with a girl and I’d say, “Did you know that JS’s translation of the Book of Abraham doesn’t match the Egyptologists’ version?” and she’d say, “Yeah, I read about that, and it bothers me. And it also bothers me that the Church won’t give a reason for the priesthood ban…” And then we could spend the rest of the evening sitting under the stars, sharing our disillusionment with each other. I’m not sure that’s realistic either, because the probability of catching a girl right at that stage seems low, though there may be more girls like that than I think who are afraid to talk about it. Of the two girls I mentioned above, I’m pretty sure the first one is TBM, but it wouldn’t surprise me if the second one isn’t totally TBM, but I can’t be sure, which is why I’m hesitant to beg for her back. I guess that I shouldn’t assume that some girl I take out wouldn’t accept me as I am or be open to some troubling aspects of Mormon history and doctrine. I guess I’m afraid of a confrontation about it, but I’ll have to man up and face it.

I’d like to date some Stage 5 girls, but they’re rare, and as was pointed out to me, a Stage 5 person at Church and ward activities looks exactly like a Stage 3 person at Church and ward activities, so identifying Stage 5 people is hard.

Honestly I never saw the basis for so many couples I saw at BYU where they were basically interchangeable so long as they were “worthy” or whatever.

I’d like this to be written in the history books:

In the late 19th Century, the widespread use of interchangeable parts revolutionized manufacturing in America. In the the early 21st Century, the widespread use of interchangeable financees revolutionized marriage in Utah. 😆

I would agree with this were it not for the emphasis in this church about only marrying your “spiritual equal.” Whether or not God, scripture, leaders or “official doctrine” (whatever that means) really intended it or not, the general attitude in the church is that you should only marry and/or date someone who is as invested in the religion as you are. If she finds out that you do not meet that qualification only after she is emotionally invested in you, it would be cause for her to feel tricked or trapped, even if you never technically lied about it.

There’s something that bothers me about this defensive posture. What about YOU finding YOUR spiritual equal, someone who gives their spirituality a thought rather than just doing as they are told? Why would you want to be with someone who doesn’t think deeply or doesn’t question things? She doesn’t have to be stage 5 necessarily, but she should have some darn good reasons for her beliefs if she’s stage 3, not just unquestioned assumptions. Personally, I think that’s what you are unclear about is what your own needs are. Why would you stoop to a relationship with someone who has nothing to say that interests you? I think this is being framed backwards. Who is the one that’s not a spiritual equal? The one for whom “the thinking is done” or the one who cares enough to think deeply on these matters? I say it’s the one who obeys without any good reason or thought behind it, the one who doesn’t look at the other person for who they are and only measures potential spouses in one dimension.