The Good Housekeeping Marriage Book | Page 5

the same time that the young man or woman is
feeling in full force the body changes, the nervous readjustments, and
the impulses to escape childhood dependency that come with puberty.
The fact is, however, that our type of courtship largely results from
using the energy of this adolescent upheaval. There is a redirecting of
the forces that mark the awakening of puberty and then start flowing
through the entire personality. Courtship becomes a sublimation, as the
scientist says, a reshaping of this energy so that later there may be a
higher, more mature satisfaction of the desires that follow along with
this influx of new vitality, this strange, unexpected interest in members
of the other sex.
Undoubtedly modern youth face in this experience a greater ordeal than
did their parents. This comes about from changes in our way of living
and the effect they have had upon marriage, particularly upon our
expectations when we enter matrimony. In times past the economic
advantages of being married were so great and, as a rule, the struggle of
life was so hard, that there was no opportunity to overload marriage
with expectations and make its successes and its failures so exclusively
the satisfying or denying of emotions.
Of course our tendency is to ask too much of marriage. We demand
that it fulfill every purpose of the heart; thus some disappointment,
once one enters upon the career of marriage, is inescapable. The young
man and woman who have entered marriage expect to grasp much too
soon the happiness which their emotions demand. The imagination has
such a free range while romance runs at full tide that it would be
strange indeed if the imagination did not go far beyond the possibilities
of any human relationship.
This readjustment of expectation is what we mean by matrimonial
maturity. The young person who refuses to play the game of marriage,
just as soon as it appears that complete fulfillment of youthful wishes is
not to be had, cannot grow up and never comes to see that the greater
satisfactions must come out of self-discipline, emotional restraint, and a
love of response that does not ask what is beyond human achievement.

Not through a bringing to life of his rosy dreams of contentment, but in
a fellowship that deepens through the maturing of emotional life, must
one find the values of either marriage or family life.
* * * * *
Although the wise use of courtship is the most important preparation
for marriage happiness, it is not the only way we clarify and mature the
emotions in our efforts to be happily married. Engagement brings its
peculiar challenge, and again demands are made that surge with
emotions and need to be dealt with consciously and practically. One of
these has to do with sex, and in a very definite way. The modern young
man and woman are familiar with the fact that wholesome marriage
requires good marital adjustment. They think of this as the sex side of
marriage. In recent years they have heard much concerning the need of
adequate sex technique in marriage. Not only do they wish information
that will prepare them to handle this problem, but often they also need
to get rid of their worry that they may fail in this relationship. This
anxiety is more common than one might expect, both in men and in
women. Even those who are exceedingly sophisticated frequently have
such fears. They wonder if they have in some way made their
adjustment difficult.
The last days of engagement frequently stir up feelings of doubt. These,
born of the thought of the seriousness of the marriage near at hand,
easily become allied with the anxious thoughts regarding sex
adjustment in marriage. There is every reason for giving young people
at this time the information they need to enter marriage as easily and
satisfactorily as possible. To give them a fair start we also have to take
away the nervous dread that may become their chief difficulty. This
must be done not by attempting to extract the emotion as we pull a
tooth but by destroying the fear by building up its opposite, security.
This is the way we always get rid of hazardous emotions: we destroy
them as we alkalize acids.
The reason why so much is made of sex technique as a preparation for
marriage is partly that in the past we have utterly neglected this side of
marriage and also that it is the easiest problem to handle. Needed

information can be clearly and definitely given, and there are a number
of excellent books, widely read, that provide this preparation for young
people about to be married. Such literature needs to be read calmly so
as to avoid exaggeration and not in the spirit of panic