Chapter 1

The Mental Aspects of Marriage

“For as he thinks within himself, so he is . . .” wrote the proverb writer. Matthew 12:344 records a similar admonition spoken by Jesus,” . . For the mouth speaks from that which fills the heart.”

The Mind, Soul, and the Beginning.

It is not only safe to say that some people will, in almost any context and about any subject, “say what is on their mind.” Those who are more reserved and do not speak their minds nevertheless have thoughts about what they would say were they possessed with sufficient fortitude to venture an opinion or speak about a given situation. Every conversation in which we are engaged, each time we hear something spoken or sung, when we hear life and Creation, when we change what we are watching on a television, each time we exit or interact with a smart phone or device or move from one environment to another our minds receive many bits of information and stimuli. We make decisions. Our minds occupy us continually. Consider how often you use your brain as part of your mind. I use “mind” in this book as much more expansive than just the organ we call the “brain.” The brain does our mental processing, but the mind holds our essence. The mind is a major part of the soul. The soul is who you are and includes your personality and your mind. You do not have a soul you are a soul. You have a body. Your body will wear out in time and cease to function biologically. I have four children. They are similar since they are siblings, yet they are also quite different from each other. My relationship with each is quite different from my relationship with the others. That is how our relationship with God is as well. He loves us all the same, however his relationship with us and us with him is unique to every human soul. This is by grand design to produce an intimacy of a type and kind the law would call sui generis5. It is such that it cannot be shared between two human souls or with anyone except God Himself. As intimate as a man and his woman6 can be, or a woman and her man7 can be, even that bond cannot rival that which God has with the soul who longs for Him and knows Him and does not just know about Him.

When a man and a woman begin a relationship, each of the partners thinks about the other. Sometimes neither is certain about the beginning of this relationship, if a relationship is beginning or is the interaction between them only temporary and surface. But at some point, after they continue spending time together each will realize that whatever its depth may be, a relationship of some consequence has begun. For the next few pages, I address this component of how a relationship grows and becomes a bond leading to a formal, binding, joinder called “marriage,” from the perspective of a man. While I will delve into the female mind here, I will speak as a man and unpack this human relational construct from that perspective. I am not meaning to be facetious here when I say, honestly, that no man has ever completely understood the female mind. A man does not even fully understand the mind of his wife or his mother. What you are reading is a sort of reverse engineering. “Reverse engineering” is a process and term usually applied to things made or manufactured and to processes. It is not usually in any way applied to humans or their complexities. It is a process or method through which one attempts to understand through deductive reasoning how something - a device, process, system, or piece of software works and was made but with little insight into exactly how it does so. Simply stated, you have something you do not understand or know how it works, like a UFO, so you take it apart and analyze how it was engineered and made so you can make one. Then you attempt to make one like the model or original by “backing into it.” Imagine if you could take cake batter (before its poured into pans and baked) and had it analyzed in a laboratory to determine what were its ingredients. Once you learned that it was 2 parts sugar, 3 parts flour, at least 2 eggs, and the rest, you could then assemble those ingredients and try to mix them in proportions based on your analysis until you finally arrived at a mixture like the original. We are looking at conduct, acts, behavior, and omissions to determine the “why” of that conduct, acts, and omissions.

The Progression of Thought and Mindfulness about the Person of Interest.

The amount of time a man spends thinking about his wife and the amount of time a woman spends thinking about her husband changes dramatically over the life of the relationship. In the beginning, the progression is affected by several non-exclusive factors.

Things are moving along when this awareness of the other “special person” causing one to “think about” him or her can be provoked in even the most sterile, unromantic, even stressful environments. It is easy to see how a man is provoked to think about his wife or woman when he sees something provocative or otherwise senses (hears, smells, tastes) something familiar to him that relates to her. As to a woman, her mental chords are struck in similar ways. A friend mentions something her husband or fiancé does or a hobby or sport he enjoys and instantly the wife or woman thinks of her counterpart. But it is more telling when the engine that stirs the mind to think about “him” or “her” is not something typically associated with fond, loving, or passionate thoughts. For example, assume the woman, who later becomes the wife of our fictitious suitor, is an officer in the collection and asset recovery department of a bank. You’re already getting glazed-eyed. That means it is her job to deal with “bad loans” or loans in which the borrower stopped paying or is in violation of the loan agreements. Assume further that the man is a lawyer specializing in bankruptcy, reorganization, and commercial litigation which are areas that necessarily intersect and interface with banks, bank loans, and businesses that borrow money from banks and become financially distressed. He may represent creditors such as banks, or he may represent borrowers turned debtors into bankruptcy, or both (but not in the same case, which would be a huge conflict of interest). Each of our two soon-to-be spouses is more likely to think about the other during the typical workday because of the elements in which their vocations intersect. When she learns that one of her bank’s customers filed bankruptcy, her mind will turn to him, even if only momentarily. Likewise, when the owner of a distressed business retains the man to represent the business in a bankruptcy case his mind will drift to thoughts of her when the discussion turns to commercial banking. When a man or woman thinks of his or her spouse in this kind of environment it signals a strong and deliberate mental bond.

Additionally, there are more traditional thought-provoking male-female stimuli that cannot be ignored. If she likes a particular style of jewelry designed by a well-known jewelry designer, like John Hardy or David Yurman, he will think of her each time he sees a piece of jewelry designed by one of those designers.

As time goes on, each will note and develop more areas of familiarity with the other. Once they begin seeing each other frequently each will notice various attributes of the other. She will observe and catalogue behavioral patterns and mannerisms peculiar to him, such as his like or dislike of certain foods, the way he walks, any visible marks or scars, what type of cologne he wears (if any), his reaction to some outfit she wears, how he holds her hand, and how to get his attention. Lots of these observations he will consider minor or unimportant. To her they are part of her mindfulness of him and he needs to appreciate (as in understand and realize, not just be thankful for) her awareness of him. Likewise, he will recognize things about her some of which are personal, even intimate, exceedingly early in the relationship and these rarely if ever change. They are usually permanent attributes and he will recall them even into their senior years. Men are visual and once a man becomes in love with a woman, as opposed to loving her (there is a difference) his mindfulness of her morphs into more than thinking about her as she is presently. Such things as the way she walks, her hair, how she feels to him when he embraces her, her physical appearance in diverse types of clothing, and certain of her anatomical attributes. At some point should he see her in a bathing suit or when they marry or get sufficiently familiar with each other and sleep together, (the author does not endorse such behavior) he will note some of the most minute aspects of her person often without her knowing until sometime later when he mentions how he likes the way she . . . or the way her . . . when they are . . .. Men tend to notice the most organic attributes of their woman early on in a relationship, at least those that can be noticed without breaching a proper, biblical moral compass.

An Account of the Mind as Laboratory.

This example, one I consider poignant and accurate, presents how a sort of mental wool-gathering takes place. This model shows how the mind of a man massages a relationship once he captures enough of a woman’s essence or person to hold his interest.

Once a young man was tasked by his father with the chore of plowing a field. This young man’s family were...