#Letr2Jil - A FEW HIGHLIGHTS starts now.
My dear Jil, I present a few nuggets from my letters to you this year. Here they are: #Letr2Jil
1. It’s important you choose your own partner. Don’t let anyone choose for you. Marriage requires custom fit. Therefore a marital partner must necessarily be a proprietary acquisition. #Letr2Jil
2. That a man is not the right man for you doesn’t mean he’s not a good man. That he’s a good man doesn’t mean he’s the right man for you. #Letr2Jil
3. When the right man comes you’ll know. It will be natural. You’ll get along with the person just fine. Both of you will know you like each other. You’ll just want to be together. #Letr2Jil
4. Don’t be desperate. When you become so desperate to hook up you’re bound to make some mistakes. In fact you’ll be sending wrong signals on dates. #Letr2Jil
5. Marriage is not formulaic. It’s something good, something natural, something organic, something unforced... Wanting each other, loving each other, being each other... That’s what marriage is all about. #Letr2Jil
6. Actively trying to be “daddy’s girl” can harm your marriage. Can mean seeking to please your dad to the detriment of your marriage. #Letr2Jil
7. There are things fathers watch out for in a prospective son-in-law – respect, temperament, prospects, genuine affection for their daughter, happiness of their daughter... #Letr2Jil
8. A relationship in which one party is extremely focused on self will only bring sadness and hurt to the other party. #Letr2Jil
9. Personality and looks cannot sustain a marriage. It is character that does. #Letr2Jil
10. Men are known to go for available and interested comfort. You’ve got to be available, open and interested concerning his needs. It’s marriage. Don’t be careless. #Letr2Jil
11. Stop presenting a careless version of yourself to your husband. Stop looking uncaring and dishevelled. Men are moved by imagery. #Letr2Jil
12. Life’s challenges are custom-made. There’s no great life without trial. Trial precedes greatness. #Letr2Jil
13. Money matters a lot in a relationship. Money matters in marriage. Lack of money can break a marriage. #Letr2Jil
14. Don’t rush into marriage. Develop maturity so you know what you really want and who you really want. Marriage is unending responsibility. You become responsible for a human ab initio. #Letr2Jil
15. Marriage is the absorption of imperfections, the acceptance of human frailty, the overcoming of all with love and tenderness. #Letr2Jil
16. Don’t go for a man beyond you. When a man is way beyond you, you know despite your faith. You don’t want to struggle to keep your man. It’s agonising. The uncertainty it produces can erode self-esteem, and destroy emotional and physical health. #Letr2Jil
17. If you want deep appreciation concentrate on the qualities of inner beauty. It’s what makes men truly appreciative. #Letr2Jil
18. You need to be wise in life. You need to learn to read character. Character is everything. #Letr2Jil
19. Selfishness prevents us from seeing ourselves. It’s a very strange mirror. It allows us to see only our desires. #Letr2Jil
20. You can’t erase someone’s past and arrive at the same man. We’re products of our past. #Letr2Jil
21. People react to their background in different ways. Some emulate the bad behaviour of their parents, some repudiate it. #Letr2Jil
22. Don’t let the sorrow of losing your child destroy your marriage. Let it bring you and your husband together. Be united in grief. #Letr2Jil
23. Fertility challenge is a very confidential stuff. It’s not something you go talking about in family circles. You don’t go around telling people your husband is infertile. #Letr2Jil
24. Don’t let conception delay put a wedge in your marriage. #Letr2Jil
25. The hallmark of a good relationship is not fight. #Letr2Jil
26. You must develop short memories for offences in marriage. There are things you must forget. Forgive and move on. #Letr2Jil
27. A marriage is a learning portal. You learn about yourself – things you never knew; you learn about your partner – things you never knew. #Letr2Jil
28. Marriage is continuous learning. As the environment changes people change, and new things to learn emerge. #Letr2Jil
29. Don’t joke with your marriage. Marriage is a very powerful social and spiritual institution. To get out of one there’s a price to pay. Most times the price is heavy. #Letr2Jil
30. You must strive for happiness in marriage. Happiness is important. And it’s attainable. Marriage without happiness is present continuous trauma. #Letr2Jil
31. Marriage requires effort. In your marriage you want love to increase, you want friendship to increase, you want care to increase, you want tenderness to continue... All that requires effort. #Letr2Jil
32. Meditating on a wrong will make you start seeking retaliatory opportunity, or you’ll start to feel oppressed. Either can be dangerous in marriage. You shouldn’t let anything build up or pile up in your marriage. If you can’t forego it discuss it. #Letr2Jil
33. Confidentiality is one of the key attributes of marriage. There are things that must remain between a man and his wife. #Letr2Jil
34. When a boyfriend and girlfriend are separated by massive distances that run into thousands of kilometres anything can happen. Bridge the gap. #Letr2Jil
35. There’s nothing wrong with trusting a man. Just make sure it’s the right man. Make sure he has values. It all boils down to nobility. #Letr2Jil
36. You will know a trustworthy fellow by his comportment and affirmation of values. There are things he won’t do, there are things he can’t do. He holds himself up to higher standards. He’s noble. #Letr2Jil
37. It’s good to believe in a man. But the man must also acquit himself and validate that belief through a sense of responsibility. #Letr2Jil
38. It is important partners think good thoughts towards each other. There’s no possibility of acrimony where there’s love. It’s also important for partners to be devoted to one another. Where there’s devotion there’ll be loyalty. #Letr2Jil
39. A low sense of self makes us voyeur on inanities, makes us self-celebrate nonsense. Which is why you’re happy you’re “the main chick” to a man. Don’t negotiate yourself down to accept such honorific title from yourself. #Letr2Jil
40. Emotions are powerful. Don’t give your affection to the undeserving. #Letr2Jil
41. You maintain a marriage with friendship and sense of responsibility. Without friendship marriage becomes an awkward relationship. #Letr2Jil
42. Don’t despise days of small beginnings in a young man. Be willing to build with your man. Many times success is a joint effort. Sometimes all a young man needs is a woman who just believes in him. He’ll conquer mountains with her faith. #Letr2Jil
43. Be honest and sincere in your relationship. #Letr2Jil
44. Authenticity is what happens when our projected self matches our inner self. There’ll be no two layers, there’ll just be us. #Letr2Jil
45. Men tend to run from a home without peace. They either keep away, or they take off, or they die in instalment. It’s why they’re afraid of temperamental women. #Letr2Jil
46. You shouldn’t stay in a marriage that threatens your life. A man who batters his wife is a potential murderer. #Letr2Jil
47. If your boyfriend displays a violent temperament you should think twice about going into marriage with him. “I do” does not cure temperament. Even if such a guy doesn’t beat you there’s the prospect of emotional abuse. #Letr2Jil
48. Love is sincere. Love is not manipulative. If you’re manipulative you end up with a synthetic variety of love. Because it’s not natural it can’t be fulfilling. #Letr2Jil
49. Don’t let your marriage slip into a functional dysfunction – something that’s just there, something in a state of existence - nothing exciting again. Spice things up a little at home. Marriage needs more spices than an Indian cuisine. #Letr2Jil
50. You ought to be discerning about what will work and what will not work in a relationship. Saves energy investment. If it comes at a great price to your peace, health, fulfilment and happiness it ain’t worth it. #Letr2Jil
51. A marriage must be built on stronger and deeper resources. There must be true friendship, true loyalty. When a marriage is based on just physical attraction the depth is only skin deep – barely an inch or two deep. #Letr2Jil
52. It is unwise for you not to work when your man can barely take care of both of you. Your earning gives some discretion. That discretionary power becomes reduced when there’s no income coming in for you. #Letr2Jil
53. Men cheat for a number of reasons. Sometimes it’s just lust, sometimes greed; sometimes it’s a non-acceptance of marital status, and it may be a state of mind; or there’s a temptress. It may also be recklessness, cultural conditioning, or a problem in marriage. #Letr2Jil
54. If you worry about what society will say you’ll never do what’s right for your life. #Letr2Jil
55. You shouldn’t constrain a man too much. He’s going to feel locked down. Being protective of your relationship is good but it has to come from a good place and it cannot be accusatory. #Letr2Jil
56. Don’t go into a union you can manifestly see will lead to unhappiness. You’ll have no one to blame but yourself. #Letr2Jil
57. Don’t proceed into a marriage you have serious doubts about. #Letr2Jil
58. Accommodation is another very important virtue in marriage. You must be accommodative. He cannot be perfect, you cannot be perfect. Recognise that as a fact of life. #Letr2Jil
59. There are bad marriages and there are sad marriages. A sad marriage is one full of promise that goes through tragic transformation. It ends in a pile of disappointment. #Letr2Jil
60. Temperament is costly. It generates invisible losses. #Letr2Jil
61. It’s better we save ourselves heartache by modifying our costly behaviour ourselves. Better to do it willingly before life steps in. If it’s too costly modify your behaviour. #Letr2Jil
62. This is my last #Letr2Jil #Letr2Jack for 2018. I’ll be going on vacation with my family. I think I deserve it, don’t you? Wishing you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year in advance!
