Patience, perseverance before marriage pay
Wedding day is like a graduation day to many couples especially those that spend a long time in courtship. Couples promise each other many things while in love, the ultimate being marriage.
It is very important that partners study each other before they get into marriage to know each other better.
Samuel Chalera and Alinafe Chilumira wedded on November 30 2013 in Lilongwe after a 10- year courtship.
In an interview, they described their decade journey both as a blessing and a lesson to them as well as younger couples.
“We fell in love in 2003. By then we were working at the same place in Madisi at a certain school. I as a teacher and her as a social worker. Our relationship grew and in 2004 we made a promise to marry.
“However, a few months after that promise, I grew cold feet and wondered whether I rushed to commit,” said Chalera.
He admitted to the challenges of a lengthy courtship, describing it as a long journey whose perseverance and resilience finally took him and his sweetheart to their day of vows.
His new wife, Alinafe, believes that the 10 years has given them the opportunity to make decisions not based on blind love, but deeper personality recognition and understanding; based on strengths and weaknesses.
“Trust and perseverance are the greatest weapons that will compliment love through good times and turmoil. Good things take time to come and they don’t come as you plan,” she said.
What about couples who do not waste time to rush to the altar to splash the “I dos” without a second thought or blink? Do the words; “when it is real, why waste time” ring true?
Marriage counselor and family clinic director Constance Masamba says it is important for lovebirds to take time until they both feel ready without coercion.
Chiwoza Bandawe, a psychologist at the College of Medicine shares in one of his Weekend Nation’s Life Tools column that life is like a mirror which reflects what happens in real life experience.
As such, he says, studying your marriage partner for some time serves to avoid regrets while already in marriage.
