Husband and wife, aware of this, will try to stimulate affection, to earn responsiveness, instead of considering his or her own rights. Too many forget as soon as they are married their capacity to charm and to entice. They believe that the marriage document gives them a right to gratification. And when their expectations do not materialize, they demand more instead of seeking to attract more. Many women take great pains to make themselves attractive when they go out or visit friends, but neglect any care in the intimacy of their home life. They take their husband’s love for granted instead of constantly winning his admiration and affection anew. Once married, they don’t seem to care whether they excite the mate’s feeling and emotions, and they forget all the many subtle means which they used so successfully to catch him. They may even consider such efforts as humiliating. No, they should be loved as they are! No woman is so young and pretty that she does not need, and none so old or ugly that she cannot find, skillful methods to keep her husband’s emotion alive.
Many men, on their part, behave in much the same way.
After their marriage, or at least after the honeymoon is over, they forget so often the “sweet little nothings” which gave so much delight-or at least they reserve them for social occasions to demonstrate their devotion in the presence of others. They fail to realize that a woman demands signs of love and affection and cannot take anything as self-evident if it is not expressed again and again. It is neither more difficult nor less gratifying to woo a woman after the wedding. Often, however, men are not trained to do this. They consider their wives as being obliged to marital “duty” and demand sexual gratification as part of the bargain. Many of them actually think that only the masculine desire is important and that women have to accept it whenever it occurs. They believe that women should always be ready but never demand.
The conviction of their masculine superiority supports this fallacious and often fatal assumption of many men. They have not learned that responsiveness to sex is the duty of both mates, and any discord in a sex relationship must be regarded as a common problem which can be solved only if both parties unite their efforts for the common task.
Every Problem is a Common Task
It is vital to marital happiness to recognize that any disturbing problem is a common task which calls for mutual encouragement and assistance. The most severe predicament which may befall a married couple does not necessarily endanger the union; on the contrary, it frequently knits them more closely together. The severity of the predicament is of no significance. Everything depends solely on the ability of the mates to stick together when confronted with a difficult task. Identical points of view and a strong set of values, accepted by both, increase the resistance of a couple to any reverse. Strong religious feelings, dependable philosophic conceptions of life, shared by husband and wife, give marriage stability. That does not mean that difference in religion or conflicting convictions are necessarily a handicap. Such differences demand only a broader understanding-a well-developed sense of tolerance. That in itself implies strong moral values, which can more than make up for an otherwise detrimental incongruity.