This week we are discussing marriage but not just an average marriage but eternal marriage. I believe that this is a key distinction that sets our marriages in the church apart from those of the world. The first prompt for the weeks asks how I am going to make my marriage a covenant marriage and not a contractual marriage. I believe that one of the main keys to creating a covenant marriage is the time that we give to our marriages and the effort. In our reading we read that contractual marriages are based off of the idea that each person gives 50% effort and that together they create a 100% effort. Frankly this idea is silly to think about if you are only willing to put in so much effort than no wonder divorce is on the rise because we have so many that feel that they are justified in how much time and effort they gave their marriage ,however, can we ever truly give enough to our spouse? Some things that I try my best to do to keep my marriage a covenant marriage and not a contractual one is to make sure that I keep the spirit near to me by preparing for the day the same way daily. Every day I wake up at 6 and go to the gym and then I come home and clean up and after that I say my morning prayers and read from the Book of Mormon. This routine is similar to that which I followed while serving a mission for the church and it has allowed me to have the spirit daily. Other things that I do are to lead my family in scripture study and prayer daily along with fun activities.

            One other prompt that I wanted to address for this post is that of what I learned from the genogram project. I learned from my parents to my grandparents to my parents and aunts and uncles that whether your parents are sealed and active you still make your own choices. My Grandparents of my father’s side are divorced and not sealed in the temple yet, all of their children are active in the church and sealed to their spouses and several of their children are sealed to spouses. As for my mother’s parents they were both very active yet, the majority of their children are inactive and many were never sealed to a spouse.