TV Radio Mirror (Jan - Jun 1963)

Do You Respect Each Other Enough? This doesn't mean hero worship. This doesn't mean you're impressed with each other's looks or talent or anything superficial or material. It means you respect each other as human beings. ... In order to build that lasting love we all want, two people must respect each other's feelings, intelligence and ideals. Without respect, you have nothing. With it, a wife can make her husband happy — and it works both ways. . . . This doesn't mean that you wear perpetual rose-colored glasses when you look at each other, or that you tell each other things that aren't true, or that you build one another up into something you're not. . . . Howcan you tell when there's enough respect? You might give yourself this little yes-or-no quiz: 1. Are you interested in each other's interests? 2. Do you like to hear him talk? 3. Do you ask each other's opinion in practical matters, such as what movie to see, whether to get a pizza or a hamburger afterward, etc.? 4. Do you think he's at least as smart as you? 5. Do you have faith in his abilities to find work that will satisfy him and provide the necessities of life for his wife and children? 6. After dating several nights a week for a year, can you still find something new to talk about? Something to do besides neck? 7. Do you trust each other's judgment? 8. Does he try to change your mind in matters of morals? 9. Do either of you lose interest quickly in what the other's saying? 10. Is it easier to fib to each other than tell the truth? (You can check your answers at the end!) Can You Accept Each Other? You can, if you never think of marrying a boy with the idea of changing him. Sometimes you hear people say, "You know, he's completely changed since he met her!" I say there's no such thing. Your basic personality, your major likes and dislikes are formed during childhood. You can change for a person you love only in small, unimportant ways. . . . Falling in love has been called everything from pure bliss to a state akin to neurosis, and when we're in love, we're willing to blind ourselves to each other's faults for the duration. . . . Everybody who stays in love deeply enough to get married does this to a certain extent. You like certain qualities about your loved one enough to minimize his faults, thinking, "Well, I don't like the way he rushes through dinner, but I guess that's a pretty small fault." ... If people didn't do this, they probably wouldn't get married in the first place. But, if you blind yourself to basic problems or dislike qualities or habits that are rooted in the other's personality, these are things that can gnaw away at your marriage later. . . . The test is this: Can you see him as he really is, then accept him for it? Don't be in for a rude awakening after marriage. Don't think the little things you try to convince yourself don't matter now will disappear. They won't. Only the smallest things can change — if he loves you enough to take the trouble. ... If you don't accept each other's odd little ways or personal foibles at the start, you certainly won't be able to afterward, when practical, everyday problems force you to be more practical every day! love Do You Feel Right Together? It's been said that "when you're in love, the ugliest places become beautiful." I believe that, too. A place — whether it's a house or a room or a mansion — isn't important in itself. Neither are the circumstances, or the situation — wealth or poverty, glamour or plainness. What counts is the person you share that room or house or mansion with. I have some wonderful memories of places I used to think were ugly when I first saw them, but when I was in love they seemed to have a new and lovely aura. . . . It's not enough to respect each other, though that's the cornerstone. It's not enough to accept each other — because you must do that with friends, family, and anyone in fife you expect to know and get along with. But with the man you love, there has to be the feeling of being right together, at home together, in any circumstances. ... At a party, with friends or strangers, alone with each other for one hour or ten — you've got to feel comfortable and at ease together. You can be yourself . . . you're not afraid to let him know you're not sophisticated or witty all the time . . . you can talk for a couple of hours or just read without having to go check your hair in the mirror every five minutes . . . you can wear pin-curls or go without lipstick. But this doesn't mean that you become careless, either about your person or the things you say. . . . Feeling at home and right with a boy is very much like feeling at home and right with your own family, except for the aura that turns plainness into beauty. . . . That aura makes the difference. And the difference is being in love. Do You Bring Out Extras in Each Other? When you're with a boy you love, you'll never have talked so much about yourself before, or listened so hard! You'll admit things you never told anybody about yourself — incidents that made you secretly happy or miserable, personal traits that you're unsure of or ashamed about. And you'll never discover so much about yourself — so many surprising, wonderful discoveries that you both make together. . . . What happens is that you bring out something extra in each other — new dimensions. The relationship doesn't set like a gelatine; it remains fluid and dynamic, like sparkling water. If a love has only one or two dimensions, it's not going to remain fluid very long. To keep that sparkling quality, you have to be a combination of things to him and he has to be many things to you. You have to preserve some of that first excitement together. . . . The most successful relationships are the ones in which we can be many people — or perhaps more completely ourselves — to someone else. When two people can satisfy many needs for each other, they can preserve variety and excitement in their relationship and keep their marriage dynamic. When they share many things they both enjoy, they just naturally have more things to do and say together. . . . The difference is that you can go out with a dozen other people and things they say don't seem really important. But with the person you love, everything becomes important — everything you see and think and feel. And you see and think and feel much more because you share with each other. (Continued on page 76) 34 From the book "For Every Young Heart" by Connie Francis. © 1962 by Connie Francis. Published by Prentice-Hail, Inc.. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey.