How to Find Common Interests with Your Future Spouse

Do you and your fiancé have common interests in actively promoting "worthy causes?" Will your interests and activities in such things as church or other social work bring you together, or will they pull you apart?

If you believe in a particular church, or the Civic Improvement Society, or the Favorite-Son-for-President Club, or the Red Cross, you will probably donate money to them. If you have enough money for everything, or if your gifts are small enough, you may have little difficulty. But most families can donate money only at the expense of something else.

However corrupt the city government may be, the wife may resent the five dollars you gave to the Better Government Association, especially if she was trying to save up enough to buy Junior a new coat. Or she may feel strongly that a man with growing sons ought to make a generous donation to the Stop-the-Next-War movement before he buys a new set of golf clubs. The spending of time may cause even more conflict. "John has plenty of time for some old meeting, but he never has time to take me to a dance or a show." "Mary would do a lot more good if, instead of all this P.T.A. work, she would clean the house once in a while, and be there when the kids get home from school." Or, "I don't mind going to church occasionally, but this business of having to be there every Sunday to teach a class, so that we can never take a trip into the country even when the weather is perfect, that is just too much."

Another, although usually minor source of conflict concerns your friends; people who work with others naturally become attached to their fellow workers, and may want to bring them into their homes. In some instances, they may get most of their social life out of such attachments. If both of you are vitally interested in the same causes and people then little difficulty should result. But if one is "dragged out" to social affairs in which he has little interest, or has to entertain others whom he may dislike, trouble may result.

Naturally a couple cannot settle all such problems in advance of their marriage. But by facing the issue, each one may be able to get a fairly good idea of what he is in for. If June was active in her Union and has eagerly volunteered for picket duty, such interests may be expected to continue even if she marries and quits her job. If James was the very active president of the Christian Endeavor, we must not be surprised if he assumes active responsibilities in the church which tie him up Sundays. If Paul has strong convictions about good government, world peace or economic justice, these should be expected to continue. Remember, marriage does not change people basically. Age and experience may change them profoundly after they are married. But do not bank on it. Marrying a person to "reform" him, either for better or for worse, is a proposition that is much more than dubious.