This page is still under construction.
There are people who go through a relationship that goes thud because after going out for a while they discover things. That situation is certainly better than the situation in which they got married and then they discovered things when it was too late.
These people may have been able to see or find out these things by themselves if they had done berurim and it would have saved them time and grief.
Granted, many people don't need berurim. Many people go out on dates just to have fun and they don't look at the possibility of marrying the person that they are going to have fun with.
Still others don't look beyond the fun. They are only interested in a relationship in which they will have fun. They don't look for the more serious things in life and they are unlikely to consider the reasons why they are getting married.
Life is more than just having fun. A relationship with a partner is more than just having fun. Life is far more serious than that and a serious person develops a serious relationship by considering the serious things that await the partnerhsip.
Those serious issues are far more important than the questions about having fun and those are the issues that should be considered before going out and while going out. Those are the issues that really matter and they should be handled before it is too late.
After it is too late and the person is married, they will still have to handle these problems that did occur, but unfortunately they won't be able to do too much about them. They will have to tolerate the person they married when serious things come up and that's what life is all about or else they will have to deal with a mistaken marriage.
This does not mean that your partner should not be fun or compatible or pleasant or nice to get along with. To the contrary, there certainly should be chemistry between the two of you. However, that is not necessarily the first or preliminary thing to consider in your relationship.
Intensive berurim, as we will see in these next few pages, can lead you into a relationship in which you are both able to handle the real and serious issues that will come up in life.
That is the preliminary or first step.
Once you know that you are on the same wavelength as far as these issues are concerned, then go ahead and decide whether that parnter's concept of fun matches yours. It probably will if all of the major issues are handled.
See the next article in this series
Read more articles about dating
Read more articles about parenting
Find out about the Jewish Parenting Forum
Find out about other Jewish and Hebrew forums
Are you required to read this webpage for a course? Do NOT print out the article. It is copyrighted.
Your exercise for this article is as follows:
Copyright © David Grossman. World rights reserved. This article may not be printed, forwarded, reproduced, or copied in any way or in any medium without written permission from David Grossman.
