Media-Inspired-Optimism: CBS/ Marriage Worth Effort /Wealth?/Grandparents/Moma Blogs - 9/14/06

Fri Sep 15 15:11:10 EDT 2006

- CBS EARLY SHOW
- STRONGER MARRIAGES WORTH EFFORT
- WANT TO BE WEALTHY?  DO THIS ONE THING
- ANOTHER BEAUTIFUL REASON NOT TO DIVORCE/AND, THE MAMA BLOG PHENOMONON

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- CBS EARLY SHOW

Thank you to all who watched this morning's show and sent your
congratulations.  It WAS a good piece that sent an upbeat, optimistic,
marriage skills/marriage education message. And it was entertaining and fun
to watch - I'm sure people didn't switch channels.  Pat and Michele Gannon
were superb and the engaged couple were so real and open-hearted. The
groom-to-be was, himself, an adult child of divorce, and determined to
change his odds.  Several of you asked how the Gannon's "Marriage Prep 101"
course was selected.  You can be sure that the NYC producers didn't want to
fly all the way to San Francisco to film a class. But, the Gannons had the
only course listed on the Smart Marriages Directory in August and the
producer HAD to shoot in August, she couldn't wait. When contacted, the
Gannons were able to find a couple willing to be interviewed that had taken
their course.  That clinched it. There are lessons in this for all of us -
get your courses listed; offer them monthly; keep in touch with your class
participants; and be responsive when contacted! I am so grateful that the
producer didn't scrap the idea and was willing to fly to the west coast AND
that the Gannons and the couple were so terrific. It's shows like this one
that are our main hope for getting our message across.  The phones have been
ringing with couples looking for classes - young, old, rich, poor. Get your
classes posted on the Directory!

One big glitch for those of you on the west coast, the show was interrupted
by the Bush speech and you didn't get to see any of it.  If you were
Bush-bumped or if you just missed it, you you can watch it at:
http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/earlyshow/main500202.shtml

Or, if your computer isn't that sophisticated, you can read the transcript
at: (much better to watch it - see the Gannon's teach and the engaged couple
"communicate")  
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/09/15/earlyshow/main2012996.shtml

- diane 

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- STRONGER MARRIAGES WORTH EFFORT
September 14, 2006
ELIZABETH HOVDE for The Columbian (Washington State)

((And, continuing with examples of journalists as our front line foot
soldiers, in this article Elizabeth Hovde lays out the case for marriage
with a light, engaging touch and then lists several marriage-strengthening
resources in her area - one of which is Mark Gungor as keynoter for Marriage
Week in Clark County Washington.  Let's hope Hovde takes the time to go see
Gungor and have her mind totally blown - and inspired. I hope someone sends
me the article she writes after that experience!  Also note that Dave Schaaf
of "Thriving Families" and Al & Autumn Ray of "Marriage Team Coaching"
attended Smart Marriages in Atlanta. Marriage Education is spreading
exponentially and this before the fed funding is unleashed.  And, my
congrats to the marriage activists in Clark county, planning ahead and
locking in Gungor that far in advance.  Brilliant!  - diane ))

I need at least one recurring, noneducational escape each week so I can
justify lying around on Big Green (my couch) eating Gummy Bears. This
summer's guilty pleasure was "Grey's Anatomy."

I've only seen a handful of episodes in the right order and am usually a tad
lost on the major plot lines, but I have seen enough of the show to know
this: The leading man had an affair with the leading woman but is now trying
to reunite with his wife.

But wait. It's even more complicated.

Before the affair between the show's leading man and woman ever started, the
leading man's wife cheated on him with his best friend. Ouch.

This twist on the affair leaves the viewer perplexed as to whom to root for.
I find myself torn between a.) wishing for a clean slate for all parties and
b.) hoping that the marriage on the edge is strong enough to weather the
storm that "Grey's Anatomy" writers send its way.

This surprises me. I rarely am torn in real life. I almost always root for
marriage. When you know that the grass is rarely greener on the other side
and that studies show most divorced people regret that their marriages came
to an end, you tend to cheer for love's recovery as a general rule.

A 2004 survey of Washingtonians showed that 56 percent of us think divorce
merely trades one set of problems for another, while just 34 percent saw
divorce as a springboard to a better life. There is baggage in every
relationship. How we lug it around is the key.

Help is available

Luckily, Clark County is a place where a lot of people are eager to save
marriages on the edge and prevent healthy marriages from resembling a
"Grey's Anatomy" plot line.

Marriages need all the help they can get, with the national, state and
county divorce rates for first marriages in the 40-45 percent range. For
just one month, July, Clark County court records show 79 dissolution cases
were filed by couples with kids while 50 were filed by couples with no
children.

One local effort, Thriving Families (www.thrivingfamilies.org), is working
with the government, churches, businesses and community leaders to make an
emphasis on marriages commonplace.

By acting as a clearinghouse for marriage-strengthening and marriage-saving
resources in the area, Thriving Families is hoping to see an increase in
happy marriages, fewer divorces and more kids anchored in homes with their
married mom and dad.

The new nonprofit has started an annual marriage event near Valentine's Day
to get married couples energized about their relationships. On Feb. 16-17,
2007, Mark Gungor will be here presenting his popular seminar "Laugh your
way to a better marriage." Save those dates and visit Thriving Families' Web
site for more information.

Aside from seminars, Marriage Team is one local resource to which Thriving
Families might direct couples in need of help. Marriage Team led by locals
Al and Autumn Ray, who boast a 36-year marriage links married couples with
coach couples trained as mentors. Marriage Team is always looking for more
mentor couples and encourages people with healthy marriages to attend its
upcoming training session starting Sept. 22. Visit www.marriageteam.org for
more information.

With such a dramatic divorce rate, a lot of marriages have already bit the
dust and second marriages are blossoming or getting tangled in old weeds.
There is local help for those marriages, too.

Gil and Brenda Stuart, remarried themselves and resembling a modern-day
Brady Bunch with seven children between them, have started an organization
called Restored and Remarried. They help stepfamilies protect themselves
from trouble spots and explode myths before they do damage. Visit
www.restoredandremarried.com. Many area churches also have resources
available for marrieds and remarrieds those in sickness and in health.

This renewed commitment to marriage in Clark County is better than a guilty
pleasure. More time spent figuring out the anatomy of our marriages means
less time performing risky surgeries on broken hearts.

http://www.columbian.com/opinion/news/09142006news59085.cfm

Copyright The Columbian 2006.
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- WANT TO BE WEALTHY?  DO THIS ONE THING

And, continuing in the same vein, maybe we're making headway! Although none
of this is "news" to anyone on this list serv (I've sent Zagorsky research
to the list numerous times in various formats), this was on CompuServe's
"What's New Today" column today and it fills me with optimism.  It's so
PRO-MARRIAGE.  It's so MARRIAGE IS GOOD FOR YOU.  It's so GET SMART ABOUT
MARRIAGE!  And, it's on Compuserve.  - diane

>   
> Want to Be Wealthy? Do This One Thing
> You're not likely to become a millionaire, but if you marry and stay married
> for a lifetime, you will have far more personal wealth than your friends who
> divorce or stay single, The Associated Press reports of a study by researchers
> at The Ohio State University. How much more? Twice as much. For this study,
> wealth is defined as the total value of a person's assets, including real
> estate, stocks, bonds and bank accounts, minus the liabilities, such as
> mortgages, car payments and credit card balances.
> 
> Find out the leading cause of divorce in America. It's not infidelity. The
> answer may surprise you.
> <http://channels.isp.netscape.com/wrap/linker.jsp?floc=wn-cx&amp;ref=http://mo
> ney.cnn.com/2000/12/06/banking/q_bankrate/index.htm>
> 
> Divorce is far more painful to the bank account than just giving up half of
> what you own. Divorced couples can count on losing on average three-fourths of
> their personal net worth. "Getting married for a few years and then getting
> divorced is clearly not the path to financial independence," study leader Jay
> Zagorsky told AP.
> 
> What's the No. 1 reason for a loss of passion? Men and women agree it's this
> ONE thing more than any other.
> <http://netscape.compuserve.com/love/package.jsp?name=fte/losepassion/losepass
> ion&amp;floc=wn-cx>
> 
> The study: Zagorsky tracked the wealth and marital status of 9,055 people from
> 1985 to 2000, all of whom were part of the National Longitudinal Survey of
> Youth. They have participated in repeated interviews about various aspects of
> their lives since 1979. The participants now range in age from 41 to 49.
> That's important, because the results could be different for those who are
> older or younger and have different attitudes about marriage, divorce and
> co-habitation. 
> 
> Can you live happily ever after? Take this quiz! Answer these 22 questions to
> find out if your relationship is rock-solid.
> <http://netscape.compuserve.com/love/package.jsp?name=fte/lovequiz/lovequiz&am
> p;floc=wn-cx>  
> 
> The results:
> --Single people slowly accumulated wealth. They began with a median of $1,500
> and by the 15th year of the study, they reached $10,900.
> --Married people accumulated 93 percent more wealth than single or divorced
> people over the entire study period.
> --Those who divorced began to lose their net worth four years before the
> divorce was final, probably because they separated into two households before
> they legally divorced.
> --Men did better than women financially following a divorce, but not by much.
> Although husbands had about 2.5 times the wealth of their former wives, it
> only added up to an average difference of $5,124 in real dollars.
> 
> Five things couples argue about: The key to staying happily married is to
> fight--just a little. Find out the most common irreconcilable differences.
> <http://netscape.compuserve.com/love/package.jsp?name=fte/couplesargue/couples
> argue&amp;floc=wn-cx>
> 
> So why are married people wealthier than others? Economy of scale is the short
> answer. It's cheaper for two people to maintain a household than it is for one
> person to do the same. Zagorsky says divorce reverses those benefits. "Divorce
> looks like one of the fastest ways to destroy your wealth," he told AP. Also,
> people tend to become more economically productive after they marry. "They
> work harder, they advance further in their job, they save more money, and
> maybe invest more wisely," David Popenoe, co-director of the National Marriage
> Project at Rutgers University, told AP. "That's because, one can speculate,
> they are now working for something larger than themselves. They are working
> for a family." The study findings were published in the Journal of Sociology.
> 
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- ANOTHER BEAUTIFUL REASON NOT TO DIVORCE/AND, THE MAMA BLOG PHENOMONON

> Diane, Check out the grandparent photo, currently the top post on my friend
> Alyssa's Blog.  It's just so beautiful.  And it beautifully makes the point
> that if there were a divorce this photo would never have happened.  The
> grandparents wouldn't be together, smiling, playing with their grandchildren.
> Or if Alyssa were divorced, she may not have the time to take a trip to see
> her parents (or if this were her husband's parents, even more unlikely they
> would see much of the kids.)  http://www.hedgefamily.net/
> Elizabeth Doherty Thomas

This post is interesting in several ways. Yes, divorce unravels the family
tapestry and breaks the bond between grandparents and their grandchildren.
(As a gramma, I can't think of anything worse.)  But, it also let's me point
out to any of you that have missed it, the exploding "mom's blog"
phenomenon.  As I read the blogs of young mothers (every young mom I know
has one), I keep wondering if these are marriage strengtheners - if they are
some sign of the times?  What do you think?  Elizabeth presented at Smart
Marriages Atlanta with her dad, Bill Doherty, where they launched their new
DVD-based, teach-out-of-the-box wedding program, "The First Dance" targeted
to engaged couples.  I'm pleased to tell you that they're adding a new
version, one targeted to the parents of the bride and groom.  They'll
introduce at the Denver Smart Marriages.   - diane

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