Soooo, why are we doing this? We are doing this for five main reasons.
THIS IS NOT LEGAL ADVICE
In my previous article titled “2 Year Marriage Contract”, I introduced my partner (Breanna) and me. I explained that we created a 2 year marriage contract that we will be using when we get married sometime in 2023. In review, our 2 year marriage contract/system includes a very detailed prenuptial agreement that will be reviewed and updated every 12 months, and a 2 year marriage contract which includes a relationship evaluation system to be completed every six months and a clause that says at the end of 2 years if both parties don’t agree to renew for another 2 years, then the marriage is complete with an uncontested petition for divorce filed with the courts with little to no lawyers, no mediators, and no fighting (theoretically).
Soooo, why are we doing this? We are doing this for five main reasons.
- The first reason we are doing this is to take advantage of the more than 200 legal and financial benefits that marriage provides that are not included if you cohabitate instead. Let me explain just one of the many financial benefits of marriage. A few months ago we flew into an airport for a little vacation and while filling out the rental car agreement the person behind the desk asked if I wanted to add my “wife” to the agreement so she could also drive. I said “yes, thanks. Is there any additional cost?” He said “no.” And then I said “oh we live together, she’s my partner but we are not married.” He said, “its $25 per day to add her then.” Ouch. That’s just one small financial benefit. I will get into much more detail about the major legal and financial benefits in a future article. Keep in mind the main reason the gay community lobbied to make gay marriage legal was so that they could also take advantage of the legal and financial benefits of marriage.
- The second reason we are doing this is because I love myself and I love my partner and I love us as a couple. What does creating a prenuptial and 2 year marriage contract have to do with love you say? Because you want to start every marriage on as strong a foundation as you can and I believe this is the strongest foundation you can build to start with.
As I mentioned in my previous article most marriages happen, in my opinion, too soon while they are still in the falling in love or new relationship energy (NRE) stage, when frankly, we are not seeing reality and we are not seeing the authentic person we are marrying. That should chill you to the bone when you really think about it. Sitting down with your partner, and working out a prenuptial agreement and 2 year marriage contract is straight up dealing with reality and creating something that will improve your chances of staying happier longer at the same time allow for a conscious uncoupling…and that is an act of love for self and your partner.
Pretending there will never be problems and avoiding conversations about the future is fear based which is the opposite emotion to love. If you are fearful to do this, what is that really saying about you and your relationship with your partner?! To me it’s a giant red flag and one of the reasons 50% of marriages end. Love yourself and love your partner and start off your marriage with a strong foundation like a 2 year marriage contract can offer. And if our 2 year marriage contract doesn’t resonate with you, do something. Doing nothing other than going with the status quo is going to get you the status quo.
- The third reason we are doing a 2 year marriage contract, ironically, is to increase our chances of being HAPPILY married much longer than the national average in the U.S. which is 8 years. But wait, I thought you are doing a 2 year marriage contract?! We are, however, it’s a renewable contract; renewable every 2 years so if both parties agree to renew every two years you can continue to be married for 50 years or longer.
So why would a 2 year renewable contract help us stay happily married longer than the national average of 8 years you may be asking? Because if you know your partner can just end the marriage by the simple act of not renewing, then our theory is that it will motivate much better communication between the two partners. It does not allow for problems to go on unresolved, which is how many marriages slip into a slow and painful decline. If I want my partner to renew, and I know she can walk away without a fight and drama (pain and drama are why so many avoid divorce even if it means staying in a bad marriage), then you can bet that I’m going to be checking in with her on a regular basis (i.e. “how are we doing? Is there anything I’m doing that is bugging the sh!t out of you that I don’t know about? Is there anything I can do to help you feel safer in this relationship?”). And if she also knows that I can walk away without a fight and she wants me to renew, then she will be motivated to make sure I’m happy with the relationship too.
Most of us know that poor communication is where almost all problems in a marriage start and then eventually leads to divorce. We have so many married friends who call us complaining about their marriages and we tell them “you need to talk to your partner about this” only to hear “I can’t, they will get upset and not understand.” They won’t understand?!!! This is your LIFE PARTNER!!! If you can’t talk to them about challenges in your marriage, it’s the beginning of the end, or worse it’s the beginning of a suboptimal life that you will continue to live for years, sometimes decades.
And to add a little structure to the principle of better communication equals longer, happier marriages, one of the clauses in our 2 year marriage contract is that we agree to sit down every six months and do a detailed evaluation of how our relationship/marriage is doing (I will talk more in detail about that in a future article). As you can see, we are committed to having open, hopefully loving, but also difficult communication to resolve issues before they get to the point of “I can’t talk about that with my partner.” We believe our 2 year marriage contract will motivate and inspire that. So the second reason we are doing this is to incentivize consistent, open, healthy communication which will result in a longer (hopefully much longer than the national average) happier, fulfilled, growth oriented marriage.
- The fourth reason we are doing this 2 year marriage system is if we do need to end the marriage, or as my brilliant partner Breanna says “the relationship is complete,” then it should not be World War III to end the marriage. And I do literally mean World War III because it’s almost never just about the two people getting divorced. Family, friends and most unfortunate, children get dragged into this system called divorce.
According to the Webster dictionary, cruel and unusual punishment is “being degrading, inflicting unnecessary and intentional pain, or being disproportionate to the offense.” Our current system for divorce literally fits the definition of cruel and unusual punishment. It’s degrading, it’s almost always unnecessary AND intentional pain and completely disproportionate to the offense – it’s just two people that don’t want to be together any longer for heaven’s sake! So much suffering happens before, during and even after the divorce to both parties and the worst thing is when kids are involved. They suffer so much trauma and pain and hardship, that it lasts sometimes for life. We protect our enemies and criminals from cruel and unusual punishment but subject our own good citizens and innocent children to it through our divorce system. No wonder some people think aliens would destroy homo sapiens if they ever landed here.
And to be clear, we are not blaming the lawyers, it’s the current system that we blame. And in fact, there are lots of divorce lawyers all over the internet urging couples to get prenuptial agreements which will dramatically minimize the fighting and pain.
When two people, or even just one, want to end a marriage, yes it’s a big deal, but it should not be the living nightmare that it typically is for most and that is the third reason we are doing this two year marriage system, to create a conscious, humane, and with a little luck, a loving way to end a marriage. And we believe the best way to do that under the current set of divorce laws that we have, is as I’ve just said, but it’s worth repeating, to create the prenuptial agreement AND the 2 year marriage contract BEFORE you get married, which we believe will eliminate most, if not all, of the fighting and legal battles that cause so much of the suffering.
Will this system eliminate all the challenges and heartache that come with divorce? Of course not, but we believe it has a chance of eliminating the majority of them. And if it only eliminates half of the pain and suffering in divorce, it is worth it to do this. Just ask anyone who has been divorced before. Is this 2 year marriage system a perfect system? No, it’s an experiment AND it sure as heck, in our humble opinion, is much better than participating in the current marriage system.
- And the fifth reason we are doing a 2 year marriage contract is we want to change the legal system for divorce so that lives, especially children, aren’t destroyed when two people want to end a relationship. Obviously, this 2 year marriage contract is just the first simple, and perhaps naive, step. There will be much work to be done over the coming years, but we hope what we are doing will at the very least get the conversation started to start a movement that will eventually result in changing the laws to make divorce NOT cruel and unusual punishment.
So the five reasons we are doing a 2 year marriage contract are:
- We want to take advantage of the more than 200 legal and financial benefits of marriage.
- We want to build the strongest foundation possible and believe that is a giant act of love to use this system to do so.
- We want to motivate better communication that will hopefully keep the marriage healthy for many more years than the average 8 year marriage.
- If we need to end the marriage then we want to do it in the most loving, conscious, humane way possible with no lawyers or mediators.
- We want to start a conversation and movement to change the current divorce laws so that lives, especially children’s, aren’t destroyed when two people end their marriage.
There is a sixth reason we are doing this that I’m not formally listing and that is fun. Fun?! Yes, fun. We are actually having more fun than we deserve creating and talking and bantering this concept with ourselves and our friends. And yes, there have been some tense and difficult conversations about various things in the 2 year contract but ultimately, those need to happen and be resolved BEFORE you get married, not AFTER. And if you also want to have fun in your relationship, you need to have those difficult conversations and resolve any issues for the fun to flow freely.
In the next article, I will write about in more detail what the 2 year marriage contract/system is all about and explain the different parts and how they all work together. I would love your feedback on what we are doing. Like I said, it’s an experiment, I’m open to any and all comments. And if this article resonated with you, please forward it on to all the people you know who may be interested in doing this.