SimonSimple

Hi People

Yesterday our eldest returned from her diving trip in clear & murky waters around some Indonesian islands. In her own words it was fun. She is about a thousand Singapore dollars poorer but several notches up in her rich experience with her latest adventure with her close friends.

Today our youngest will return from his 2 weeks backpacking trip with his friends in Vietnam. No doubt it will also be a rich experience for him. A sort of rite of passage into his adulthood. Actually his 2 year stint doing his national service would count as the other rite of passage into adulthood.

This weekend our middle will fly off to Kuala Lumpur for another jaunt for her Frisbee Fix. This is following an earlier one in Bangkok this year and maybe another one later this year to Tasmania.

Our kids leaving home ever so often is becoming a regular thing in our household. Whenever they are out of town we do miss them a little bit. But who are we kidding? Ever since they ascended into adulthood and left their teen years I believe their physical presence is no guarantee that they are emotionally present. We as parents are not about to ‘blackmail’ them into insisting they have the required conversation with the ‘oldies’ or demanding that we are included into their lives. I guess they need their space to find themselves and define themselves.

That brings me to the subject of the Empty Nest. This season need not spell Emptiness, provided we take care to make it our Love Nest or Loveliness. But it takes some thought during the times when there were no kids around or when the kids were young. Time and again we have emphasised in our Marriage Preparation Classes - when you get married, the two of you are a family. Why? Because even when the children come along, all too soon when they turn 18, they will begin to leave you. Physically as well as emotionally.

So the idea is to invest in each other more than you invest in your children or career. I was chatting with 2 of my ex-colleagues yesterday. I told them I had to wait till I was 55 to contemplate early retirement since now the trend is to retire at 62 or even 65 or for some who have overextended themselves with a huge mortgage, almost never retire! As for working women, perhaps they can ascend to ‘tai-tai-dom’ in their forties since they can at least depend on their husbands who have successful careers.

Whatever it may be, my take is that both husbands and wives must invest in each other early in their marriage, or risk boredom in their retirement years.

Take care…..of each other. Love & cherish each other carefully. God bless.

Hi People

We just returned from Jakarta after a weekend of conducting a marriage seminar and a few talks. With 32 years of a happy marriage behind us we were ready to share our secrets with the many participants. Our hosts were the perfect hosts - true Indonesian hospitality. We were hosted to fabulous authentic local fare and were chauffuered from point A to point B.

People often comment how lucky we are to have found each other. We roll our eyes are go “Lucky? We work hard at our marriage. We are united in defending our marriage”. Want to know how?

Here is the secret. Think some good thoughts about how you want to live out the rest of your married life. Let me ‘front load’ you with these facts: If you are the man, chances are you will leave your career at some point in time. If you are the woman (whether a house wife or a career woman), know that your children will leave you. Now you get the picture.

So for those who have not yet hit the midlife crisis, there is still time to invest in your other half. For those who have invested wrongly in their career or their children, call a truce and return to the spouse of your youth. There is still time yet. Admit the errors of your ways and make up for lost time.

While we were in Jakarta we saw an amusing poster in a shopping mall. The Indonesian word for the word atmosphere is ‘atmostfear’. So husbands and wives, if you want to create the right atmosphere for your marriage of later years, at most fear that if you do the wrong things in the early years of your marriage you will regret the later years of the marriage.

With the empty nests and the empty pockets with us it is not hard to imagine you have a gem within your grasp - treasure the gold nugget you have next to you. Your career and children pale next to your spouse as gold dust pales next to a solid gold bar.

Invest in the Real Thing!