Facebook and Marriages

Jun 16, 2014 by Jim and Jerolyn Bogear

 

In an article back in 2012 Wall Street Journal stated, “More than a third of divorce filings last year contained the word Facebook, according to a U.K. survey by Divorce Online, a legal services firm.”

The article goes on to state, “Affairs happen with a lightning speed on Facebook,” says K. Jason Krafsky, who authored the book “Facebook and Your Marriage” with his wife Kelli. In the real world, he says, office romances and out-of-town trysts can take months or even years to develop. “On Facebook,” he says, “they happen in just a few clicks.” The social network is different from most social networks or dating sites in that it both re-connects old flames and allows people to “friend” someone they may have met only once in passing. “It puts temptation in the path of people who would never in a million years risk having an affair,”

What about us? In looking at social media these days it has become a challenge for many relationships, i.e. re-connecting with old friends, so that there is indeed a strong temptation.

We have a friend who re-connected with a friend from years ago, and the conversation quickly turned to getting together, how available she was, and would they like to get together. This married man expressed concern as the conversation seemed to turn from just connecting on Facebook to getting together in more than just friendship.

We appreciate this man’s commitment to “run” from this potential disaster without offending, but thought it best to stop this conversation before it went to a place he did not desire.

What relationships are we allowing to cross a line for us personally? What conversations are we allowing to continue to cause inappropriate contact and development? It is interesting that this article is from the secular world and warns us of the potential “temptations” and traps in ways Facebook can damage relationships. We are not advocating it is Facebook’s fault, but rather what we are allowing ourselves to get involved in where in the past we would not have connected due to separation of miles. We need to take personal responsibility for our actions. There is much value and good from sites like Facebook to re-connect with old friends, but what temptations do we allow to creep in and soften us to yield to these temptations?

• What safeguards are we putting in place in this new day of technology to help us maintain healthy relationships, especially our marriages?
• What do we need to do to be proactive in putting these in place?
• To whom are we accountable?
• What conversations do we need to have with our spouses to make sure we are doing our best to bomb-proof our marriages.
• In a world of need, and desire to be wanted, what are we doing to find our value and commitment in our marriages?

None of us are immune and we are finding more and more opportunity to build unhealthy relationships allowing ourselves to slide down the slippery slope of justification.

Take some time to evaluate and commit to our spouses the desire to be only there for and with them as we do our best to honor our vows of “until death do us part.”

We want our marriages to be the very best and one of those is to re-commit by both our words and actions to fulfill a wonderful sacred, covenant marriage.

Take some time today, or very soon, to put some re-committed safeguards in place. We believe in you and your marriage.

~ Jim

Resource: Does Facebook Wreck Marriages?