Robinson and Audrey: Our lessons in marriage

It is such an honor for us (Audrey and Robinson) to be guest contributors to this amazing blog that Joe and Nyamu started to share their journey of marriage. These guys have been our best friends for the longest time!! We met when we were all single, went through dating together. In fact, Joe met Nyamu at Audrey’s home during a hangout for the first time! And that was the beginning of their beautiful story. We planned our weddings together, (even got married the same year) and now we are on this journey called marriage. Wow it’s a blessing to have such people in our lives. Yes, there have been times that we have argued and cried together but also there have been many more times we have laughed hard, supported and encouraged each other.

In the past two and a half years we (The Mwanikis) have learned so much that we could literally write a book!! Here are some major key lessons that have brought us to where we are today:-

1. There is no such thing as “us against the world” in marriage: Many couples isolate themselves from others when they get married. A lot of them abandon their single friends now that they have moved to another “status” in life. For us we learnt that the more you open your life to others, the more of a blessing we are to them. Whether single, dating or married, we are always willing to walk with our friends. We believe that they can learn from us in as much as we learn from them.

We share how we plan our finances, strategic life plan and goal setting. How we handle our families of origin, the fights we have had and what we learnt from them, wedding planning, how to date effectively, and our current marriage enriching book list. We share it all. For us, we don’t believe in having a private life because eventually one way or the other, it will one day be out there for all to see. The question is, what will it look like? Having a mentor couple who can pour their lives to you and being a mentor to others to whom you can pour your lives to is one of the fastest ways to grow. This is because you save your time by learning from their mistakes and making well informed decisions.

2. We have always ensured marriage does not change Audrey and Robinson: We are first individuals before we became husband and wife. This means being deliberate in helping each other grow to be best version of ourselves.

Robinson; “Audrey loves laughing and smiling. She is kind, has a big heart and always seeing a 10 in everyone she meets. Moreover, she is a very strong focused woman and I always go to her for counsel in any decision I need to make. My role as a husband is to make her shine and there is no joy than seeing her be more of herself.” Most men come and shut off their wives in marriage because of ego, they come with this notion that “I am the man of this house so what I say goes” For me, that is not my philosophy. My role is to offer leadership and guidance to my family and not to control her. The Audrey people have always known should be the same Audrey and some more.

Audrey; “Women always think that they can change their husbands. That will never happen. I have just learnt to let my husband be. Be the man, be the leader and support his vision. I have never thought of forcing him do things, changing how he looks, or how he dresses or how he speaks. Some people even want to change him for me! But for me, I will continue to love him and trust in his abilities to be his best. When you do that as a woman, the man becomes the best version of himself. Best thing I can do is to work on me

and trust God to do the rest. I have seen Robinson grow so much since we met, most of the time am in awe the best thing is its God working in him and him working on himself.

As we mentioned earlier we could write a book! But in conclusion, we would like to say that marriage is a gift from God. You either make it heaven on earth or hell on earth. It is hard work because to make it a little heaven, you must accept each other, adapt to one another and understand your different personalities and behaviors. Yes, we think differently, and that is a big strength, not a reason to attack each other.

We have been through different seasons: loss of job, lack of stable income, change of friends, new opportunities but we have never felt like we don’t want be married to each other. We are in it until death do us part with God lighting every step of the way.

God bless