Key Idea: Evaluate Character for Two Full Years before dating

Because I believe that character is all-important when it comes to marriage, and because I know that people of poor character often try to pretend to be better than they are for the sake of deceiving others, including potential spouses, I encourage everyone to evaluate their potential spouses for a period of two full years before allowing yourself to consider them romantically or maritally.
And by evaluate, I simply mean “watch closely”. Watch who this person is, watch how they treat people, watch how they navigate issues of integrity and truth, watch how they deal with the matter of their own mistakes, whether they can readily accept when they are wrong, or whether they are the kind of person who can never admit that they are wrong. These are the kinds of things that you as a spouse are going to be living with, and they are the kinds of things that will either make each day smooth and straightforward, or like constantly walking uphill, or trying to wade through treacle.

Many people might think that taking two full years sounds unrealistic. However, people commonly accept that it takes two full years to truly know someone. Furthermore, remember that you can evaluate an unlimited number of people in that same two years, if you are not getting romantically involved with any of them yet.

See more on this subject on this post here: “All About Two Years“