If you want to empower a nation, empower their women; this saying holds true and for many reasons. A few years back, we were working with a family and we held out for the business ideas of the wife. If I were in that situation again and if all the factors remain the same, I would align with that same decision. When a wife prospers, she doesn’t get a new husband or abandon her children; she rarely becomes abusive and violent towards her husband; she is more thoughtful of her immediate family and thus the proceeds of the empowerment benefit her entire family and neighbourhood. My mother is a living legend. For so long, I had erroneously taken empowerment to mean just the socio-economic path. There is much more.

There are so many stats confirming there are more women than men out there and the implication of this to marriages. I am always amused at how African ladies curse men for being infidels and all sorts, and I have witnessed conversations where women verbalized no concern or love lost for the woman whose husband they have decided to have, momentarily or permanently. More relevantly, it baffles me how men continue to fall for the same ageless trick – a maiden. It worked for Gen. Sanni Abacha and continues to work for many high-profile people in the ministry.

The decadence of this millennium has only reinforced the capacity of strange women, in many ways and on multiple platforms. The best antidote is a combination of the man’s self-control and his wife. Putting the man’s self-control first is deliberate. The control is very much in his hands – to be churn infidelity and the paths that lead to it, to exercise restraints where necessary, to flee rather than overestimate his strength, to be transparent with his wife, and to teach his appetite etc.

Having said the above, I have observed that luring or baiting away a man from the presence or sight of his wife is the preliminary stage on the itinerary of strange women. On many occasions, knowing that a man is married is no longer enough to keep predator ladies away. If anything, we now know that millennial ladies prefer married men. But, the profile of the wife and the health of their marriage do a lot to keep evil away. By “profile”, I don’t mean your professional or financial standing. The physical and physiological tools of these ‘woke’ ladies are available to every woman and many of them are within the contexts of what daughters of Zion can avail of. It is mostly about attitude, packaging, and carriage. The predators are not any more endowed than the wives whose marriages and families they prey upon.

What the eyes of your husband see can be momentarily more important to men than your academic qualifications. Actually, a good tailor or hairstylist or nice brands of lingerie or perfume or modest makeover accessories or jewellery (if you use them) may cost more money, but they save you and fetch you much more. Spending quality intimate time together and less nagging or less obsession for home chores can bond you together more than your wedding vows can. In your intimate moments, leave out the rest of the world and be active in the moments that you both can’t get outside one another. Learn some female-dominant sex postures and take the lead. Please, never allow unresolved conflicts to prevent or reduce your sexual performance. Teach him how to show you love. Some wives may contest this, but I hope you know the psyche of the husband-snatchers out there, if side chicks are gentle in cueing and luring husbands away, why should wives offer less initiative in safeguarding their homes?

If possible, just show up at your husband’s work to check on him. Your joyful charisma, beauty, packaging, and pleasant aura would be enough to phase out or prevent some things. I expect that you know that going out to fight a colleague who is trying to flirt with your husband can only reduce and/or hurt you. A lady once recounted that being warned off in a humiliating manner was the motivation for her to do the hitherto unimaginable - from flirting to the outright affair. A better style was how a Pastress elegantly took a minute walk within the church car park with a big sister in their church and succinctly communicated “stay off my husband” order to the sister; thereafter asked the sister to make them laugh back to the rest of the brethren, wearing cheerful faces.

If you lock your phones away from one another, then perhaps you are no longer naked with each other. Mobile phones have been the safe harbour for many things and many people. You may know more than I do, but I still don’t understand why two people in a very healthy marriage can’t have unrestricted access to each others’ mobile phones and emails. We can now justify the ATM and bank log-ins being kept private in some marriages – to prevent or contain financial abuse where the same had happened or is likely to happen. But to lock our mobile phones away may mean that we have reasons not to be transparent with one another. Be there with your husband – offline and online. Safeguard your home.

Selah

© Selah Series 2021