Plans For Saving Your Marriage

Everyone agrees that it takes a lot of work and dedication to have a healthy and lifelong marriage. The fairy tale of meeting that special someone and the honeymoon stage do not last forever. Marriage is beyond the courtship and honeymoon. Start early in the relationship to plan for saving your marriage.

During courtship you spend time together that was about each other not about doing the dishes, washing the clothes, cooking the meals, mowing the lawn, and all the day to day activities that have to be done. The best way to keep you love fresh and to have a healthy marriage is to plan for it.

Planning for Saving Your Marriage

■-Set realistic expectations

■-Set goals for the marriage

■-Keep a positive attitude

■-Express tender loving care

■-Effective communication skills

Let each other know your expectations of each other. You must establish realistic expectations that practical. You can agree not to yell or call each other names during a disagreement but do not set the expectation to not have a disagreement. That is not being realistic. You are setting your marriage up for failure if you do this. Both partners need to agree upon the expectations for the marriage.

Setting a goal of having a healthy lifetime marriage is like setting a mile marker in front of you that is always moving just far enough ahead to allow you to keep the goal in site but always another step to go.

Do not accept a negative attitude at any time from either partner. Always look at your marriage in a positive light. Acknowledge the positive attitudes and personality of your spouse. Do not dwell on the negative behaviors. You build up the positive and that is what you will see more of. If you focus on the negative behavior you will get more of the negative behavior. What a surprise! You though the one to change the negative behavior was the spouse with the negative behavior. It really does not work that way. You get what you see and give attention to.

You should show extra tender loving care toward your spouse. What is tender loving care? It is simply the do in love. Politicians are thought to be good politicians when they put action behind their campaign promises. In a healthy marriage you will find two partners who put action behind their words of love. Tender loving care provides needed nurturing to the relationship.

Using effective communication is more than just talking, it actually requires more listening than talking. Customer service training teaches you to ask open ended questions rather than closed ended questions. Open ended questions start with how, when, and where. When asked these questions require the other person to carry out a dialog and you listen. Closed ended questions such as Did, Could, Would can be answered with a mere yes or no and often get answered with just a nod of the head. Do you want to open your partner up for communication then ask open ended questions?

in Marriage