Early in your marriage attend a study, retreat or read a great book or listen or watch a CD or DVD on healthy marriage. Add a new marriage education program each year to broaden, deepen, and further enrich your marriage, making ongoing marriage education a regular part of your married life. This can also be done through weekend retreats that are usually available right in your area or certainly within driving distance or at a vacation spot.
By taking the time to develop the healthiest communication skills you can at this stage you will save much heartache in future stages that are even more stressful. Partners in strong marriages have strong communication skills. The cliche that “good communication is the most important part of successful marriage” is true. The happiest couples said they were satisfied with the way they communicate, find it easy to express their feelings and find their partner to be a good listener.
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Have you ever experienced a disagreement, difference of opinion, or misunderstanding with your spouse? If answered truthfully, every couple would have to say “Yes, of course.” If you haven’t one of you is not being honest or open. It is normal and healthy to have our own opinions. The learning is to work toward understanding one another’s points of view. Sometimes we just agree to disagree, but we do it in a pleasant manner with help from above! Love to hear your comments on how you have managed to do this well??? Basically, we allow one another to be their own person and not try to sell the other on our idea always being better, We each have a right to our own opinion.
If we can listen closely to how our partner feels about a matter and how they came to that conclusion, we will understand their point of view better and it may even make sense when you look at it from their perspective. You may honestly be able to say, “That’s interesting, I never thought of it that way before.”
Following are tips to help strengthen your marriage. But first, check out my products related to marriage health.
Happy marriages are marriages where people are going to feel more comfortable about what is going on and are not going to worry about some of the weaknesses that they deal with on a daily basis. Learning about the internal life of good marriages in a culture of divorce is a great investment in your marriage. The fact is many people we know are happily going about their daily lives rarely merits comments by the media or just in daily conversations among friends and co-workers.
If you would like more ideas on how to do the above, feel free to contact me at [email protected]
Waverly Hanson
Marriage Counselor & Author
In my personal life, I have had a long successful marriage and have remarried following my husband's death. I have had three sons and helped raise a niece for three years and have seven grandchildren. I have loved spending time with them as they were growing up.
I also enjoy getting together with family and friends, ATVing in the mountains, photography, hiking, and traveling. I also enjoy reading, creating art, decorating, and serving others by volunteering.
Assisting couples in rebuilding their marriages has been so rewarding as I've had the privilege of seeing hundreds of couples reunite and get back to being positively connected to one another.
I also work with personal development and those who want to move forward by making positive improvements such as goal setting, self-care, boundaries, behavioral improvements, overcoming procrastination, conflict management, etc.