Marriage is a hallowed institution in almost every society. Unfortunately, it seems like this institution is under some attack. Divorce rates are high in most advanced countries. Many people are at a loss to explain why. There are many vague reasons floated about, but none that are specific enough to help people combat the divorce rate and save their marriages.
What Does It Take to Have a Successful Marriage?
Yet nearly everyone in a marriage agrees that they want to preserve it. People from different backgrounds have come together over the last few decades, as divorce rates climbed, to find out what helps successful marriages work.
They have also worked with people in the middle of a divorce to find out how they could have avoided the ends of their marriages. I can summarize their findings in a series of tips.
Tips for a Successful Marriage
• Put Your Partner First
Many marriages go to the brink and then recover. When therapists and others have interacted with these struggling marriages, they have overwhelmingly noticed that the couples who come back from the edge of divorce share one significant trait. The partners in these marriages mutually turn their attention away from other factors and toward each other.
Many things can turn partners’ attention spans to something outside of the marriage. The classic example is the infidelity of an emotional kind at least. However, there is much more to a marriage than this. Often, children become the focus of one or both partners, and they forget to take care of each other. Work can also create such stress and challenges that spouses lose track of one another.
These spouses have to learn to look at each other once again and make each other the real focus of the marriage. This is hard to do when you have small children but, if you want the children to have two parents in the home when they grow up, you will need to consider your spouse. Even married couples that are getting along need to remember to keep each other in focus as their marriage develops.
• Look in the Mirror
Just as it is vital to take care of your spouse, it is essential to take care of yourself. Taking care of your appearance is another way of staying focused on your spouse. Many marriages suffer because one or both spouses act as if there is no reason for either of them to remain attractive.
This is not just a physical issue. Spouses bear a responsibility to take care of themselves and their interiors. Marriages can also suffer when one spouse allows addiction to affect his or her life.
There is also an insult to your spouse when you attempt to dress up for work or to meet friends but do not impress him or her with your appearance. You cannot treat your spouse like you were on your first date for the rest of your life. However, it is essential to show your spouse that he or she remains important and worthy of your attempts to impress.
• Keeping the Romance Alive
This attention to your partner and your appearance should spill over into frequent attempts to keep the romance alive. It is vital to the romantic health of a couple to spend time together alone.
This does not just mean sitting together and doing the bills, though that may be a healthy activity in which to engage as a couple. Married people also need to spend time together as though they were dating again. This remains true even if the couple has children.
• Give Each Other Space
This advice may sound contrary to the previous lesson. However, just like you need time together as a couple, you each need at least a small amount of time alone. This is just elementary in mental health. The romantic health of a couple can suffer from too much time together, and it can suffer from too much time apart. A balance in this area is a critical part of marriage.
• Have Fun
A lot of couples set aside time for the entire family to have fun. They remember to set aside time to be romantic together. However, they forget to set aside time have fun together.
• Keep Loving the Spouse that You Married
After some time together, certain qualities of your spouse that were easily overlooked can become more than irritating. This often leads to disruptions that can result in divorce.
Ultimately, this is unfair. These qualities were present when you married, and it is not fair to believe that these qualities will change just because you are married. You need to remember all the qualities that you love and recall that they are still there in your partner.
• Be Clear
All too often, each person in a married couple begins to think that the other person in the couple can or should read minds. Lack of communication is one of the biggest rocks on which a marriage can crash. This communication does not just apply to talking about passing the salt and buying groceries. If you have an emotional or a romantic need, you need to let your spouse know directly, without hints.
• Lead Your Own Life
You have to take care of yourself and not get lost in taking care of your partner. This is another part of taking care of yourself. By focusing too much on the needs of your partner, you can cause yourself damage and stress that will negatively impact the marriage eventually.
• Show Your Confidence in Your Spouse
Your spouse needs to feel that you see him or her as attractive. However, he or she also needs to know that you feel confident in his or her actions. It is easy to become a criticizer and constantly carp on what your spouse does wrong. Turn that around and help to build up your spouse’s confidence. Make remarks when your spouse does something well or right.
• Demonstrate Loyalty
You can lose respect for your spouse if you do not force yourself to be respectful of him or her in public. Speak well of your spouse to others. If he or she ever discovers that you are speaking poorly about him or her with others, this can be a significant blow to self-confidence.
• Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff
You should never let your spouse walk all over your feelings or purposefully hurt you in any way. However, you should not turn mountains into molehills. Do not allow an argument about the way that your spouse folds the towels to ruin your marriage.
• Shared Responsibility
Maintaining a marriage, keeping a home and raising a family requires a lot of work. People can take roles in this endeavour without understanding just how much the other spouse is doing. You or your spouse may be doing much more than their fair share of the world in keeping the ship afloat. Do not be afraid to go over your mutual responsibilities and allot them accordingly.
• Be Happy to See Your Spouse
Taking your spouse for granted does not make him or her feel very good. When you see your spouse at the end of the day or after a long period apart, remember to put a smile on your face. This works even better if you allow yourself to be genuinely happy to see your spouse.
The key to making many of these steps work is always keeping in minds why you love your spouse. Going over those reasons at different times may help to keep you interested in making the marriage work.