Do You Have What It Takes to Be Married?

Although it may seem unromantic, a happy marriage is a long term project that requires daily tending. When we’re young and in love, we tend to think of marriage as this blissful thing that springs up out of the ground like a full fledged garden. In reality, it takes work. You have to pull weeds, cut branches, get a little dirty – but the end result can be just as beautiful as that magic garden we imagined before.

The end result is that happily married couples make explicit decisions about how to manage day to day activities. They realize that decisions, small or large, must be made in an environment of mutual respect and understanding. When conflict arises, whether it’s doing dishes or parenting techniques, the couple has learned how to communicate effectively.

What can impede this happy marriage is the circumstances of the marriage itself – when the couple got married, and how good their relationship was before they did.

For example, many couples rush into marriage while still in that early “idealized” state, where they are totally in love and neither has any faults. Studies show that divorce rates usually peak in the third year of marriage – a testament to the idea that only fools rush in. Idealized images of each other lead to idealized expectations. This is dangerous because the couple doesn’t give themselves time to find out how to solve conflict; they’d rather imagine that it doesn’t exist.

Another issue is the idea that moving in together will let you get to know one another better. In truth, this situation is tricky, and divorce rates are higher among those couples who lived together before marriage. The problem is that living together without marrying, especially if it’s mostly for money reasons or convenience, can lead a couple to think that they’re in a temporary situation.

Without a sense of “we’re married now, we have to make this work,” the couple tends to avoid negotiating conflict by avoiding long-term problems altogether.

Negotiating conflict and learning to recognize that men and women have different ways of handling conflict are skills that are invaluable to a happy marriage. However, when couples refuse to move out of the idealized stage and into the reality of conflict, they only hurt themselves.

Remember that having conflict in your relationship is normal – not a red flag. The only real thing that can keep the two of you from having a happy relationship is pretending that conflict doesn’t exist.

Neil Warner

I’m the “relationship guru,” and my main focus is to increase the quality of love-based relationship experiences. In this ground-breaking guide I offer useful strategies on healing a difficult angry relationship with love and compassion. You don’t have to stay in an unhealthy relationship one more minute. Let us share our tools with you today.

We can begin by you having a complimentary consultation, with a plan for action to change your life with new skills included. Just click this link and get started now!