The Mrs and I celebrated 10 years of marriage this year.
A 7 day all-inclusive trip to Antigua – pretty awesome, but we did lose an iPhone (last picture to the right), get food poisoning, and realize we’re not all-inclusive people.
Life is full of lessons.
This momentous occasion led me to think about doing my part to make the next 10 the very best they can be.
Wish I could say I have it all figured out, but really do we ever have it figured out – life, love, ladies…very confusing topics.
I horde links of great blog posts on the reg, so I turned to my “Love” category to see what lessons I need to incorporate in the next 10 amazing years of wedded bliss…
Lessons in Love
Let’s start with a couple quotes from Esther Perle
A Definition of Love by Esther Perel
It’s a verb. It’s an active engagement with all kinds of feelings—positive ones and primitive ones and loathsome ones. But it’s a very active verb. And it’s often surprising how it can kind of ebb and flow. It’s like the moon. We think it’s disappeared, and suddenly it shows up again. It’s not a permanent state of enthusiasm.
Marriage by Esther Perel
Marriage is an aggregate of multiple narratives. It belongs to the people who are in it, but it also belongs to the people who are supporting it and living around it: family, friends, community. As I once said, and it became a kind of a saying for me, when you pick a partner, you pick a story, and then you find yourself in a play you never auditioned for. And that is when the narratives clash.
How to Easily Make Your Relationships Awesome: 4 Secrets
- Bids & responses
- Turn toward bids
- Decode bids
- Ok to miss 20%
- Curiosity, depth, and feelings
- Collector of emotional moments
8 Things Happily Married Couples Do
- Pay compliments
- Express thanks
- Take their workload
- Apologize when wrong
- Help de-stress
- Physical – light touch, small kiss
- Send partner out
- Send self out
Became More Self-Aware in Your Marriage
- Tripple A
- Attention
- Affection
- Acknowledgment
- “Thank you for putting aside yourself to do this for me.”
- All good ideas
- Prioritize positivity
- Cultivate healthy passion
- Savor experiences
- Focus on character strengths
- Emphasize gratitude
7 Tips for Building a Marriage
- Daily practice
- Make sure on the same page
- Control your own happiness
- Balance parenting and marriage
- Ask, “how can I help?”
8 Communication Traits of Happy, Healthy Marriages
- Daily appreciations – quantity leads to happiness
- Active listening
- Write down criticisms – if ever needed
- Practice positivity – 5:1 ratio positive:negative
- Embrace the power of timeout
- Make contact
- Use “I” statements
- Ask questions – get curious
How to Keep a Long-Term Marriage Thriving, According to 7 Happily Married Men
- Prioritize date-nights
- Remember the little things
- Revisit places
- Know love languages
- Surprise romantic gestures
- Court once per month
- Compliment her
How to Have a Happy Marriage: Powerful Secrets from Research
- Bad things are exceptions, good things are traits
- Give thanks
- Celebrate the good times (capitalization)
- Communication is key
- Try a new restaurant after you go skydiving
10 Relationship Skills All Husbands & Wives Need to Master
- Show appreciation (validation): be there, listen
- Listen: what would help you most right now?
- Avoid interruption
- Flirt: practice posture of interest
- Set appropriate boundaries
- Prioritize marriage
- Watch words during arguments: use “I” statements
- Stay clear of invalidation
- Know when to take a timeout
- Pay attention to body language
Small Facial Expressions Let You Know Your Marriage is Happy
- 80% of communication is nonverbal – faces display an immense amount of information
- Grab nose = more space
- Bite or grab lower lip = solve a problem/get rid of something
- Upper lip = stimulated by conversation or appearance
- Copied or repeated behaviors = positive
- Rolling eyes and not focusing on the partner = lack/loss of respect
