Know Your Family History

Many situations come up in marriages that stem from you or your spouse's past.  It may be the style of parenting that was used by either of your parents.  It may be the absence of one or both parents physically, emotionally or otherwise. It is important to know about each other's past in order to better understand each other and give grace to each other in times of misunderstanding.  

Another aspect of knowing your family history is to look back and see what important things have happened or what important people may have formed part of you or your spouse's lineage.  Do a little investigation into your family trees.  Make it a couple project that the two of you work on together.  Ask your parents, uncles, aunts, cousins, grandparents or even great-grandparents if they're still around.

If it's not appropriate timing for whatever reason to delve into the past then begin with yourselves.  Write out important dates and events in your own lives and go forward from there.  It can be a gift to future generations or to other family members when you pass into eternity.

Make it fun to know your family history or to build a new history.  If you're the creative type then you can choose to design your own history book.  While browsing around on Amazon I saw a few books that I thought might be helpful.

To Our Children's Children: Preserving Family Histories for Generations to Come is step-by-step guide to creating histories from the memories of older people.

Family Tree Legacies: Preserving Memories Throughout Time helps you keep track of basic information and special memories, important dates etc.  There are fill-in pages to record all your essential family information. It is in a binder format so that you can grow your own family tree by using the included CD to print out new copies of the book's fill-in pages.

Our Family Tree - A Keepsake Book is divided into 28 sections to help you document family ancestry and traditions.  The sections include: The Story Begins, Your family's earliest ancestors, Family Recipes and Your family's special dishes and favorite treats. There are designated spaces for family photos and a 14x20-inch family tree poster to summarize your ancestry and comes with a linen cover so that it can be displayed attractively.

Scrapbooking Your Family History is a colorful volume with techniques for preserving precious ancestral memories through scrapbooking. Use those vintage photos, uncovered documents, and newly-found family stories to create scrapbooked family trees and pedigree charts, depictions of holidays and family reunions through the years, and histories of family homesteads. Inscribe notes on ancestors’ occupations and hobbies etc. and there are also techniques for displaying the scrapbooked material in shadow boxes and frames.

Those are just a few of what I saw.  Click on any of the links to get more information on them or to see if there are any others that appeal to you.  Give it a try and see what surprises you discover in you or your spouse's family tree.

Photo credit

  

A Love Language Minute: Feel Like Giving Up on Marriage?

by Dr. Gary Chapman

Do you feel like giving up on your marriage?

I've been counseling people with marital struggles for over thirty years. Often they come alone because their spouse will not come with them. And, often they have no hope. They are living in very difficult marriages. I am under no illusion that I can give a magic formula to bring healing to all such marriages, but I do believe that in every troubled marriage positive steps can be taken by one partner that have the potential for changing the emotional climate between the two of them.

The first step is to make the decision not to give up. Read a book, talk with a counselor or pastor, share with a trusted friend, but don't give up. Nothing is impossible with God!

There are three radical and negative approaches to a troubled marriage: suicide, homicide, and divorce. The first two are considered unthinkable by intelligent, mentally healthy people. On the other hand, divorce is often seen as a humane way of ending the pain of an unhealthy relationship. Some have divorced two, three or more times and are still in search of a happy marriage. When I did the research for my book Desperate Marriages, I discovered that divorce does not solve problems. It creates problems that never go away.

The answer is not found in running, but in learning. Learn what is behind your spouse's bad behavior. Then you can ask God for wisdom on how to respond. You can be a part of the solution.

A Love Language Minute - Love Makes the Difference

I really do believe that "love makes the world go round." Why? Because God is love. It is His love for us that makes all of life meaningful. So, what does that have to do with marriage? God made us for each other. Husband and wife are designed to work together as a mutual support team to discover and fulfill God's plans for their lives.

In a word, love is the choice to look out for each other in the same way that God looks out for us. It doesn't require warm feelings, but it does require an open heart.

Spouses become God's agent for helping their partners feel loved. Few things are more important than encouraging one's spouse to accomplish God's plans. Marriage is designed to help us accomplish more for God. Two are better than one in His kingdom.

If we do not feel loved in marriage, our differences are magnified. We come to view each other as a threat to our happiness. We fight for self-worth and significance, and marriage becomes a battlefield rather than a haven.

Love is not the answer to everything, but it creates a climate of security in which we can seek answers to those things that bother us. In the security of love, a couple can discuss differences without condemnation. We discover how to bring out the best in each other. The decision to love your spouse holds tremendous potential.

I believe that love really does make the difference between success and failure in a marriage. Keep in mind that love is not a feeling, but love stimulates feelings. When we learn to love each other effectively, we keep warm emotional feelings alive.

from Dr. Gary Chapman

A Love Language Minute - I'm Feeling Angry

When you are angry, the first positive step is to admit to yourself that you are angry. Say aloud, "I'm feeling angry." The second step is to ask God to help you handle your anger in a positive way. "Lord, help me to do what is right and good with my anger." The third step is to ask, "Did someone sin against me?" If so, the biblical answer is to lovingly confront the person and seek reconciliation.

On the other hand, if you are angry simply because something happened that irritates you, ask "What can I learn from this experience?" If the other person habitually arrives late for your appointment, perhaps you can talk with them and negotiate change. Thus the anger has served a positive purpose. God wants to teach you how to handle your anger in a godly way.

When you are angry, be sure to get the facts before you take action. You hear your spouse tell someone on the phone, "I'll be there tomorrow night." You know that tomorrow night is your date night, so you get angry. Before you storm in and say something harsh, take time to ask, "Did I hear you promise someone to do something tomorrow night?" Your spouse says, "Yes, I told mom I'd bring her blanket by. I thought we could do it either before or after we go out to eat."

Your anger subsides because you took time to get the facts. Often we jump to conclusions about what someone said or did, and we accuse them in anger. We ruin a perfectly good evening because we failed to ask questions.

from Dr. Gary Chapman

A Love Language Minute - Gifts Don't Grow on Trees?

We all have specific friends who love receiving gifts--it's their primary love language. It is what makes them feel loved most deeply.

Gifts need not be expensive; after all, "it's the thought that counts." But I remind you, it is not the thought left in your head that counts; it is the gift that came out of the thought that communicates emotional love.

The gift can be any size, shape, color, or price. It may be purchased, found, or made. To the individual whose primary love language is receiving gifts, the cost of the gift won't really matter.

If you can afford it, you can purchase a beautiful card for less than five dollars. If you cannot, you can make one for free. Just go get the paper out of the trash can where you work, fold it in the middle, take scissors and cut out a heart, write "I love you," and sign your name. Gifts don't need to be expensive to have meaning.

When was the last time you gave a gift? Is there friend or a co-worker who needs encouragement this week?

from Dr. Gary Chapman

A Love Language Minute - Does Your Child Feel Loved?

Loving Your Child Through Quality Time

Four-year-old Sara is pulling on her mother’s leg. “Mommy, Mommy, let’s go play!” “I can’t play right now,” her mother says. “I’m making potato salad. I’ll play with you as soon as I finish.” Two minutes later Sara returns to ask again.

What can we learn from this scenario? Sara is revealing her primary love language – quality time. What really makes her feel loved is her mother’s undivided attention. However, her mother may see her pleading as irritating. Don’t ignore your child’s irritating behavior. They are giving you valuable information.

Are You Speaking the Right Love Language?
Quality time means giving a child your undivided attention. If you are a parent, do your children feel loved? I didn’t ask, "Do you love your children?" I know the answer to that. It is not enough to be sincere. It’s highly possible that you are not speaking your child’s love language.

If you don’t give them quality time, they will not feel loved even though you are giving them ‘words of affirmation’, ‘physical touch’ ‘gifts’ and ‘acts of service’. If your child is begging you to do things with them, then quality time is likely their love language. If you haven’t read my book The Five Love Languages of Children, I urge you to do so.

How to Give Quality Time
All children love stories. When they are small we read to them, and the story often leads to exciting conversations. Stories often stimulate emotions. Asking a child, “How does that make you feel?” is a way of helping the child learn to express emotions. Children also like to hear you tell stories about your childhood. You can give the child a sense of belonging when sharing your stories.

Reading and telling stories is one way to give a child ‘quality time’. For those brief moments, the child has your undivided attention. If this is the child’s primary love language, then nothing is more important in making that child feel loved. When you meet a child’s need for love, you are laying the foundation for a bright future.

from Dr. Gary Chapman

Click on the book image below for more information on speaking your child's love language.

LOVE LANGUAGE #5: PHYSICAL TOUCH

Physical touch, as a gesture of love, reaches to the depths
of our being. As a love language, it is a powerful form of
communication from the smallest touch on the shoulder to the
most passionate kiss.

1. Perhaps you and your spouse have never openly shared with
one another the types of touching you find pleasurable.
Discuss the emotional, sexual, and psychological dimensions
related to all these areas of the body.

2. Make a list of all the circumstances, locations, and types of
appropriate touch that will enhance your physical relationship.
For example, how does each of you want/expect to be greeted
at the end of the workday? What about touching in public? If
you each feel differently, come to a compromise resolution.

3. In the book, Pete found it very difficult to ask for physical
touch, especially sexual touch. Why do you think this was true?
Talk with your mate about any challenges either of you have in
this area – including struggles with body image.

4. Resolve never to touch your mate in a harmful way. If you’ve
ever harmed your spouse even in the slightest, ask forgiveness
and commit to dealing with this self-control issue.

Taken from www.fivelovelanguages.com.

LOVE LANGUAGE #4: Acts of Service

Criticism of your spouse’s failure to do things for you may
be an indication that “acts of service” is your primary love
language. Acts of service should never be coerced but should
be freely given and received, and completed as requested.

1. If we really want to serve our spouse, we need to do things
for them the way they would want – not the way we think they
should be done. Seek specifics from your spouse on a few new
tasks he or she desires of you, and do exactly as instructed.

2. Choose three humble tasks that you don’t especially like but
know your spouse would be pleased to see completed.
Surprise your spouse by doing them without being asked.

3. Do you struggle with ingrained attitudes about gender
role stereotypes – “women don’t grill” or “men don’t do
bathrooms”? Honestly discuss where these ideas come from,
and look at your own expectations in this area.

4. Pick four tasks that you wish your mate would do for you.
Be ready to receive the same, and work out adjustments that
are based on mutual love rather than coercion or a legalistic
swap. Keep practicalities like schedule in mind.

5. Remember some of the acts of service you performed for
each other during courtship – and how they drew you together?
See if your relationship can be rekindled by serving one another
as you did pre-marriage.

Taken from www.fivelovelanguages.com.

A Love Language Minute: Living with a Depressed Spouse

By Dr Gary Chapman

John is a successful business man, but his wife is suffering from depression. “She spends most mornings in bed, and in the afternoons she just sits around the house,” he said. “She seems to have no ambition. Every night, I have to bring food home for dinner. Many nights she doesn’t eat with us. She has lost forty pounds over the last year. To be truthful, life is pretty miserable at our house. I feel sorry for the kids, although they get more attention than I do. But I know they must wonder what is wrong with their mother.”

John just described some of the classic characteristics of depression. Unfortunately, depression does not go away simply with the passing of time. John’s wife needs medical and psychological help, and without it things will get even worse. Many Christians don’t understand depression. They think it is a spiritual problem. While it may have a spiritual dimension, it is often rooted in physical and emotional imbalance.

Identifying the Problem
What do you do when your spouse is depressed? First, you must get information. It is helpful to think of three categories of depression. First, depression may be the by-product of a physical illness. When we are physically sick, our minds and emotions move into a depressed state. We temporarily check out. It’s nature’s way of protecting you from constant anxiety about your physical condition.

The second kind of depression is called situational depression or reactive depression. It is a depression that grows out of a particularly painful situation in life. Many of these experiences involve a sense of loss: the loss of a job, the loss of a child to college, or loss of a friendship.

The third category is depression rooted in some biochemical disorder. It is a physical disease, and must be treated with medication. Visit the library or search the web and learn about depression. It’s the first step in helping your spouse.

Finding the Solution
The healthiest road of treatment involves an honest and in-depth evaluation of three elements: physical, psychological, and spiritual. Seriously depressed persons will seldom take initiative to help themselves. As a caring spouse you must insist that they get help. Depression is not an incurable disease. Even those who have been depressed for months or sometimes years can find relief with the proper treatment.
Long term depression can be devastating to a marriage. If your spouse has been depressed for more than a few weeks, I urge you to take action.

LOVE LANGUAGE #3: Receiving Gifts

Gifts are visual symbols of love, whether they are items you purchased or made, or are simply your own presence made available to your spouse. Gifts demonstrate that you care, and they represent the value of the relationship.

1. The value of a gift is in the eye of the beholder. Perhaps you didn’t especially value a gift you received. Consider the giver’s intent and reorient your thinking to value the love demonstrated by the giver.

2. Take Dr. Chapman’s advice and work up a list of gifts your spouse has especially appreciated in the past. Beyond that, seek more input from others who know his/her tastes. Now decide to give one token of love, however small, in line with those preferences each week for the next month.

3. Perhaps in your mind gifts and finances don’t mix well at present. Yet if gift giving is an investment in your most important “possession,” you can view it as a form of savings or security. Review your budget, and sacrificially give more to your spouse.

4. Are gifts your mate’s primary love language? Then you may need to give up your own priorities, at least temporarily. Think about a time in recent years when your spouse really wanted something – either a certain gift, or the gift of your presence – and you failed to come through. Consciously plan to make the tough choices the next time around.

5. Remember that the gift of yourself means more than just your physical presence. Attempt for one week to share at least one important event or feeling in your day. Seek the same from your spouse.

Taken from www.fivelovelanguages.com.

LOVE LANGUAGE #2: Quality Time

Spending quality time together through sharing, listening, and participating in joint meaningful activities communicates that we truly care for and enjoy each other.

1. “My job is so demanding” may be a statement of excuse for not spending quality time with your spouse. Yet success and material provision can’t substitute for intimacy. Set up a plan with your spouse to balance your responsibilities to allow for adequate quality time. Be sacrificial in the trade-offs you make.

2. Bill realized that Betty Jo’s primary love language was “quality time,” so he made a list of things he knew she would like for him to do with her. Walks, vacations, or simply more talks with the children all involved the sharing of themselves in the midst of worthwhile activities. Create your own list and
make a commitment to two items within the next month.

3. Look back upon the last major problem or challenge your spouse faced. Write out ways you could have better achieved the following: (a) less advice and more sympathy; (b) more understanding and fewer solutions; (c) more questions and
fewer conclusions; (d) more attention to the person and less to the problem.

4. Find out how important “shared activities” are in your marriage. Pick three experiences that brought you very close and are a source of continuing fond memories. Did these experiences involve quality time in shared activities? Plan
a new event that has strong “memory” potential.

Taken from www.fivelovelanguages.com

A Love Language Minute: God Speaks Your Love Language

From Dr. Gary Chapman

After almost forty years of counseling couples and families, I am convinced that there are five basic languages of love. There may be many “dialects,” but only five languages. Each person has a primary love language, which means that one of the five love languages speaks more deeply than the other four on an emotional level. When someone speaks my primary love language, I am drawn to that person because he or she is meeting my basic need to feel loved.

The five love languages are more fully explained in my previous books, but let me briefly review them:

(1) Words of Affirmation
(2) Quality Time
(3) Gifts
(4) Acts of Service
(5) Physical Touch

Feeling God's Love
Susan was my first appointment of the day, and I felt like crying when I heard her story. Her father had committed suicide when she was thirteen. Her brother was killed in Vietnam. Six months ago, her husband had left her for another woman. She and her two small children were living with her mother. I felt like crying...but Susan wasn’t crying. In fact, she was vibrant, almost radiant.

Later the same day I had an appointment with Regina. Her parents had divorced when she was ten years old. She saw her father only twice after the divorce: once at her high school graduation and again at her younger sister’s funeral. Her sister had been killed in an auto accident. She was in my office because she was contemplating a fourth marriage. “I don’t want to grow old alone, but I don’t have a very good track record with marriage. My mother keeps telling me that God loves me and has a plan for my life. Right now I don’t feel God’s love, and I think I must have missed the plan. I’m not even sure there is a God.”

Two ladies, each having experienced enough pain for a lifetime. One feels deeply loved by God; the other feels empty. Why do some people claim to experience God’s love very deeply, while others feel so distant from God that they are unsure God even exists? I believe the answer lies in the nature of love itself. Love is not a solo experience. Love requires both a lover and a responder. If God is the divine lover, why do not all of His creatures feel His love?

God's Languages
God Speaks Your Love Language (to release February 2009) builds on the concepts from my previous books and considers the love languages of God. It is my premise that the love languages observed in human relationships all reflect various aspects of divine love. If people are indeed made in the image of God, and if people have five distinct love languages, then we would expect to find all those love languages expressed in the character and nature of God. Indeed, God speaks every language, so it is not surprising to discover that He communicates fluently through each of the five love languages. In the weeks to come, I'll discuss each of these.

LOVE LANGUAGE #1: Words of Affirmation

Compliments, words of encouragement, and requests rather than demands all affirm the self-worth of your spouse. They create intimacy, heal wounds, and bring out the full potential of your other half.

1. Take an evening to allow your spouse to share his or her dreams, interests, and talents. Draw out the specifics through empathetic listening. After putting yourself in your spouse’s shoes, lovingly and sincerely encourage him/her, and offer to help achieve these goals in any way possible.

2. Familiarity may breed contempt or discourtesy in different forms. Check certain characteristics of your relationship over the last week. Has your tone been harsh, your attitude sarcastic, or your viewpoint judgmental? Have you focused mainly on where your spouse has failed? Resolve these issues and seek forgiveness.

3. Evaluate your relational style in terms of communication patterns. Do your words reflect requests, suggestions, and guidance? Or do they hint at demands, ultimatums, or even threats? Remember that choice, free will, and voluntary service are key aspects of love. How can you improve your verbal approach to your spouse?

4. There is an infinite variety of kind, intimate, and supportive ways of verbally communicating with your mate. As the book suggests, start a notebook entitled “Words of Affirmation” in which you record creative and superior ways of building up your spouse, even in the smallest ways.

5. Marriage can be vastly improved by a simple technique. Make a list of things you especially appreciate about your spouse. Then twice a week give your spouse other verbal compliments based on your list. After the list is exhausted, decide to continue this for two months as opportunities arise.

Taken from www.fivelovelanguages.com.

A Love Language Minute - Love is a Choice

From Dr. Gary Chapman

The Five Love Languages has helped hundreds of thousands of couples rediscover warm emotional feelings for each other. Now, this did not happen because someone decided, “I’m going to have warm feelings toward my spouse again.” It began when one person decided, “I’m going to express love to my spouse in spite of the fact that I don’t have warm feelings toward her or him.” Emotional love can be rediscovered. The key is learning the love language of your spouse and choosing to speak it regularly. Warm feelings are the results of loving actions. Love is a choice.

A Powerful Weapon
How can we express love to our spouses when we are full of hurt, anger, and resentment over past failures? Remember the words of Jesus: “Love your enemies. Bless those who curse you.” Why would Jesus say this? Because love is the most powerful weapon to change the heart of the other person. Love doesn’t erase the past, but it makes the future different.

The Full Tank
If I know my wife's primary love language and choose to speak it, her deepest emotional need will be met and she will feel secure in my love. If she does the same for me, my emotional needs are met and both of us live with a full “love tank”.

How do you create this kind of growing marriage? It all begins with the choice to love. I recognize that as a husband, God has given me the responsibility of meeting my wife’s need for love. I choose to accept that responsibility and learn how to speak her primary love language. What happens? My wife’s attitude and feelings toward me become positive. Now she reciprocates and my need for love is also met. Love is a choice.

It May Be Unnatural
What if speaking your spouse’s love language doesn’t come natural for you? The answer is simple: “You learn to speak it!” My wife’s love language is "acts of service". One of the things I do for her regularly as an act of love is to vacuum the floors. Do you think this comes naturally for me? You couldn’t pay me enough to vacuum the house. There is only one reason I do it: LOVE. You see, when it doesn’t come naturally to you, it is a greater expression of love.

The Key to Emotional Warmth
Your spouse has a primary love language, and if you learn to speak it, you will see a radical change in your spouse. The five love languages are words of affirmation, acts of service, quality time, physical touch and gifts.

Learn your spouse’s primary love language and you will have the key to unlocking warm feelings. You don’t have to have warm emotions toward your spouse to speak their language. Love is a choice.

A Love Language Minute: What Love Really Means

What Love Really Means

Ways to Show Your Love

From Dr Gary Chapman

Last week I suggested that there are two basic ways to express love to your spouse: words and deeds. Today we look at deeds. The apostle John said, “Love not in word only, but in deed.” Do something to show your love.

Love is kind, the Bible says. So, find something kind and do it. It might be an unexpected gift, or washing the car that they drive. It might be keeping the children while they go shopping or hiking. Or, how about a love letter. How long has it been since you wrote your spouse a love letter? Or, perhaps dinner at a restaurant that doesn’t have a drive through window.

Love is patient. So, stop pacing the floor while your spouse is getting ready to go. Sit down, relax, read your Bible and pray. Love is also courteous. The word means court-like. So, do some of the things you did when you were courting. Do you remember, ladies, how you used to reach over and touch his neck? Do you remember, guys, how you used to open the car door for her? Express your love by your actions.

Loving the Unlovely
Now I want to give you a very difficult challenge. It is found in the words of Jesus recorded in Matthew chapter five, “Love your enemies.” Anyone have a husband who qualifies? “Pray for those who persecute you.” You feel persecuted? Pray for the one who is persecuting you. And I don’t think he means pray that the wrath of God will fall on them.

This is the challenge to love an unlovely spouse. It’s fairly easy to love your spouse when your spouse is loving you. But what if they treat you harshly, take advantage of you, and humiliate you? For this, you will need the help of God. God specializes in loving the unlovely. When I say love, I’m not talking about trying to have warm feelings for the person. I’m talking about choosing to see them as a person of worth, as someone for whom Christ died.

Therefore, I will talk to them and treat them with dignity and respect. In so doing, I may be God’s agent of love. Who knows? They may even begin to reciprocate.

A Love Language Minute - Balancing Work and Family

Balancing Work and Family

From Dr Gary Chapman

Is it possible that we may be working so hard to support our families financially that we end up losing our families? Then money becomes empty compensation. This week we’ll talk about the issue of money and marriage.

What is most important in life? If we are given stark choices, the issue becomes clear. If someone offered you one million dollars for your child or your spouse, would you take it? Any sensible parent or spouse would say, “No”. But do we not sell our families for much less when we spend all of our energy working for money and have no time left to enjoy our relationships?.

Balanace
Work is a noble endeavor. In fact the Bible says that if a man will not work, neither should he eat. But can we work too much? Is vocational success worth losing a marriage? The Scriptures teach that life’s meaning is not found in things, but in relationships. It is found first in a relationship with God, and then with family and others.

Family relationships are always in process. If we want to keep our marriages alive, our families healthy, then we must find ways of balancing work and family. Thousands of men and women are finding that a growing marriage and a healthy family requires readjusting schedules from time to time. The key question is, “How does my work affect my marriage and family?” Once I answer that question, I will know if I need to change my work patterns.

Integration & Time Management
The answer is not always less work. Sometimes it is integrating the family into my work. For example, does your work allow the opportunity for you and your spouse to have lunch together from time to time? Such lunches can be an oasis in the midst of a dry day.

If your work requires travel, could you take your spouse or one of your children with you? This allows a mini-vacation which you might not otherwise be able to afford. It also exposes your family to your vocation and gives them a little more appreciation for what you do.

Less work and more time at home is not necessarily the answer. Better use of time at home may make all the difference. Do something different tonight with your spouse or with a child. Get out of the routine. Minimize the television and maximize activity and conversation. Keep your marriage alive and growing.

How to Put the Sizzle Back in Your Marriage - Part 4

Taken from www.associatedcontent.com

Be there for your spouse. When your spouse is hurt, sick, or just having a bad day, be supportive. Listen, give feedback if they want it, take care of them and help them according to the situation. For example, you and your spouse have been planning a rafting trip for months with some of your closest friends. You're both looking forward to it. Then the day before the trip your spouse comes down with a bad case of the flu. Would you be supporting your spouse if you went on the rafting trip anyway? How do you think your spouse would feel if they knew you were having a great time while they were sick in bed alone, unable to take care of their self? Let me give you another example. You're at home watching your favorite team on TV, and your spouse calls to tell you that their car has broken down and they need you to pick them up from a certain location. What are you going to tell her? Would you insist on watching the game and letting her fend for herself? In each situation, the supportive response is to be there for your spouse. Your partner should always come first.

If you follow these suggestions, you're less likely to take each other for granted and more likely to lend positive energy to the relationship. Always remember that a relationship is like a flower; if you don't nurture it, it will die.

This ends the series of articles on putting the sizzle back in your marriage. We pray that this was a blessing to you and your marriage.

How to Put the Sizzle Back in Your Marriage - Part 3

Taken from www.associatedcontent.com

Keep your promises and agreements. When you say you're going to do something, make every effort to do it. Broken promises and agreements only lead to broken marriages. I once worked with a couple in which the husband couldn't keep his promises. For example, he kept promising to take his wife out to dinner and a movie, but each time he had a different, seemingly valid excuse. Over time the wife stopped believing him and lost faith in his commitment to the marriage. When promises are continuously broken, feelings of mistrust inevitably develop.

Be honest with one another. Honesty should have started the day you met. Marriages can't succeed if partners aren't honest with each other. No matter how bad the situation, it's always better to be up front with your mate. Otherwise your loved one may feel angry, depressed, frustrated, and disappointed. Dishonesty leads to an increase in arguments and mutual disrespect. "Are you saying I need to be honest with my partner about everything?" you may ask. The answer is yes. Some people are afraid they'll lose their independence if they tell their spouse where they're going and what they're doing. Maybe they lied to their parents when they were a teenager, and now they're treating their spouse the same way. Such people aren't ready to be in a marital relationship. They just want to do as they please without considering another person's feelings and needs. Being married doesn't mean giving up who you are, simply sharing who you are with another person.

Telling the truth isn't the same as being demeaning, however. Say your spouse asks, "Do you think I look fat?" Since weight is such a sensitive issue for most women, you might want to pause a moment and muster a little tact before you answer, especially if you do think she looks fat and you really wish she'd lose weight. Perhaps you can try a more neutral response, such as "You look fine, honey." You haven't lied, exactly, but you've deflected the question. Or, if your spouse asks if you like the outfit she's wearing and you don't, you might say, "You know, I like the other one better," rather than, "I think it looks terrible on you." In short, be sure to temper your honesty with kindness!

Click HERE for Part 4.

How to Put the Sizzle Back in Your Marriage - Part 2

Taken from www.associatedcontent.com

Take each other out on a date. Just because you're married doesn't mean you should stop dating. Remember the fun and excitement of dating? You can recapture it by making a date at least once a week. Take turns taking each other out.

Explore new activities together. Life offers so many options and opportunities. Find activities you both like and do them-anything from dancing to going to the opera to traveling around the world!

Have a family council once a week. Set aside a special time when both of you can talk about whatever you want. Topics can range from something that's bothering you to problems at work to planning a fun activity. Of course, you don't have to wait until family council to talk. If something's disturbing you now, bring it up as soon as possible. Holding feelings inside can be detrimental to the marriage.

Pay attention to each other's needs and wants. In fact, you should compete to make each other happy! If you both make it a point to become aware of your spouse's wants and needs and then do your best to satisfy them, even if it requires some personal sacrifice, you're guaranteed to have a happy marriage.

Work together as a team. You're equal partners in this marriage. Neither spouse should dominate. Make decisions on matters of mutual concern together, and be prepared to compromise when you're unable to agree. Let's say you're planning a trip together, and you want to go to Costa Rica but your spouse wants to go to Thailand. Obviously, if one partner insists on getting his or her way, the other may end up feeling disappointed and resentful. Consider your other options. You can both select and agree on a totally different place. You can decide to go to one place one year and the other place another year. If your finances allow, you can spend half your vacation in Costa Rica and the other half in Thailand. Whatever decision is made, you both need to be happy with it.

Click HERE for Part 3.

How to Put the Sizzle Back in Your Marriage

Taken from www.associatedcontent.com


A few years ago I talked to a group of women between the ages of twenty and forty-nine who sounded dissatisfied with their marriages. "I'm bored because we never have any fun together," one woman complained. "We haven't had sex in months," moaned another. "We spend too much time fighting," several women agreed. "He spends too much time with his friends-and we've only been married for six months!" said the youngest in the group. I've also heard men make similar comments. People just don't seem to be happy in their marriages. Complaints are coming from every direction. In my experience, the problem comes from taking each other for granted. When two people take each other for granted, they take the sizzle out of their marriage. Here are some examples of how you can put the sizzle back into your marriage.

Appreciate your spouse as often as possible. Pleasing, loving words will make your spouse feel good about themselves-and you. Some examples are: "I love you." "I enjoyed the dinner you cooked." "You look handsome/beautiful." "You did a wonderful job keeping things clean." "I love it when you're on time."

Follow up your words with loving actions. Surprise your spouse with flowers, love letters, gifts, favors, or anything else you know they would appreciate. Be creative. This way your spouse will know you care. Never forget special occasions such as birthdays, Christmas, anniversaries, and Valentine's Day. Otherwise, your spouse may think you don't love them.

Spend intimate moments together. Don't let the passion fade from your marriage. Physical intimacy brings two people closer together. Sometimes it may be difficult if you're tired, busy, or preoccupied. But don't let your problems or energy level stop you- make time to be intimate anyway. Make an appointment if necessary. I know it may sound silly, but at least that way you know you're both committed. When you do become intimate, take your time. Explore and enjoy each other's bodies. Moving straight to the sex may cause feelings of frustration and disappointment.

Click HERE for Part 2.