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It might surprise you that very few people have any idea what they are getting into when they get married. People can spend years planning and preparing to get married but if planning is all it takes, then why is the divorce rate in this country so high? In my experience as a life improvement consultant (pre-Lovingyou.com), I have helped a lot of people with a huge variety of problems. These problems covered virtually every aspect of life, but one of the most prevalent areas was helping people in their relationships with other people, especially their spouse. What I found during that time was that most people lacked a basic understanding of what a marriage is and what it takes to really make a success out of it.
A marriage is actually much more than just being together. It is sharing and creating a life together. You see, what you have in any marriage is two distinct individuals that have decided to spend their lives as a single unit, a family. Now, just because they have decided to spend their lives together and get married does not automatically mean that the marriage will work. In order for a marriage to work, it has to be constantly worked at. That means that the two of you have to operate for each other and not just for yourselves!
So, what are the three keys to a successful marriage?
Firstly, ROMANCE plays an essential part in keeping a marriage successful. I am not going to dwell too much on romance because it has been extensively covered in the romance101 section of this site. However, I will say this: with romance, you are not only constantly re-creating the love you share for each other, but you are also bringing yourselves closer and closer to each other.
Secondly, you have to constantly CREATE the marriage. By this I mean that you should always strive for a better relationship. Anything that is left stagnant will always decline and that holds true probably more for a marriage than it does anything else. The moment you stop striving to make it better is the moment you will start to slowly drift apart into separate lives. Have you ever seen a couple that has been married thirty, forty or fifty years that hardly ever even speak to each other anymore? I would imagine that they have been slowly drifting apart for a very long time. Here are some ideas to help you in creating your relationship:
Decide to be married.
When you make this decision, what you are actually doing is formally declaring that the two of you (and however many little one’s come along for the ride) are going to operate as one unit, striving for a common goal and not as individuals.
Create a set of guidelines for the marriage.
The first part of this step should be done individually by you and your partner. Get a sheet of paper each and write down what you think is an ideal marriage. It is very important, when doing this, that you decide what you think is a great marriage and not what other people have told you is a great marriage. Everyone is different and what works for some, may not work for you.
After have written down your concepts of an ideal marriage, you should write down what you need and want from your partner. An example would be, “I want someone who is supportive of my career.”
The next step is to actually formulate the guidelines for your marriage. You do this by comparing notes on what you have both written and combining the two into something you can both agree on. You should then write these down on a seperate sheet of paper.
By the time you are done, you should have written down, an agreed upon definition of the ideal marriage and and a set of guidelines by which you both agree to live. If you can, have this printed and either framed, or at least kept easily accessible so you can refer back to it at any time. If this is an exercise you are doing before you get married, which is higly recommended, you can use the guidelines to formulate your wedding vows.
Constantly strive for the ideal marriage.
This is the actual step where you constantly strive for a better relationship. You have both agreed upon what the ideal marriage is and you can look at the current state of your marriage as a comparison. When you see that something is not quite right, work out a way to get it there. Also, if you see something slipping away from the goal, sit down and talk to your partner about it so you can fix the problem before it gets any worse.
This now brings us quite neatly to the third key to a successful marriage, COMMUNICATION! This provides the bedrock from which a successful marriage can grow and, without it, there really is no foundation from which to move forward. The actual subject of how to communicate to your partner is covered in a separate article, which can be read by clicking here. That article covers the basics of communication in a relationship as well as how breakdowns in communication occur. It is definitely an essential read for anyone who is married or in a relationship!
In summary then, the three keys to a successful marriage are: Romance, Create, Communicate. All of these three things are inter-dependent and, although one of them may help a little bit, you need to constantly work on all three of them to provide a solid foundation for your marriage. I hope I have been able to give you some basic ideas and tools to help you in your relationships.