7 Ideas to Keep Love and Strong Marriage

Who doesn’t love a good fairy tale? Everyone! And most of us want to believe that when we find our Prince Charming (or Princess) that we’ll easily ride off into the sunset and live happily ever after.

With the divorce rate around 50%, it is clear that most people don’t know how to create and maintain healthy relationships and marriages.

It’s not like any of us had a class in school called “Love and Marriage”. In fact, most of us never learned any life skills at all, let alone relationship skills.

All if us hear people complain about relationships all the time. “Relationships are so difficult!”.

• Empathize with each other.

One main problem with relationships is that most people only see their own point of view. It’s inevitable that couples will have disagreements. But that doesn’t mean it has to damage your relationship.

• Have date night.

One of the sad things about relationships as the years go on is that people forget to “date” each other.

• Learn to work through conflict effectively.

Most people handle conflict the wrong way. They think it’s a “Me vs. You” situation. They think they have to be right and “win” the arguments.

• Talk about finances and plan a budget.

Money is one of the top things that break couples up. Maybe one of you is a spender, and the other is a saver. That’s a problem! It will cause a lot of disagreements and strife.

• Don’t neglect intimacy.

If you have kids, it’s easy to neglect intimacy. And intimacy means more than just sex (although you shouldn’t neglect that either).

• Have a balance of togetherness and independence.

Sometimes couples fall into one of two different extremes: too much togetherness or too much time apart. Neither is healthy.

• Always stay affectionate and loving.

Some people don’t like touching, hugging, and snuggling very much. But, it really does help a relationship stay strong. It releases good chemicals into the brain the promote bonding.