On our wedding day, few of us are focused on the problems that are undoubtedly to come.  Marriage is intended to offer each partner a safe harbor from the trials of life.  I see marriage as two people, joined together, protecting each other from the outside world.  When a marriage is unable to provide that place of safety and comfort it becomes the source of stress, not a refuge from it.  The following article serves to highlight some of the ways in which you can protect your marriage from becoming this source of unbearable strain in your life.  Of course, no single article is able to adequately address the complexity and depth of marriage.  For this reason, marital psychotherapy is often the most appropriate treatment for marital dysfunction.  That being said, I hope the following perspectives help to clarify the importance of marriage and aide in being proactive in caring for your marriage.

From the outset a marriage requires commitment.  As we become attracted, begin to date, and seek a deeper connection we become increasingly more committed to each other.  It should be clearly evident prior to engagement that a couple is committed to one another, but marital commitment involves something more.  A healthy marriage requires a commitment to marriage, not just to each other.  People are imperfect and often selfish.  There will be struggles in your marriage.  There will be disappointment and broken promises.  If the sole foundation for your marriage is a commitment to the other person then the marriage is severely weakened when a partner fails us.  Beginning with a foundation of commitment will allow you to weather the storms with more confidence than if you were only committed to the person who has hurt you. Our grandparents and great grandparents rarely considered divorce as an escape from their unhappiness.  They faced life together, heads held high as they faced whatever challenge came next.  Their generation faced an economic depression, two world wars, and social unrest.  They understood the inevitability of challenges in life; they never expected daily equality from it.  They viewed their marriage as a permanent structure.  They may not be the perfect spouse, but their commitment would be perfect.  In our culture of faster than instant gratification we struggle to see anything as permanent. A long-term plan has come to mean perhaps six months, maybe a year.  What is missing is the ability to see marriage as an institution that represents the best of our convictions.  Instead it has come to symbolize the limits of our ability to please ourselves.  As we fill our lives with the next convenience, we fail to cultivate anything of permanence.  A commitment to marriage establishes a permanent structure that is more likely to stand for a lifetime.  Certainly this discussion is best had prior to marriage, but it is never too late to re-commit not only to each other, but also to the union you share. 

A central factor in the degradation of marriage is the expectation that we deserve equality, or better stated that our understanding of equality has become severely limited in its scope.  Our expectation of marital ‘quid pro quo’ has led us to feel disappointed almost daily as we carefully keep score in a game of “what have you done for me lately.” One way to guard against the tendency to focus on equality is to have clearly defined goals for your marriage.  It surprises some, but I challenge many of the couples I see in my office to develop an understanding of the purpose of their marriage.  What is your goal?  Why are you doing this together?  What values inform your choices?  When the storms of life are raging what do you hold on to?  It seems that far too often we have lost the ability to think of the long-range goals for our relationships.  Thirty, forty, fifty years from now what do you want your marriage to have meant? What impact do you desire to have on your family, children, and community?  With a commitment to goals that can impact generations we are better able to absorb not only the small offenses, but also the severe pain that can accompany issues of betrayal, neglect, and loss of integrity.  There are countless resources to help you communicate, have better sex, and parent more consistently.  These are helpful tools but insufficient to bring about lasting change if they are not resting on a foundation of commitment to the purpose of your marriage. Take the time to define the purpose of your marriage.  Hold to your goals through the trials.  Pick a destination on the horizon and steer with confidence as you navigate, for there is a reward in store for those who persevere.

Defining roles is another important aspect of a healthy marriage.  Gone are the days of June and Ward Cleaver, but that does not mean we can avoid defining the roles each spouse plays in a marriage.  Economic and social factors have significantly altered the roles of men and women in today’s break-neck paced world.  I often see couples in my office that are merely flying by the seat of their pants.  Their hope is to simply survive the chaos of the week, hanging on for dear life as the calendars are stuffed with appointments, activities, school, and career.  The defining of roles is more than simply laying out who will be responsible for a given task.  Although this is often a helpful first step in controlling the chaos we seem to find ourselves living in.  Defining roles requires that we know what our goals are, and establishing how each partner will help the marriage to reach those goals.  In a marriage with defined goals and individual roles is better equipped to endure the tension of inequality.  The ebb and flow of our lives will unquestionable require each partner to become the primary responsible party in a given situation.  With an understanding of the role played by each spouse this temporary period of unequal responsibility will be bolstered by the support of the other partner. 

In preparing to write this article I asked my four year-old daughter what she thought people needed to know about marriage.  She thought for a moment, index finger placed thoughtfully on her lower lip, and confidently stated, “They need to know that it is sweet.”  She smiled an innocent smile and then laughingly said “and that there is kissy-kissy” and then laughed hysterically as she leaned against our couch.  Even in her limited understanding, she landed on truth.  Marriage is sweet.  There is a sweetness in a life shared, a warm hand to hold as we face the trials of life.   Each of us embarks on our marriage with visions of the joys to come.  Few of us see “until death do us part” as filled with strife and dissatisfaction.  However, far too many couples are trapped in a cycle of disappointment that seems to have precious few patches of harmony.  The number of marriages ending in divorce continues to climb and the expectation of sweetness in marriage has become the hope of the naive.  However, my daughter is right, marriage is sweet.  But the sweetness is fashioned through the trials, enhanced by disappointments overcome.  Sweetness is formed by effort and enriched by the sacrifice of self that is required.  I love my daughters answer, marriage is sweet, and who doesn’t love the kissy kissy.