1) Choose to Get Rid of Baggage.
I want to help you understand some of the relationship patterns you may have brought into your marriage from your childhood and your previous relationships. With knowledge of these patterns, you can learn positive strategies and stop using ineffective ones. Learning to change old patterns involves recognizing where you are in the process and getting out of it.

The patterns from the past, whether they come from your childhood or previous relationships, were successful and useful when you developed them. These behaviors and patterns helped you cope with the challenges you faced at those times. However, they may no longer be effective if the reasons you used them do not exist in your current marriage.

I want to share what I believe is a very helpful skill to creating a healthy process of handling conflict in your marriage. One of the most effective parenting interventions is the time-out. When a child’s behavior gets out of control or parents need to change the direction of a child’s behavior, they have the child take a time-out. The same principle can work wonders for your marital relationship. The goal is to learn how to work together to effectively disengage when your interactions are not healthy.

Either one of you can call for a time-out, but you both need to commit to honoring the request when it is made. Additionally, you both agree to let go of your desire to win the fight and trust that taking a break is best for both parties. Simply agreeing to table the fight for the time being is far better than saying or doing hurtful things. The important thing here is not to use the time-out to run away from the conflict. The partner who asks for the time-out should let the other partner know when they think it might be okay to talk about the issue again. I cannot overstate the importance of learning to take these time-outs.

By considering the baggage you both bring to the relationship from your families of origin and past relationships, you’ll understand why some of the patterns in your relationship occur. Something as simple (but not easy) as taking a time-out is a learned tool that provides clear steps for changing hurtful patterns within your marriage.

Honor your spouse when they ask for a time-out in the middle of an argument. How did that feel to put their need to ‘pause’ ahead of your need to continue with the argument?

2) Choose to Challenge Unspoken Truths.
Some of the most insidious and destructive elements of a marriage are the assumptions spouses make about each other. Assumptions are sometimes based on previous experiences that have been interpreted and at other times are based on minimal factual information. They are beliefs that have been adopted that later become a part of the reality of the relationship.

The problem with assumptions is that they become what I call “unspoken truths.” These are assumptions, which may or may not be true, that are accepted as truth in a marriage. Once accepted, partners give up trying to change these beliefs. These “unspoken truths” form the basis for how spouses act toward each other and drive much of what happens in the relationship. Once spouses begin to accept these beliefs as givens in the relationship, they become the building blocks for their understanding of each other.

Can you identify with any of the “unspoken truths” below?

1) He cares more about his work than he does about me.
2) She changed when we had kids; they have always been more important than me.
3) He won’t ever change that’s just who he is.
4) No matter what I do, she will never really love me.
5) He says he works all those hours for us, but I think it’s really to prove something to himself.
6) I think he likes the idea of marriage but just not the reality of being married to me.

I have seen couples find hope in the transformation that happens when they are willing to do the work of exposing “unspoken truths” in their marriages. Something powerful happens when spouses are willing to risk vulnerability with one another, speak their hurt, and put the other partner first in their marriage. The same can be true for you in your marriage.

If you will begin to identify the assumptions in your relationship and honestly share these “unspoken truths” with each other, you can make a clear choice to live your life together differently.

So many couples discover that they allow their entire marriage to be based on assumptions and beliefs, most of which are not true at all. When we make the brave choice to challenge these “unspoken truths” and no longer believe them, our relationship changes drastically. It may be overwhelming at first, but eventually this choice leads to healing and truth.

3) Choose To Trust.
Trust is one of the biggest challenges many couples face. Some of you have experienced betrayal in your marriage due to infidelity, lying, or other conflicts. Here is the thing about trust. It takes a long time to build, but it can be destroyed in an instant. Trust is the bedrock of every marriage relationship.

In my work with couples, I have discovered four primary conditions under which trust can grow and flourish in a marriage. First, trust starts with honesty. Some of you may lie to protect someone’s feelings, out of guilt, to avoid a conflict, or to prevent others from seeing the real you. But you probably lie most often because you are worried about what will happen if you tell the truth.

If you have tried to be honest in your relationship but that attempt has been met with anger or hurtfulness, you may be hesitant to be honest in the future. You are not doing your partner any favors by allowing their emotional reaction to prevent you from being honest. Having the.. https://allsinglesandmarried..com/2019/12/9-choices-to-make-for-successful.html?m=1