Why does she think I need to know what she ate for lunch? 

Why does he get mad when I show up just a LITTLE bit late? 

Why does she cry whenever that jewelry commercial come on? 

I cleaned the entire house for her, why doesn’t she appreciate me?

All these questions are answered and more… Seriously, sign up already!

There are many reasons I hate working out.  It’s hard and I get tired.  Sometimes it’s boring.  Sometimes it just isn’t convenient.  The biggest reason I hate working out is that I don’t know that I’m doing anything right.  Am I doing the right exercises?  Does my plan fit my personal fitness goals?  There are so many exercise and diet plans that I get overwhelmed.  I honestly don’t know which one to use because I’m not a personal trainer.

A personal trainer would listen to my goals and develop a plan to make them happen.  A personal trainer would take into account my lifestyle, schedule, and current physical state and figure out how to get me to where I want to be.  A personal trainer would know how to guide me.

Same is true with our relationship fitness.  There are plenty of books and websites promising to make your love life better.  There are plans and theories on the best ways to fight and the best way to love.

All of them could be great, but what is the best advice for you?  How do you know that you’ll get the relationship results you want?  What relationship experts or “personal trainers” are helping you figure out the path to the relationship of your dreams?

Andy Stanley’s book The Principle of the Path:  How to get from where you are to where you want to be gives a wonderfully simple explanation for why you are where you are.  Many of us have dreams that have not become reality yet.  We wonder why our goals haven’t been achieved, why our marriages are in shambles.  In this book Stanley simply asks, “What path are you on right now?”  This question is the core of the Stanley’s Principle of the Path because the path you choose to follow will lead you to a destination, whether you like it or not. 

The beauty of this book is that it has the power to speak to any situation in your life, including your marriage.  Stanley is able to draw on the abundant wisdom of Proverbs without ever seeming preachy or theologically complicated.  Though not a “how to” book by any means, in Chapter 4 he talks about a prayer that he and his family use to make important decisions that I believe would be beneficial for any family to use.

This book is not technically a marital resource, but I would encourage any couple thinking about marriage to read it. Remembering that your marriage is path with a destination will help you better evaluate if this person is the best choirce for getting where you’d like to be.

Define the dip for your marriage before it even starts.  Define what “enough” is so that you’ll know it when you see it.  Define the dip so that you won’t be discouraged by the inevitable fatigue and failure that comes with the marital territory.  Define the dip so that you won’t be tricked into quitting before you really want to.

There are times when a couple needs to quit the marriage.  A point where it isn’t worth trying anymore.  Define those times before you start.

Thinking we come from dysfunction scares us. We start to believe that we are damaged goods. Then we tell someone we want to spend the rest of our lives together, and we pause. Will our baggage stop us from having the marriage we want? Will we make the same mistakes our parents made?

The thing is, none of us come from perfect families. We’re all messed up. That’s just the way it is.
More importantly, you survived that “dysfunctional family”. You made it out. Don’t ever underestimate the strength and courage this requires.

And now that you’ve survived your family you can make that marriage of your dreams a reality. Recognize your family’s shortcomings, where things weren’t healthy. Now make a decision. Decide that this won’t happen in your new family. Get help from a pastor or counselor if you need it, and decide that the dysfunction ends here. You survived, now decide.

Marriage requires survivors.

As we enter the beginning of the traditional wedding season I will be “doing” premarital counseling with popular fictional couples that we all know and love.

Gosh they look happy.  It’s that premarital counseling at work, I tell ya.

So we’re wrapping up with Big and Carrie.  They have a clear idea of where their couplehood is strong, where it is weak, and how to fix things when stuff starts to break.  Now we’re going to talk about what their goals and expectations from the first year of marriage will be.

Goals
For many people, especially women, getting married is the only goal in mind when it comes to a relationship.  After a wedding a couple can feel lost and confused about where to go next with their relationship.  A relationship without goals will eventually result in boredom and frustration.  Goals create a sense of purpose and growth for many aspects of our lives (our careers, health, etc.) and this is especially true of our relationships and marriages.

Carrie and Big decide that their goal this year is to develop their emotional connection.  They define emotional closeness as having a better understanding of both their own feelings and each other’s feelings.  They decide to use their love of books as the stage for reaching this goal and will read one book a month together.  Weekly discussions about the book is their plan for engaging with each other emotionally.

Expectations
Each partner comes in to marriage expecting it to be a certain way.  However, it is not common for partners to discuss their respective expectations from the marriage.  Without talking about expectations it is easy to feel let down or as if your spouse is purposely trying to make you miserable when these expectations are not met.  Laying expectations out on the table allows the couple to discuss what they want and whether it is realistic or not.

When Carrie and Big discuss their expectations about marriage it becomes apparent that Carrie is expecting to spend significantly more time together than Big was planning.  Without this discussion Carrie would be left open to being hurt by perceived rejection by Big.  After talking about each other’s expectations, Carrie and Big are able to come together and decide a realistic amount of together time to expect during their first year of marriage.

Thankfully, Sex and the City: The Sequel will be out soon enough, and we’ll get to see how their premarital counseling helped out!

If you are a Nashville couple and would like more information on premarital counseling with the Nashville Marriage Studio, please contact me at marie.mckinney@gmail.com.

As we enter the beginning of the traditional wedding season I will be “doing” premarital counseling with popular fictional couples that we all know and love.

Preparing for marriage requires going in with both eyes wide open. Or at least as open as possible. It is easy to become so in love with the idea of “happily ever after”, especially when planning a wedding, that you lose sight of the reality that you are two imperfect people coming together to form an imperfect union.  Knowing what your Relationship Weaknesses are will help you avoid that “caught off-guard” feeling that typically comes with your first marital rough patch.

Carrie and Big have investigated what makes their relationship strong, now let’s take a look at areas where they can expect to struggle.

Emotional Intimacy
Big has emotional intimacy issues.  Huge ones.  And Carrie, honestly, isn’t much better since she insists on wanting he who is never available.  Becoming “too close” scares both of them and they have a habit of sabotaging the relationship so that it will return to a distance they feel comfortable with.  This weakness will probably be present in varying degrees for the rest of their relationship.  Learning to say “I’m afraid of getting too close”, rather than act out and cause damage, will mitigate this weaknesses effect on their bond.

Infidelity
Lots of cheating went on between Big and Carrie in all its various forms.  The rule “Past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior” does not disappear after you say “I do”.  Their infidelity is rooted in their problems with emotional intimacy, however, its presence decreases the level of trust in their relationship.  Low levels of trust make relationships darn near impossible.

Passion
Like anything else, our strengths can also be our weaknesses.  Big and Carrie connect so well physically that it can become easy to use it as a sort of crutch.  Instead of truly resolving issues they depend on sexual intimacy as a way to feel close to one another.  This weakness is tricky since it has it’s healthy side to it as well.  Big and Carrie will have to make a point to be very concious of their motivations for seeking out physical connection:  are we doing this because we want to be close, or is this our way of avoiding real issues?

If you are a Nashville couple and would like more information on premarital counseling with the Nashville Marriage Studio, please contact me at marie.mckinney@gmail.com.

As we enter the beginning of the traditional wedding season I will be “doing” premarital counseling with popular fictional couples that we all know and love.

Big & Carrie

Mr. Big and Carrie are of Sex and the City fame. He is super wealthy and she is the ultimate fashionista. They are the tortured “on-again, off-again” couple that left us screaming at the television set whenever he pulled that “I can’t commit” junk. Despite all of the drama, however, we were all convinced that they were definitely meant to be.

Guiding Big and Carrie through premarital counseling would begin with determining their Relationship Strengths.

Everyone has relationship strengths, but few couples take time to recognize them. Identifying relationship strengths will help you navigate the hard times with more stability when you can use these strengths as a sort of lifeboat.

Big & Carrie’s Relationship Strengths:

Humor
These two know how to laugh together. They have used their humor to not only have fun together, but they also use it to diffuse the intensity of arguments. Taking time to laugh during a heated conversation can be a very healthy way to connect (as long as it’s done in moderation).

Passion
They were on a show that revolved around the topic of sex. Passion was not a problem for these two. Their shared appetite for physical intimacy is great for their relationship because it is a tried and true path to bonding for these two.

Individuality
Hands down their biggest strength is that they are two separate individuals. Big is successful in his businesses and Carrie is a professional writer. Each has found their own way in their world and developed their own identities. Having a solid knowledge of their selves means their couplehood will be stronger because of it.

The next part of premarital counseling for this lovely, though fictional, couple will be determining their Relationship Weaknesses.

If you are a Nashville couple and would like more information on premarital counseling with the Nashville Marriage Studio, please contact me at marie.mckinney@gmail.com.