- You can have a happily-ever-after with some work.marriage image by Mykola Velychko from Fotolia.com
Marriage counseling can be helpful for people struggling with everyday problems and stresses. You might not understand why you feel a certain way or you might want to improve your marital relationship. Tools and a supportive counselor can help you achieve your goals. Finding the motivation and commitment to work through your marital problems can be difficult. But once you and your spouse implement the tools, you learn and see positive changes. You might feel rewarded--and gain a new respect for yourself, your partner and your marriage. - Questionnaires can help assess each person's needs and wants.question of love image by Allyson Ricketts from Fotolia.com
Questionnaires help you understand your spouse much better. By honestly answering a series of questions, your therapist can gain more insight into you and your spouse's ideas about children, money and leisure activities. Understanding the differences between your and your spouse's desires can open up lines of communication and lead to compromise and change. - Role playing can help you better understand your spouse.two people in love image by Andrii Oleksiienko from Fotolia.com
Communication is a key factor in a successful marriage, according to Amy Bellows, PH.D from PsychCentral. However, many married couples struggle to communicate effectively. Respect and active listening are two necessary skills for good communication between couples. Both skills can be practiced and learned.
Choose a topic you and your partner are struggling with, such as finances or time management. With the help of your therapist, each person states their opinion as the other listens. Your therapist will make suggestions as to how the communication can improve through different words or approaches. Practice these new forms of communication during and after your therapy sessions. - Managing anger is an important component to marriage.jordina 4 image by Jaume Felipe from Fotolia.com
Arguments will occur over the course of a marriage, and you and your spouse need to learn how to solve conflicts effectively. Insults and put-downs can destroy a marriage. Yet, during times of anger, many people resort to those tactics. Learning how to positively deal with your anger is an excellent skill to have, not just in a marriage but in any relationship.
The key to effective anger management is recognizing your triggers and understanding where the angry emotions come from. You and your spouse must then develop a plan to fight fair and avoid the pitfalls of negative conversation. A trained therapist can help you learn how to reframe your problems and develop better skills to handle conflict through therapy sessions. - Understanding emotions helps a marriage run smoothly.Maldives... image by VeraDat from Fotolia.com
Marriage has many emotions tied to it--love, sadness, happiness and fear, to name a few. You might struggle to understand how and why your spouse feels a certain way, or you could dismiss the feelings as unimportant or silly. Many times, what you believe you are feeling is actually a cover for your true emotional state.
According to Dr. Jim Hutt of CounselorLink, fear and hurt are two common emotions underneath an angry outburst. Until you can understand and express the emotions underneath the anger (or hurt or fear), you and your partner will struggle with the same problem and same negative outcome. Speak with your therapist to help unearth the underlying problem for you and your spouse.
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