Can you believe it? At the end of this month, we will officially hit 42 years of marriage! To celebrate this milestone, we wanted to share some of the most important lessons we’ve learned about marriage over those years.
Before we dive in, we want to remind you that by no means do we have it all figured out.
We’re self-described as being married 42 years, 32 of them happily. Many lessons have been learned throughout the process of turning around our hurting relationship. We had to work through many challenges, including unrealistic expectations, high amounts of criticism, and even infidelity.
The most important lesson we’ve learned? Marriage isn’t about perfection. It’s about growing, loving, and learning both individually and together.
To help you do just that, here are 42 lessons we’ve learned in our 42 years of marriage. Our hope is that they will help and encourage you on your marriage journey:
1) Ask for help.
Far too many couples wait until they are on the brink of divorce to seek help. In our experience, even happy couples can benefit from counseling or coaching.
2) Pursue secure attachment.
Your attachment style will determine how you form relationships, interact with others, and respond to conflict. Not sure what your style is? Take our attachment quiz to find out! Anyone can move toward a more secure attachment style. All it takes is some self-awareness and personal work.
3) Make requests rather than complaining, criticizing, or commenting.
Too often we accuse, blame, complain, criticize, or make passive aggressive comments when we are hurt. Use your emotion or hurt to identify your need and then ask your spouse for what you need.
4) Talk to Jesus before you talk to your spouse.
Take your hurts and emotions to Jesus first. He’ll help you determine if this is something you need to work through in your own heart or if it’s something you need to talk to your spouse about.
5) Apologize well.
Most people don’t know how to give a genuine, heartfelt apology. When apologizing, don’t stop at “I’m sorry.” Make sure you identify how your actions impacted your spouse and then finish with “Will you please forgive me?” (Don’t even think about saying “I’m sorry, but…”)
6) In marriage, the little things are the big things.
The things that simmer under the surface are the things that gain momentum over time. If left unaddressed, they will draw us further and further away from each other. Also the little acts of compassion, generosity, and kindness are how love is shown over and over.
7) Continue learning how to love well.
It’s easy to love someone who is loving you back and doing all the right things. It’s a completely different ball game to show someone unconditional care even when they feel hard to love. Just like so many other skills, you have to learn how to love well—it’s not a skill we’re born with. (If you’re in a season where it feels hard to love, this podcast episode will be helpful!)
8) Use the God-tool of forgiveness 10 or more times a day!
This is one of the most underused tools in your relationship. This multifaceted tool is how we handle imperfections, keep our hearts uncluttered, and downshift our anger. Forgiveness is an intentional and voluntary internal process where you experience a change in feelings and attitude regarding a hurt. Learn more about God-tools and how to use them in our book—No More Perfect Marriages.
9) Accept how God made your spouse.
You were created differently on purpose—and those differences, while sometimes frustrating, are part of God’s design. Instead of trying to change your spouse, honor who they are. Yes, you can still work through issues, but let that work be rooted in honoring how God made you each unique.
10) Humility is a key heart posture.
If we’re not careful, pride can sneak in and do a number on our marriage. It’s self-centered, self-focused, and self-preserving. But humility calls us to put our egos aside and reminds us that our ways are not always the best way.
11) Have weekly marriage meetings.
Every week when Sunday afternoon rolls around, you’ll find us sitting around our kitchen table having our weekly marriage meeting. This is a time to make sure we are on the same page regarding our marriage, our calendar, and important tasks. Learn how to plan your own weekly marriage meeting here.
12) Connect daily.
We like to think of this practice as the daily drip of dopamine that connects our hearts. It doesn’t have to be anything extravagant—this can be as simple as setting aside 15 minutes to check in with each other or share the same activity each day (think morning coffee, prayer, or a quick card game before bed).
13) Connect weekly.
This could be a weekly marriage meeting or adding in a consistent date night to your schedule. A weekly connection helps you operate as a team and have a deeper connection point with one another.
14) Connect monthly.
Hire a babysitter, get dressed up, and get out of your usual routine to remember why you fell in love with each other. This helps you strengthen your bond and keep the romance alive.
15) Practice safe conversations.
In order to have a safe conversation with your spouse, there are some important steps you need to take. For instance, you can start by asking “Is now a good time?” Then, as you’re communicating, you can repeat back what you heard before responding to ensure both parties feel heard and understood. Check out How to Have a Safe Conversation for the step-by-step details.
16) Never stop dating your spouse.
We like to say that if you aren’t intentional about connecting with your spouse, good marriages become stale and hurting marriages crumble. The deeper we get into marriage, the easier it is to kick “dating your spouse” down the priority list. The truth is, taking the time to date your spouse is an investment that will pay dividends for years to come. Learn how to date your spouse here.
17) Prioritize your personal growth journey.
We both had to do a lot of work individually before our marriage could take on new life. Growing as an individual is essential for not only your well-being, but the success of your relationship. We covered the importance of personal growth on our podcast—give it a listen for some inspiration!
18) Get curious.
Ask each other good questions and stay curious about why your spouse does something a specific way or feels a certain way. When we take the time to listen to and understand our spouse, we develop more compassion, understanding, and empathy for them.
19) Allow your spouse to be human.
We all make mistakes—we are only human after all! Practice giving your spouse the grace to be human, to have bad days, and to mess up.
20) Flirt with your spouse!
Flirting with your spouse is an important part of any marriage. Sending flirty messages or leaving love notes is a great way to create points of connection and intimacy. Download two months of fun & flirty messages for FREE here!
21) Talk about sex.
Many people think they have “bedroom problems” but they actually have a connection problem outside the bedroom. Instead of trying to have better sex, start by considering what you are doing to hear and connect with each other’s hearts. Remember, what happens outside the bedroom lays the foundation for what happens inside of it. If you’re struggling when it comes to sex, know that you’re not alone—give our podcast episode on improving intimacy a listen for some helpful guidance.
We’ve made it to the halfway point! If you’re enjoying this list and want to take positive steps toward a healthier marriage, we encourage you to take advantage of our FREE Marriage Crash Course!
22) One of the greatest threats to lasting love is living life on autopilot.
It’s natural to fall into a routine in life, but the danger arises when we no longer nurture and protect our relationship. If you aren’t actively growing closer together, then you are drifting apart.
23) Address your baggage.
We define baggage as places where we need to pursue personal growth, instances of trauma or hurt from the past that remain unhealed, and learned behaviors, habits, and thinking patterns from our childhood that no longer serve us. Everyone needs to take the time to own and deal with whatever baggage they may have if they want to bring their best self into their relationship.
24) Give your spouse the benefit of the doubt.
Our brains have a way of naturally thinking the worst about our spouse. It’s important to take our thoughts captive and assume the best about our spouse whenever we can.
25) Recognize the red flags for unrealistic expectations.
Anytime we have an expectation that our spouse should “just know” we want or need something, that’s a surefire sign that we’re harboring an unrealistic expectation. It’s not fair to expect our spouse to be a mind reader. Other red flags include the terms “should” and “ought.” Learn more about managing expectations here.
26) Pray for and with your spouse.
Prayer is one of the most powerful tools we have in our toolbox. Prayer helps us align our desires with God’s and lift each other, as well as our circumstances, up to Him. If you’re not sure where to start, our companion books 199 Prayers for My Husband and 199 Prayers for My Wife are great resources to establish a rhythm of regular prayer.
27) Identify the dysfunction in your marriage.
No marriage is perfect, and learning how to work together and blend the lives of two distinct people is hard work. It all starts with identifying where you get stuck and taking steps to change that.
28) Avoid confirmation bias.
Confirmation bias occurs when we look for evidence that “proves” what we have already decided to believe about ourselves or others. When we do this, we are essentially putting blinders on so we can’t see any information that contradicts what we want to believe about our spouse. If this term is new to you, check out this podcast episode to dive deeper.
29) Beware of the slow fade that child-centeredness can cause.
Child-centeredness happens when we place our children above our marriage relationship. Somewhere between changing diapers, getting kiddos off to school, and preparing them to navigate the world independently, our marriage can end up taking a backseat. If you’re past raising children and are in the midlife stage of marriage, check out these tips for making the most of it.
30) Have fun with your spouse.
Life gets pretty busy—especially if you have little ones. It’s easy to forget to prioritize fun and laughter together. Having fun with your spouse takes work and intentionality, but it is well worth the effort!
31) Disagree well.
You are bound to disagree with your spouse or even have full-blown arguments from time to time. The key is to disagree well by listening, giving and receiving feedback, and speaking kindly in response to our spouse. Here are six disarming phrases you can use to disagree well.
32) Communication is key.
How we communicate in marriage matters! We had to learn this the hard way. Instead of allowing our communication to be marked by recklessness, rushing, or even thoughtlessness, we learned how to be intentional about how we communicated with each other. Explore our advice for turning hurtful conversations into healthy ones.
33) Overlook harmless human habits.
We need to use the tool of grace when dealing with the harmless habits that bug us but don’t really hurt us. Like snoring. Or leaving lights on. Or leaving the toilet seat up. Grace is a beautiful gift that two spouses can continually give to one another.
34) Set your own family traditions.
You and your spouse come from unique backgrounds with different traditions. It’s important to take the time to compare your existing traditions and expectations so you can determine how you would like to observe holidays going forward as a married couple.
35) Set boundaries together.
This includes everything from how long you’ll stay when visiting your in-laws to how many social events you’ll put on the calendar in a given week. In our marriage, it has been so helpful to be aware of each other’s limits and create healthy boundaries around how we choose to do life together.
36) Own your part.
Everyone needs to address what they brought to a situation and take accountability for how they’ve hurt each other to be ready to rebuild and repair the relationship. We like to say that we have to own our junk before we can address how our spouse needs to change.
37) Love the real, not the dream.
Idealism can drive a wedge between you in your marriage. It constantly affirms that our marriage should be just like the ones we have seen portrayed in movies and books. Rather than hold our spouse to this impossible expectation, we need to love the real person they are.
38) Align your goals.
This simply means setting the stage for growing closer together throughout the years and accomplishing more meaningful things together. It starts with sharing openly about your hopes and dreams and ends with deciding how to work towards those things as a couple. Learn more about aligning your goals here.
39) Embrace the power of a one-minute hug.
A full-body hug where we simply hold each other is needed now more than ever in our fast-paced-distracted-by-devices crazy lives. It communicates, “You are the most important thing to me right now.”
40) Spend time alone.
Just as important as prioritizing time together is spending time apart. When you get married, you aren’t committing to spending every waking moment with your spouse. We can benefit from having separate hobbies and interests.
41) Learn about your Love Style.
This concept helped us to not only better understand the blueprint we each carried into marriage, but also understand the repetitive dance of pain we had been experiencing for years in our marriage. When we understood our Love Style, we were able to heal from our past wounds, repair painful relating patterns, and rebuild our relationships in healthy ways.
42) Keep growing together.
The journey is not over. Each day we try to be intentional about growing closer together. We will keep growing together and pursuing one another for another 42 years!
We are so grateful to be able to share these lessons with you from our 42 years of experience. Our marriage has been through a lot, but we’re happy that we now know so much more about what it takes to build a strong, lasting marriage rooted in faith.
If you are ready to start strengthening your own marriage, the perfect place to start is with our FREE Marriage Crash Course. Whether you’ve been married for one year or forty or more, this course is designed to bring understanding, connection, and love to your relationship:
