The hidden challenges that sit within relationships and their ability to be married for life is significant.
I have spent the best part of two decades helping couples understand their crisis, learn the strategy that will give them the best chance to discover what is possible for them.
I can see with total clarity that no one knows what they are getting into when they marry, so they are poorly armed to deal with the inevitable challenges that I see couples experience every day.
When you consider the massive cost of getting this part of your life wrong on every level, shouldn’t marriages come with a warning?
Imagine a couple getting married in their 20’s. Will they be the same people in their 60’s?
You see, what attracted them and what connected them in their 20’s might change in their 30’s, 40’s or 50’s.
Changing with age is just one problem.
Imagine a couple trying to be married for life yet can’t understand each other especially when it goes wrong which it will, because every couple has problems.
Couples have no idea the challenge they are taking on when they decide to commit their whole life to another person. It’s a huge responsibility, and everyone feels qualified to get it right.
- Do you know what drives your partner?
- Do you know what creates attraction?
- Do you know what your partner needs and why?
- Do you know how to deal with conflict so there is more security and more love?
These are just a few of the critical elements couples must know to stay connected.
Ordinary lovely people don’t know this and are just getting on with their lives doing their best, but can find they are suffering impossible conflicts that go round in circles.
They can suffer from a loss of intimacy and don’t know why.
Loss of trust, loss of love these are all complex to understand and to fix.
I remember a gentleman married for 20 years came in for help; his wife wanted a divorce, but he had no idea why; she never said a word about being unhappy.
One lady was totally confused when her husband just gave up and told her he was leaving – no reason just left.
Of course, every case I see has a root problem, and if the couple had understood their dynamic, many could have avoided the path they were on.
One couple came for help; the husband had an affair, which resulted in a child. The affair failed, marriage was repaired; now, the affair child visits the couple every other weekend.
All these problems because the couple didn’t understand what they were doing or how to correct it.
People don’t make understanding their marriage a priority, and most will end up in some kind of trouble they won’t know how to solve.
Some can live passionless for years.
Many live disconnected from who they really are in the marriage, only becoming themselves when they are not with their partner.
Marriages should come with a health warning.
People are unskilled at being married, but they are unaware of the risks without having critical skills.
- Risk for their own health
- Risk for their financial health
- Risk for their children’s wellbeing
We all know unskilled people tend to struggle with a task where skills are required.
Without a doubt, relationships are complex, and managing them is challenging if you don’t know what you are doing.
Most people are so blind that they don’t know what they are doing is destructive until their partner says, “I want a divorce”!
Then they wake up to their reality they don’t know how to fix it and when they try it only gets worse.
The skill of relationship building is in about how to make the complex simple.