Let’s face it, marriage is hard work. There has to be almost a viscous drive to fight through boredom, business and major setbacks to get to the great stuff. Otherwise, the marriage goes into survival mode, or worse, it becomes another court date and lawyer fee.
These are three questions I ask my wife regularly to make sure we still fight for vitality and stay out of survival mode:
1) What can I do better? This question makes me wince at first, because it opens my male ego to possible collapse, but I ask it anyway. If my wife knows she is given permission at scheduled intervals to coach me as her husband, our children’s father, etc., then wisdom often emerges over frustration. She doesn’t have to calculate when the planets will line up perfectly to discuss my recent return to emotional aloofness or my ADD on house projects. Those things go on the what-can-Jon-do-better list. I don’t require it, but often she returns the favor and asks me the same question. Sometimes I oblige and other times not. Either way, something crazy starts to happen when we ask this simple question to one another, we start getting better at being together.
2) If you were me, what would you do? Here’s a question that helps diffuse an impasse or argument that is heading for nuclear. Stop, breathe and give your spouse the opportunity to experience this whole situation from your point-of-view. If you were me, what would you do? Your spouse is given the chance to do two things at once: A) Describe to you how they hoped you would have handled him or her, and B) it helps them get into your skin voluntarily instead of being forced to see it your way. You’ll be surprised how clarity shows up sooner rather than later, and often with less collateral damage.
3) What do you love about me? It’s really a trick question, because it’s more about them than you. Let me explain. When your spouse can reflect and verbalize what they love about you, then you discover how your love gets noticed the most by him or her, what makes him or her feel loved. She might say, “I love when you send me random text about how beautiful I am.” And yet, she may never mention that you clear off the table after dinner every night. He might say,“I love when you show me affection without prompting.” But he may never mention how incredible you make the flowerbed look in the spring. It doesn’t mean that the unmentioned is not important, it’s just not where your love is transmitted the most. Subconsciously, your spouse is revealing that love is greater felt by what rises to the top of his or her what-I-love-about-you list. Of course, keep up the clean up and flowerbeds, but you definitely want to maximize the affirming words and unprompted kisses, because that’s where the love is highlighted most.
