When I met with clients before we established The Marriage Foundation (Where we collected all the marriage wisdom you would ever need) I liked to reduce tensions with little distractions that were actually a ruse to get my desperate clients to see the magic of marriage and how they have the power to convert theirs, just by applying the basics. Unfortunately, none of us are taught the basics before we get married so it does take a bit of adjustment. One of the distractions I used was to ask a simple question “Why did you get married in the first place”? To make it interesting I told them that if their answers were better than my discovered universally applicable answer, they would not have to pay for their session. I did this for all 8 years that I was refining and perfecting the system we now use, and I met with hundreds, so I don’t think my study was anecdotal. On my whiteboard I dutifully listed their answers, which were good and honest. They included
But, said I, “true! But why get married? Why get married, at all?” The answers were pretty good.
Naturally there were more answers and I’m sure you could add them to the lists but I want to make a point.
All of us get/got married for happiness. In 8 years only 2 of the hundreds of clients I met gave that right answer. And no one thought their answer(s) was better than mine, and so I didn’t go bankrupt.
The next question is the beautiful hook that got them thinking in the right direction instead of wanting to “work on issues”.
What is the one thing that always brings happiness?
I didn’t play whiteboard games with this question because the answer is a marriage defining polestar… when you accept it.
Love is the ultimate producer of happiness. We all get married because we crave the happiness that comes from love. It is baked into our DNA. This is the essence of marriage, the goal of marriage, and the incredible gift of marriage. We all know it but…can you see where we are going with this? Can you deduce what is the greatest challenge you, and I, and all of us, have in marriage? Yes, remembering this truth is the challenge. Remembering that our marriage is sustained by love for love’s sake. When we remember this, we avoid the dumb things like arguing, confronting, criticizing, anger, and, you can add to the list of dumb things.
I can easily expound on this, using examples and so forth. But to those of you who I am reaching, who feel this truth in your bones, go further! Read one of my books or, if your marriage is shaky get our online course. Don’t stop here. The beauty and joy of marriage is beyond imagination, and what I’m telling you is provable by you. Go for it!
