How to Be Successfully Married

In a follow up to how to get your life together in order to meet someone instead of just whining about it, let’s now turn our attention to how to be married and do so successfully. That is should you decide to go that route. These rules also work for long term committed relationships if that’s more your style.

Step One: Don’t be a jerk. You know how you hate hanging out with people who are jerks? Well guess what, you can be a real jerk sometimes too. Stop it. Before that snippy remark comes out of your mouth, think then don’t say it. It’s true that familiarity can breed contempt, but that’s petty and you’re (probably) better than that.

Step Two: Don’t ever get into comparisons about who does what in the relationship. This never ends well. So what if you do the dishes more, the other person probably does something that you don’t. Relationships are symbiotic, you both can add something to make it work. That doesn’t mean that each thing needs to be 50/50 and there is no point in keeping score because it’s not a game that anyone wins or loses. Just try to pull your weight and if your partner does the same it will work out.

Step Three: Understand the concept of the married brain. When two people are together long enough each person’s brain realizes that the other will remember a specific thing and they are allowed to forget it. This actually helps in the long run since it allows for specialization and division of labor. You can specialize in remembering everyone’s birthday and your partner can specialize in keeping track of mortgage interest rates and 401k planning. They’re both things that nobody really wants to do and each of you gets to forget about something.

Step Four: Alone time. Great, you live together and occasionally share a home office. Well, hanging out with the same person 24×7 will lead to madness. There are plenty of ways to get alone time but what works well for me is having a different schedule. I am an early riser and my wife is a night owl. When I go to bed she can watch TV shows that I wouldn’t want anything to do with and tweet about them, and when I get up at 6:30AM on a Saturday I can read articles online about whatever new gadget is out. It gives each of us our own time in a shared space to pursue our own casual interests. You could also simply do something without your other half that they don’t want to do. You don’t have to drag them along.

An aside to alone time is that if at all possible two bathrooms will help. It’s not always practical but try to work out a way to make it happen.

Step Five: Let them be who they are. If your spouse does something that mildly annoys you but they really enjoy then just let it be. It’s selfish to try to change them or make them stop something that isn’t really hurting anyone just so that you can be slightly less annoyed. I believe it was said best by the poet Homer J. Simpson, “no TV and no beer make Homer, something something.”

If it’s really detrimental then say something, but in a human way, not in an annoyed and huffy way.

These aren’t the only things that count and there are many others. But these are what work for me. Oh, and the golden rule, always follow that.

The Golden Rule: If you each have the other person’s best interest in mind all will be right.

Photo: FlickrEfleming

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