5-Day Marriage Turn around: Healing your Marriage!

DAY 1

Why Marriages Fail.

Today, we would begin a series on why marriage fails.
Everything God made was designed to succeed, and to maintain that success, He set in motion principles that would sustain it. One of God’s creation is the family, the foundation of our society. However, what births the family is marriage. As a matter of fact, most people’s perspective and attitude towards marriage are gotten from their families.

 

When a marriage fails, depending on the situation, people get hurt, children who have nothing to do with it begin to blame themselves, become depressed, withdrawn, etc.. More so, the emotional impact can be debilitating, the financial cost exorbitant, and the physical consequences draining, sapping every positive energy left for any creative or productive work.

 

What then is marriage? What are some of the reasons for which marriage fails? Marriage, for us, is a blood covenant between two people trying to build an intimate and romantic relationship, while supporting each other towards fulfilling their marital purpose. However, there are practical steps everyone of us must take if we are to build and sustain an exceptional marital romance. Please, join us tomorrow as we take this topic further.

 

ACTION POINT: Take some time out with your spouse to draw a picture of how you want your marriage to be in the next 3 years.

DAY 2

Why Marriages Fail: The Selfish Spouse
Yesterday, we started a series on why marriages fail, we would be taking it further today by discussing selfishness. According to dictionary.com, selfishness is “devoted to or caring only for oneself; concerned primarily with one’s own interests, benefits, welfare, etc., regardless of others”.

 

Selfishness is like a little spark of fire in a dry forest, if not extinguished early, it can burn down everything in its path, destroying valuable assets. It is one of the greatest threats to oneness in marriage. From our experience of counselling myriads of couples across different cultures, we have observed that spouses who insist on having their way, at the expense of the interest of their marriage, often have high probability of experiencing ‘failed marriage’. The point is that couples can’t work together or build a lasting marital romance if they don’t compromise.

 

Selfishness is like a virus, when it finds it way into parenting, spouses start brainwashing their children against each other, forming various ‘factions’; when it finds its way into conversations between spouses, each spouse would want to enforce his/her point of view (even when it stands no chance) on important decisions, rather than pursuing the interest of the marriage; when it finds its way into the bedroom, spouses would only think of how to satisfy themselves at the expense of their spouses. During conflict, a selfish spouse would wait for his/her spouse to make the first move – to apologise.
“Marriage is brutal on selfish people” | Jimmy Evans.

 

ACTION POINT: Take practical steps to deal with selfishness by learning to consciously look out for your spouse’s needs. If you need to see a counsellor, please do.

 

DAY 3

When it was beautiful
Yesterday, we considered the impact of selfishness on marriage. Today, we will be considering the impact of negative memories.

 

As a little child, I had good memories of Christmas, I was always fascinated and enraptured by the season. It was often an opportunity to try on new clothes, travel, visit, enjoy a wonderful time with my family, etc.. You probably would understand the experience, yours may have been during thanksgiving, birthdays,…; the mood and atmosphere are often electrifying. In the same way, we have people we look forward to seeing, people who create pleasant memories and experiences. It becomes a challenge when our spouses are not on that list.

 

There are couples who don’t enjoy each other’s company at all. As a matter of fact, they are often happy when their spouses travel because they can finally have some peace and freedom from all the arguments, mean words, silent treatment, telling off before the children, etc.. The fact is that people do their best to avoid pain and anyone who is the source of it. On the other hand, some couples can’t wait to see each other, every moment is savoured, they act like young lovers (teenagers in love).

The accumulation of negative experiences and memories could stab the heart of any marriage, thereby, leading to a failed marriage. Are your memories of your spouse and marriage appalling and painful? What are you doing about it? Have you given up on trying?

 

ACTION POINT: Building positive experiences and memories must be deliberate. You may have to get a counsellor involved.

 

DAY4

Did not expect it to turn out like this!
Yesterday, we examined the impact of consistent negative experiences on a marriage and why it is important that we make concerted efforts towards building positive ones. Today, we shall take it further by examining the impact of poor emotional boundaries with the opposite sex.

 

Just like we pointed out yesterday, when negative experiences begin to multiply and things start to progress towards irreconcilable differences, some couples stop committing to their marriage and spouse, others begin to seek intimate relationships with close friends, confiding in them about problems and issues in their marriage.

 

This, sometimes, opens doors to inordinate emotional entanglement that clouds judgment, provides false comfort, while fuelling fantasy. Someone who went through divorce once told me that the ‘connection and acceptance’ he experienced during his affair diverted the energy he needed to push for solving his marital problems. However, to his chagrin, his pain doubled when he observed that the same problem he refused to resolve sprung up in his new relationship as well.

 

One of the best gifts you can give your marital romance, especially when there is a problem, is to set up appropriate emotional boundaries with the opposite sex.

 

ACTION POINT: Make up your mind to end that discussion now. Anyone who cannot control his emotion is like a city without walls.

 

DAY 5

Could you be the enemy of your marriage?

Yesterday, we discussed about the power of setting emotional boundaries, especially when our marital romance suffers a set back. Today, we would be considering the impact of words.

 

Words are powerful, they create emotional state, communicate facts, wisdom, intentions, feelings, worldview, love, etc.. Nations have gone to war over words, families have been torn apart over words, children’s esteem have been ruined over words and marriages have failed over words. Beyond this, words have spiritual and creative powers, they can confer curses and blessings. There are couples who say terrible things about their marriage, you hear them say to each other “I wish I never got married to you”, “this marriage is not heading anywhere”, “this marriage is boring”, “you make me sad”, “I will divorce you someday”.

 

These words shape the future of their marital romance and family, they are like self-fulfilling prophesies. The defence is often that, “but this is the truth”, “this is how I feel”. In life, there is a difference between facts and truth. You make your reality (your experiences) through what you believe and say over a period of time.

 

What have you been saying about your spouse and marriage? Are you making emotional statements and decisions? Are your words healing your marital romance or making things worse?

 

ACTION POINT: Consciously review your words, you may have to change who you spend time with, what you read and watch because they program our thoughts which influence our words.

 

Chidi & Victor Akunna
Relationship Catalysts