A Better Marriage - Counseling Session

1. Marriage is hard. It is supposed to be. It is the largest opportunity to grow and develop talents and attributes to become more like our Heavenly Parents
2. Work on a small set of rules that will govern the way your interact in your marriage; write them down; try to maintain those boundaries consistently
3. Don’t sweat the small stuff
4. Have your couple prayer every day – express your love and appreciation to Heavenly Father concerning your spouse and your marriage and your family
5. Look to build more trust in yourself and in each other
6. Be the change you want to see in the relationship. Be the kind of spouse that you would want to come home to – that you can’t wait to see again
7. Look for the ‘bright spots’ and magnify them; use them to define the marriage (not the shortcomings, or dark spots)
8. Be aware of the seeds you’re planting every day, in every communication, in every interaction – verbal and non-verbal. Remember the little verse: “Today I plant a seed. Tomorrow it may be, A flower or a weed. Depends on the seed.”
9. Look for the benevolent purpose in everything your spouse is saying
10. The Lord is not necessarily in the fixing business, He is however in the teaching business
11. Leave the door open to be wrong: “I might be wrong, but my thoughts were…”
12. Minimize the bad days: 1 day a month, to 1 day every few months, to one day a year or less
13. Be a patient person, wait for the right time to talk about a difficult subject and couch it with love
14. People will respond positively and make more change in their lives – the kind of change that will be more lasting – when they are approached in love vs. in criticism or in a time of contention
15. Ask yourself: Would I rather be right or be loved?
16. “Nothing of any significance or import was ever created without first being a document!” –a Create your personal mission statement; Create your family mission statement; pray about them, study them, live them
17. Put yourself on the receiving end of your comments and responses – are they being said in the right tone, spirit, and love?
18. You can’t fix yesterday – let them go and work on being the you today
19. Read yours and your spouse’s patriarchal blessings frequently – see yourself and your spouse from Heavenly Father’s perspective
20. ‘Pay Attention’ – it’s the most important thing
21. Be thankful for the differences and learn to appreciate and celebrate the differences – it’s supposed to be that way (nobody wants to be married to a clone of themselves.
22. Be truly sincere – have true sincerity in your communications
23. Make your spouse a priority above all else – all else, even your own needs; interact with more attention, more respect, more concern, and more commitment that you would to your boss or your parents or anyone else
24. Ask, “Anything else?” respectfully before trying to respond with your side of the matter
25. Go to the temple together often
26. Don’t get pedestrian with basic courtesies – saying Please, Thank You, Excuse Me, I’m Sorry, I Forgive You, Pardon Me, etc.
27. Run an ongoing audio tape in your minds repeating, “Somebody loves me (a drawer of clean socks)”; “You are so beautiful!”; “I am so very blessed to be married to you!”
28. Make sure that you are striving to follow the Basic Gospel principles in your home: prayer, scripture study, fasting together at least once a month; having a meaningful Family Home Evening weekly, be faithful in your church service, going to the temple, obeying the commandments
29. Incorporate the Ward Goals into your home and your lives: Seek and Follow Spiritual Promptings; Increase (Ward) Family Unity; Have Greater Worship through Music; Improve Sabbath Day Reverence; Strengthen Personal Spirituality Every Day; Recognize Opportunities to Magnify the Priesthood
30. Identify a scripture as your family scripture – here is the Loving Lake Elsinore Ward’s scripture Mosiah 18:21
31. Try to be better than the expectations
32. Be forgiving for the small and the not-so-small things; forgive first and ask questions later; forgive like you would want to be forgiven when you arrive at judgment day
33. Study the Paradoxical Commandments for Marriage; Our Marriage Contract – 13 Principles; The Top 10 Things I’m Supposed to Learn from Trials; and 13 Ways to Receive Forgiveness

Bishop Wm. Calvin Hughes

March 19, 2010