Dear friends, I came across a post written in Spanish which I thought would greatly help all of you who are married. They are 10 tips from a psychological viewpoint written by Dr. Adrián Cano, of the Clínica Universidad de Navarra (Pamplona, Spain) which are worthwhile to consider and live in order to have a happy marriage.
I tried to translate them as best as I could to make it sufficiently understandable for you. I apologize beforehand if I haven’t succeeded to be clear at some point.
-Fr. Rolly Arjonillo, priest of Opus Dei, CATHOLICS STRIVING FOR HOLINESS. We are also in Facebook: www.facebook.com/CatholicsstrivingforHoliness. Hope you like our page and invite your friends as well to do so in order to help more people.
+++
- UNITY: grow strong with your spouse. The strength of your marriage lies in your unity: in your being together as one. When your spouse speaks about difficulties or problems, consider them yours as well. Ask your spouse about its meaning, what it represents, and try to put yourself in your spouse’s place. Foster within you the virtue of humility.
- PRIORITY: Always prioritize your spouse. Your spouse is the one who gives meaning to your existence. Don’t give more importance to the desires of other people to those of your spouse’s: but both of you should be prudent at the same time.
- SERENITY: discuss things serenely and you will be grateful and they will be thankful to you as well. Put a balance between reason and heart. Do not let yourself be dominated by either one of them. The virtue of temperance can help you.
- RESPECT: this is indispensable. Consider the issues and viewpoints of others giving them at least the same value or perhaps more than your ideas. Do not impose your thoughts, nor should you transform your opinions into dogmas.
- UNDERSTANDING: Empathy! Try to put yourself in the place of the other, and find out what a thing means to him or her. Ask if you do not understand. Be generous.
- LOOK TOWARD THE FUTURE: sometimes we think that the world ends tomorrow and this is the last chance for such and such. False. Opportunities arise every day. Patience is a great virtue.
- COMMUNICATION: we think that we speak well or we listen well. Wrong. We may know how to utter sounds, but communication goes far beyond than this. It is necessary that we are able to express our ideas without hurting our neighbor, describing our point of view, beginning phrases with “I” to arrive at the “we”, and expressing our feelings and affections. Active listening is even more important and necessary than talking, and this requires a learning process: pay attention and keep it, and make sure that the other feels heard and taken into account. Arriving at a consensus fits perfectly here.
- PRIVACY: we should not make public what belongs to the privacy of your marriage. Sharing what belongs to the privacy of the spouses destroys trust among spouses. Be very prudent. It is better to remain silent in public than to discredit your spouse.
- TRANSPARENCY: speak clearly. Express what you feel, what worries you, what you would like the other to do, what you would like to do … so that the other spouse knows. A more intimate knowledge of the other facilitates decisions.
- HUMOR: make the habit of laughing at life itself. There is nothing which could erase our smile. Really. Do not consider as “absolutes” almost nothing. Apply your intelligence in resolving problems. Laughing “with” and not “of” unites much more than we think.
SOURCE: Dr. Adrian Cano, “10 Ideas para disfrutar de tu matrimonio,” in http://blogs.cun.es/10-ideas-para-disfrutar-de-tu-matrimonio-en-navidad/