Beer With A Buddy: Conversations on Life and Marriage
Without a doubt, my wife is my best friend, and she is my go-to person for just about every conversation. We can talk about anything, and we do our best to find time every day to get together for a great chat.
While I love talking to my wife, I find that sometimes you just need some time out of the house with a friend to help clear your mind and get a fresh perspective on life.
I find these times to be really refreshing, and I usually come away from a little bar time full of ideas and energy (as long as I don’t overdo it with the beer 
).
Beer With A Buddy Time, as I like to call it, is an important part of living a full life and a healthy marriage.
Get Out!
Of course, alcohol doesn’t have to a centerpiece of this time. While I enjoy a cold, frosty one and prefer to chat at night after the kids are in bed and my family time is over, you can meet a friend for a meal, some great coffee or a round of golf. The important ingredients are simply you, a good friend and a free mind.
5 Ways to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking
Editor’s note: This is a guest post from Louise Baker. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do!
Nonverbal communication is an important part of how human beings relate to one another.
The important thing to remember is that the unconscious mind is powerful, and it can pick up on many different things about another person even if they are not obvious.
For instance, body language is a perfect example of nonverbal communication. A person’s posture tells people a lot about how that person thinks about himself.
Within a marriage relationship, nonverbal communication is even more important. It has been estimated that over ninety percent of the effectiveness of communication is facilitated by nonverbal cues. Obviously, it’s important to understand how improving nonverbal communication can improve your marriage relationship!
Five Ways to Improve Your Marriage Through Nonverbal Communication
Give these five tips a try in the daily interaction with your spouse and see what a difference you can make without saying a word:
1. Make sure you always express affection.
Marriage as a Competitive Sport
Editor’s Note: This is a guest post by Susan Mallery. I’m excited to help Susan kick-off a guest writing tour on a series of relationship and marriage sites in support of her latest novel (details below).
Susan is a best-selling romance/fiction writer and a strong supporter of marriage and our efforts here at Engaged Marriage. Please welcome her and her fans to our community!
Everyone’s gone to dinner with a couple who just don’t seem to like each other.
As you fidget uncomfortably, Mr. Mean complains that his wife washed a red sweater with the whites, then he flashes his pink socks. Mrs. Mean snaps back that if he worked harder, they could afford new socks. They pretend the character slams are all in good fun, but you can hear the vein of bitterness beneath their words.
Worse, you can feel that bitter energy in the room. Spend time with Mr. and Mrs. Mean, and your soul shrivels a little more with every minute.
What Happened to This Couple?
The Means didn’t start out that way. Like most couples, they were giddily in love on their wedding day. So where did they go wrong?
Don’t Feed the Swans…Or the Haters!
I had two very different experiences last weekend that gave me a very valuable reminder of the importance of good communication. As you will see, neither unfortunate event had anything to do with marriage, but I think they both hold lessons that we should keep in mind in our married lives.
Swan Attack!
After enjoying a wonderful day of free family activities, we decided to close things out by stopping at a local park to feed the ducks. We had some old bread and two eager little kids.
Things started off well enough. As we approached the pond, we had a couple of geese, some white ducks and some gorgeous mallard ducks swimming eagerly in our direction. And then there was the big swan.
In hindsight, I should have been a bit more cautious about that damn swan. This thing was big, and it quickly made its way to the front of the breadline, hanging out just on the edge of the water. We made sure the big bird was well-fed, not that we had much choice as he was aggressively snatching every piece of bread that he could gobble up.
*Flash*
How to Get Your Spouse to Talk to You: 7 Tips for Engagement
Do you sometimes have trouble getting your spouse to talk to you? Or really listen to what you have to say?
Frankly, I was surprised by the number of readers who typed in this concern as part of my recent Two-Question Marriage Survey. If you haven’t taken that survey, I’d love it if you took a minute (literally) and provided your input. The results have been so helpful in understanding your needs, and I’m excited to announce a new resource to help address Big Issue Number One in the next week or so (stay tuned so you don’t miss it).
Even though it wasn’t a top response, the sheer importance of this topic compelled me write a post addressing it to the best of my abilities. Obviously, I don’t know the specific circumstances surrounding each situation, but I hope I can provide some helpful tips for establishing healthy two-way communication in your marriage. After all, I think we can all improve in this all-important area!
7 Tips to Get Your Spouse Engaged
1. Be the Spouse You Desire
Got 15 Minutes for Your Marriage?
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I'm Dustin, the guy behind Engaged Marriage. I'm living and loving the crazy life of a young husband and Dad.
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