Not too many years ago I was pretty desperate to find a way to help my marriage.  I knew if I didn't it was liable to be over, and I didn't want that.  Well, my wife and I celebrated our 26th anniversary earlier this year.  We still have our moments but we are committed to staying together and I want to help you do the same.

I know that your situation is certainly different from mine.  In fact, you may be thinking there's no way I can know what you are going through.  And I don't know all the details of your problems, but some issues are pretty common and some of the things I did to help my marriage will probably help yours too.

3 Keys To Marital Harmony

If you got down to the basics of everything I did to help my marriage you would wind up with 3 key things.  These 3 principles are at the root of almost anything you can do to save or improve your marriage.  None of them will probably be earth shaking revelations, but they helped me and they can do the same for you.

Mirror. Mirror On The Wall

Nobody wants to hear this, but one thing that I did to really help my marriage was to make the decision to accept responsibility for my shortcomings.  The truth is that, a lot of the time, something I said or did was the cause of a problem or issue with my wife.  Is everything my fault?  Of course not, my wife isn't perfect either, but admitting my flaws makes it easier for me to overlook some of hers.  It also seems to help her to cut me a little more slack when I screw up.

Don't Play The Blame Game

Somthing else I did to help my marriage was to stop pointing fingers.  It seems to be human nature to look for somebody to blame whenever anything goes wrong in our life.  The sad part is that a lot of the time we aim our frustration at those we love the most, especially our spouse.  This is a sure fire way to turn your home into a battlefield.

One very common way situation that used to end up with me frustrated and angry at my wife was when something I had been planning did not pan out like I thought it should.  Usually this had nothing to do with her, she was just in the unlucky position of reminding me of a reason that what I had been planning wouldn't work out.  I had to just face the fact that sometimes things just go wrong and it isn't necessarily anybody's fault.

Just Talk It Over First

Another way I found to help my marriage was as simple as talking things over with my wife before building up plans and expectations in my mind.  In fact, this was a big part of learning to stop blaming her when things didn't go my way.  I figured out that I was thinking up ideas in my head for things I wanted to do and not bringing her into the loop on my plans.  Then when I announced my intentions and she reminded me of something that was going to interfere with them I actually kind of blamed her for the problem.  When I started talking to her about my plans first most of these issues went away.

It's Not Brain Surgery

So there you have it, three things I did to help my marriage.  None of them are brain surgery but they really are pretty powerful principles if you put them into action.  Like most things in a relationship they are all related to honesty and communication.  As simple as they sound, following these three principles was the most important thing I did to help my marriage.