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When you get into an arguement, ask yourself if this is the hill you want to die on. You will lose not matter what, so be sure the reason you are argueing is worth dieing over.
To those of you who are now in successful, solid, happy marriages.
1. How, if at all, did you prepare for married life?
2. What advice do you have for singles who want to enjoy a successful marriage?
3. How important has it been in your marriage that you and your spouse have:
- mutual understanding
- communication
1. It happened so that both of us: closed and existing relationship and cleaned up any remaining residuals of those before we met. That was a pure stroke of fate. As my wife says, no new door opens before you shut the old door and lock it. My exes been haunting me for years, it took me 4 years to make myself understood that I am not open to renewing anything, it's not a joke. To be extreme, I destroyed all memories of all former rels including pictures, e-mails, keepsakes and all. Some useful things the exes gave me were permitted to stay. I am totally glad we did that. It really helped. My wife found one of the pictures of my exes in an old album, it went straight to the shredder which happened nearby.
2. Keep working on it, it's more work than it seems to be. Make a decision whether you guys stick together and stick to it religiously. When I am asked if I am religious, I answer yes, I worship my family, that's my religion. It comes to rituals too, me and my wife developed hundreds of rituals big and small and we stick to them. Which makes it solid, we can't be pried apart without bleeding.
3. Mutual understanding is critical, no relationship can survive without it except maybe complete sub-dom. Communication is critical as a vehicle of delivering mutual understanding. Keep sharing feelings and thoughts, speak up about everything at all. Be constructive delivering critique, don't say "you are bad at...", say, "how about we do it this way, do you want to try?...". Imagine that you are in a submarine or a space station and there's a sh*y, hostile world out there which isn't too far from truth. Look at what life would you have, honestly if you happened to lose each other. Be honest here, take rosy goggles off. Imagine yourself going again into the dating scene, going through the same task of building up the rituals and mutual understanding over again...
That's right off the top of my head, whatever jumped into the tips of my fingers...
When you get into an arguement, ask yourself if this is the hill you want to die on. You will lose not matter what, so be sure the reason you are argueing is worth dieing over.
+1, good one. When breaking peace, think twice if it's worth it. Think of the way to do it smoothly and without confrontation. Example: she does something that irritates you. See if it's something really harmful, harmful enough to make you bleed. If it does not break your leg, does not pick your pocket, does not cause your family financial loss, does not make you bleed, think if you can adjust your mental focus and let it go. If it is important, gently, with a smile and in a positive, jocular way share your a tiny bit of frustration. If she misplaces your key all the time making you spend 15 minutes daily looking for it, find a place for that key and make it understood that's the place you want you key on, but don't scream and pound your fist over such small matter.... Think big picture, think what a wonderful person you are blessed with, make yourself happy with what you have.
To those of you who are now in successful, solid, happy marriages.
1. How, if at all, did you prepare for married life?
We lived together for almost two years. I strongly encourage you to do this if and when you find the one you think you may want to marry. I think this is of the utmost importance. You also have to be close enough to your potential spouse that you'd rather spend time with them than "hanging out with your buddies going to clubs/bars".
2. What advice do you have for singles who want to enjoy a successful marriage? Just love the person you are with and TAKE YOUR VOWS SERIOUSLY. You dont need to have everything in common with the person you married. For example, I like guns, my wife hates guns. My wife is a dancer, I dont really like dancing. Thing is, you dont need to have everything in common for a successful marriage. You just need love, understanding and be willing work at it.
3. How important has it been in your marriage that you and your spouse have:
- mutual understanding - Very important.
- communication - this is of vital importance
See above in red. Remember, no one wins in an argument. This is where the importance of mutual understanding comes in. Marriage is 100/100, not 50/50.
For example, I like guns, my wife hates guns. My wife is a dancer, I dont really like dancing.
Same situation with guns, situation with dancing reversed (I am a competition dancer, she can't move at all), plus more: my wife loves shellfish, I hate shellfish, my wife loves hard rock, I hate hard rock, I love mountains, my wife gets sick up high and on and on and on. If we were to read each other's profile in an online service, we would skip it and move on to someone "compatible"... Horoscope situation is even worse: by all horoscopes, Eastern and Western, we are at a peak of incompatibility. With all that in picture, once we met, it was instant chemical attraction that had not faded in years... We barely made it through the first date without breaking our rules, and as of the the second date next very day we were addicted to each other.
Never settle. If there are any doubt, move on. Goes for both parties.
Some interests in common is best, but each need some private interests.
Never try to change the other party, any change will likely go in different directions than you want.
Never be afraid to divorce, it's only expensive because it's worth it.
If you suspect the other is cheating on you, it has been happening awhile.
I have kept a little part of myself locked away, in case of a break up I have somewhere to retreat to.
My wife and I were close friends for 10 years before we wed.
To those of you who are now in successful, solid, happy marriages.
1. How, if at all, did you prepare for married life?
We both, separately, lived long fruitful single lives... Long... Very long... Did I say long?.. When we met we were tired of our long fruitful single lives... The courtship was fast... So technically we didn't prepare together, but were prepared separately with our looong single lives...
2. What advice do you have for singles who want to enjoy a successful marriage?
1. Don't expect. Lower your expectations. Enjoy the person as he/she is.
2. Laugh at his/her jokes even if they are old.
3. Little kids make people crabby... you will be snapping at each other... Thats' OK.
3. How important has it been in your marriage that you and your spouse have:
- mutual understanding - this has to happen on the subconscious level. Without thinking about it. Then it's the real compatibility.
- communication - still struggling there. Mostly because his first reaction to anything I say is joking... I'm working on it, though sometimes just can't stop laughing.
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Horoscope situation is even worse: by all horoscopes, Eastern and Western, we are at a peak of incompatibility. 
With all that in picture, once we met, it was instant chemical attraction that had not faded in years... We barely made it through the first date without breaking our rules, and as of the the second date next very day we were addicted to each other.
