Are you irritated with your spouse? Are little irritations building up in your relationship to the point where they’re over-riding the good you once thought about each other?

“The plain truth is that it’s impossible for two human beings to live together for any length of time and not hurt each other. All too often life gets in the way of living. If the struggles of marriage were isolated to the minor irritations that come along with being imperfect, we would probably all have great marriages. But minor irritations can grow into major problems—and major infractions can break your heart.” (Bill and Pam Farrel, from the book, “Love, Honor, and Forgive. A Guide for Married Couples”)

It’s amazing the damage that can be caused by allowing little irritations to build up in your mind against your marital “partner!” After a while it can become difficult to be kind to the person you pledged on your wedding day to “love, honor and cherish, and that can eventually cause bigger problems.”

“The simple truth is that happy marriages are based on a deep friendship—a mutual respect and enjoyment of each other’s company. A couple that keeps their friendship strong despite the inevitable disagreements and irritations of married life, experiences what I call ‘positive sentiment over-ride’ — their positive thoughts about each other and their marriage are so pervasive that they tend to supersede their negative feelings. It takes a much more significant conflict for them to lose their equilibrium as a couple.” (Dr John M. Gottman, from article, Lessons from the Love Lab, Family Circle, 4/2/02)

So, what do you do to tend to those problem areas so you can maintain a stronger friendship and have more “positive sentiment over-rides?”

We have several things you can look at that might help you in some way. The first is to go into the “Marriage Messages” section to see what we have there that can help you. Two messages in particular (among many) would be:

• Creatively Re-framing Our Marriages – Marriage Message #259
• Love Accepts Many Irritations – Marriage Message #241

Also, there are a couple of articles featured in Marriage Partnership Magazine that you can read on their web site that could also help you. Please click on the links below to read the articles:

• Fixing Those Irritations
• Spouse Interrupted: My Little Digs Made Big Holes
  
• Ready, Set, Grow!