Let her know you care.
Show her you love her.
Do you do these things in your marriage?
Most guys do. It comes with great intention. But often, it’s done too late. And merely a response to having upset your wife in the first place.
Maybe you didn’t listen to her properly.
Maybe you forgot to make a certain call you said you’d make.
Or you forgot your anniversary.
So it’s natural. You want to make things right. You’re a guy.
Do you want to make things right when you screw up?
So you apologize.
“I’m so sorry I forgot our anniversary. It’ll never happen again.”
Or you say what she wants to hear.
“I understand you don’t trust me. But please know I’m going to do everything to prove I’m trustworthy.”
Or you bite your tongue, even when you’re jonesin’ to set things right, but you know anything you say will only make things worse.
But do any of these tactics actually work?
If you’re like me, you know they typically don’t.
And that’s because they all rely on an underlying motive and belief.
A belief that you can fix your wife or your relationship with a problem-solution mentality.
And there’s the challenge. To do something different, but what?
Even if the “fix it” tactic works, and you get some short-term relief, it’s only a short time until you’re back in the doghouse.
And so the cycle repeats until you feel so trapped in your marriage that you’ve fallen into despair or just want to blow it all up.
So what should you do instead of fixing your wife or relationship?
Step One – Connect with the same intention of making things right or showing you care.
Step Two – Do it in a way that’s not about a tactical solution to a momentary problem.
Step Three – Go deeper into the bigger pattern of distrust, resentment, emotional distance, sexlessness, or whatever’s dogging your marriage.
Step Four – This is the big one, the game-changer, the five words you should never forget for the rest of your life: Be Relational vs. Be Right.
Instead of fixing anything, be relational.
When you stop trying to fix your wife, the amazing thing is all the pressure is off of you.
You don’t have to make things better anymore.
You can just kick back and be you.
Get serious. Take a deeper dive. Learn what being relational means in the video below.
Maybe you’re thinking…
Seriously, dude? Sounds too easy?
If it were so easy, you’d be doing it already, right?
True. But while it’s a simple concept, it takes action and practice to implement.
We essentially have to re-program ourselves as men.
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Previously Published on stuartmotola.com and is republished on Medium.
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Photo credit: iStock
