A collection of essays extended from The New York Times' most-read article of 2016. Anyone we might marry could, of course, be a little bit wrong for us. We don’t expect bliss every day. The fault isn’t entirely our own; it has to do with the devilish truth that anyone we’re liable to meet is going to be rather wrong, in some fascinating way or another, because this is simply what all humans happen to be – including, sadly, ourselves. This collection of essays proposes that we don’t need perfection to be happy. So long as we enter our relationships in the right spirit, we have every chance of coping well enough with, and even delighting in, the inevitable and distinctive wrongness that lies in ourselves and our beloveds.
Am I with the right person? Will our love last? Men and women in love are haunted by these questions. Love -- especially why it blossoms in relationships and why it later dies -- is a mystery to them. Will Our Love Last? A Couple's Road Map solves this mystery by giving readers a new understanding of love -- an understanding they can actually use to evaluate the soundness of their relationships and to answer confidently the crucial questions that mystified them before. Based on hundreds of cases in his twenty-four years as a marital therapist and twenty-nine years in his own happy marriage, Sam R. Hamburg, Ph.D., explains how compatibility is the key to lasting love. He shows how compatibility on three major dimensions -- the Practical Dimension, the Sexual Dimension, and the Wavelength Dimension -- is essential to the mutual understanding and affirmation that keep love alive, and he leads readers through a simple but systematic procedure for assessing their compatibility with a romantic partner in these crucial relationship areas. Dr. Hamburg introduces a new technique, The Hand Rotation Exercise, to help readers express their degree of compatibility and then convey that visually to their partner. In addition, he presents two new original techniques for working through relationship conflicts and coming to agreement on difficult issues: His Way/Her Way and The Long Conversation. Written in a clear, direct style that is free of jargon, Will Our Love Last? empowers readers to make important relationship decisions that are intellectually and emotionally informed. Will Our Love Last? will help couples trying to decide if they should take the next step to a more committed relationship. It will aid individuals embarking on a new relationship, or who are between relationships, to evaluate the rightness of a new or prospective partner. And it will assist people who are already in committed relationships to make an honest assessment of their prospects for happiness with their current partner. People have it in their power to make sure that they truly are with the right person. Will Our Love Last? shows the way.
WHAT DO EXCEPTIONAL COUPLES KNOW THAT OTHERS DON’T? If roughly fifty percent of marriages fail, what about the other fifty percent—the ones that “succeed”? Are those couples who stay together necessarily happy? No, not necessarily. In fact, many marriages that remain intact are far less than ideal. A mere seven percent are really good—in fact, exceptional. These couples have much greater than average passion, happiness, longevity, and fulfillment. And the good news is, luck has nothing to do with it. But if less-than-exceptional marriages are made up of men who are supposedly from Mars and women who are supposedly from Venus, what planet do exceptional husbands and wives come from? What are the secrets of exceptional couples . . . and what can they teach us? Marriage therapist Gregory K. Popcak believes that ways of relating employed by exceptional couples can benefit all marriages. In The Exceptional Seven Percent, he looks at the most successful couples and exposes their secrets. Each chapter examines in detail the basic characteristics of exceptional couples, including: · Developing a marital imperative—the key to unlocking all the other Exceptional Couple qualities · Setting and achieving emotional goals · Cultivating exceptional levels of fidelity, loving, service, rapport, negotiation, gratitude, joy, and sexuality Through anecdotes, analyses, exercises, quizzes, and guidance that is consistently supported by marriage research, you’ll learn what your weaknesses are and how you can begin to make positive changes. You have the power to turn your marriage into the most precious thing in your life. Why settle for anything less?
A voyeuristic peek into the lives of our friends and neighbors. No subject is too taboo, and these anonymous interviews reveal heartbreaking, heartwarming insights about sex, fighting, money, addiction, in-laws, and the Internet.
Dennis and Barbara Rainey, founders of FamilyLife, help couples establish the important daily habit of praying together, offering personal stories and answering questions about the dynamics of prayer. Daily entries -- including a short devotion, questions for reflection, and a prayer -- take husband and wife through topics related to prayer, spiritual growth, and key marital issues. “Sweetheart, let’s pray.” In the press of daily living, preserving a private moment to pray with and for your life-partner can be tough. Yet joining hearts before God is the single most transforming, intimate experience in marriage—a simple act that will fill your life, your relationship, and your home with wondrous love. A time to listen, a time to touch, a time to connect with what matters… Dennis and Barbara Rainey tell how a decision to pray together daily strengthened their understanding of one another, reduced conflict, and knit their hearts together in a deep, spiritual bond. Their thirty days of reflections can do the same for your relationship—starting today!
A groundbreaking book--based on years of the same thorough research that made the "Dress For Success" books national bestsellers--about how women can statistically improve their chances of getting married.
The only way to secure her dream is to marry a handsome stranger . . . When Rose and Jack meet, she has just lost her uncle, and with him her dream of owning a coffee shop. Rose wanted nothing more than to open a café in her uncle’s building. But her uncle’s will is clear – the building goes to Rose’s husband. Not to her. Then, his lawyer, Jack, offers an unusual solution… she can marry him. She’ll get the café and he’ll get the building. For some reason, Rose agrees. It might be a marriage of convenience but it’s anything but simple. Despite it being his idea, Jack is unbearably surly... But then he does something that shows Rose he might just have a softer side. Maybe love can start with a contract… but will Rose still feel that way when she learns the full terms of their deal?
“After years of debate and inquiry, the key to a great marriage remained shrouded in mystery. Until now...”—Carol Dweck, author of Mindset: The New Psychology of Success Eli J. Finkel's insightful and ground-breaking investigation of marriage clearly shows that the best marriages today are better than the best marriages of earlier eras. Indeed, they are the best marriages the world has ever known. He presents his findings here for the first time in this lucid, inspiring guide to modern marital bliss. The All-or-Nothing Marriage reverse engineers fulfilling marriages—from the “traditional” to the utterly nontraditional—and shows how any marriage can be better. The primary function of marriage from 1620 to 1850 was food, shelter, and protection from violence; from 1850 to 1965, the purpose revolved around love and companionship. But today, a new kind of marriage has emerged, one oriented toward self-discover, self-esteem, and personal growth. Finkel combines cutting-edge scientific research with practical advice; he considers paths to better communication and responsiveness; he offers guidance on when to recalibrate our expectations; and he even introduces a set of must-try “lovehacks.” This is a book for the newlywed to the empty nester, for those thinking about getting married or remarried, and for anyone looking for illuminating advice that will make a real difference to getting the most out of marriage today.
A thoughtful, down-to-earth, contemporary guide to help partners identify and address relationship-killing behavior patterns in their own lives. Good people can be bad at relationships. One night during his divorce, after one too many vodkas and a call with a phone-in-therapist who told him to “journal his feelings,” Matthew Fray started a blog. He needed to figure out how his ex-wife went from the eighteen-year-old college freshman who adored him to the angry woman who thought he was an asshole and left him. As he pieced together the story of his marriage and its end, Matthew began to realize a hard truth: even though he was a decent guy, he was a bad husband. As he shared raw, uncomfortable, and darkly humorous first-person stories about the lessons he’d learned from his failed marriage, a peculiar thing happened. Matthew started to gain a following. In January 2016 a post he wrote—“She Divorced Me Because I left the Dishes by the Sink”—went viral and was read over four million times. Filtered through the lens of his own surprising, life-changing experience and his years counseling couples, This Is How Your Marriage Ends exposes the root problem of so many relationships that go wrong. We simply haven’t been taught any of the necessary skills, Matthew explains. In fact, it is sometimes the assumption that we are acting on good intentions that causes us to alienate our partners and foment mistrust. With the humorous, entertaining, and counterintuitive approach of The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, and the practical insights of The 5 Love Languages, This is How Your Marriage Ends helps readers identify relationship-killing behavior patterns in their own lives, and offers solutions to break free from the cycles of dysfunction and destruction. It is must-read for every partner no matter what stage–beginning, middle, or even end—of your relationship.
