How Not to do love and marriage this year

  First Comes Love 
     "Will you marry me?" asked my boyfriend of five years. Then he flew overseas to serve with the U.S. Army for the entire next year.
     Two weeks after he returned, during a snowstorm on New Year's Eve,  we became husband and wife. As we drove from the ceremony in our new VW Beetle, we thought we knew a lot about married life. After all, we were in love!

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Then Comes Marriage 
     Yet through the years we discovered a few tips about how NOT to do love and marriage. I'm sharing these tips with you this Valentine's Day. Perhaps one of these ideas will help shift your thinking and bring you a sigh of relief. Wouldn't that be nice? I invite you--whether you're a newly-wed, an exhausted middle-ager, an empty-nester, or still waiting--to skim through these tips and notice what catches your eye. Even small revisions in the way we do life and love can make a difference. 
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11 Tips About How NOT to Do Love and Marriage 

1. Blame your spouse for what is really yours to decide and change. (You can do this silently or loudly.)
2. Neglect your own personal and spiritual well-being.
3. Believe that the growth and health of your marriage relationship is all up to you. OR believe that it is all up to your spouse. (Black & white thinking limits enjoyment.)
4. Refuse to negotiate.
5. Focus (or obsess) on your "idealistic" (unreasonable expectations) for wedded bliss.
6. Shame, intimidate or bully your spouse into being and doing what you think he or she "should" be and do. (Often these are related to your unreasonable expectations.)
7. Pretend to be someone you aren't or that you enjoy something when you don't. (You can be authentic and still choose to enter into an activity that is not your favorite.)
8. Compare yourself, your spouse and your marriage to other couples' lives. (Remember, you only see from the outside!)
9. Always respond to disagreements in the same way you did in your family of origin.
10. Live each day trying to avoid your spouse's disapproval, ire, or unhappiness. (Your mate's responses to life are his/her responsibility to own.)
11. Believe that your spouse and your marriage have the capability to be perfect 24/7, just the way you envision it. This is a sure-fire way to be consistently disappointed with life, marriage and your mate.

The GOOD NEWS? 

You, your spouse, and your marriage don't have be perfect (just like you picture it all should be) to be loving, fun and seriously cool. 
​Really! Only God is perfect!

So we can relax and stop over-trying, over-helping, or over-controlling in order to make our mates and marriage-relationships be "just right." I find this such a relief!

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Which one of these 11 tips do you identify with this Valentine's Day?