10 Ways to a Happier Married Life

Whether you’re a newlywed or are approaching your twentieth anniversary, there is always something new to learn about marriage. Here are some counselor-approved principles to improve the satisfaction you and your spouse experience in your married life.

10 Ways to a Happier Married Life

1. Put God first in your marriage.

Marriage is God’s idea, and the vows you said when you got married were to each other and God – the married life of a Christian couple is different right from the very start. Furthermore, the Bible teaches us that God performs a miracle in our marriages, uniting us together in a covenant relationship with Him as one.

Ecclesiastes 4:12, “Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not easily broken” shows that there is much strength in the marriage of believers; and so, it is critical to put God first throughout and to keep coming back to that, in the good times and bad.

2. Have trust as an absolute cornerstone.

Knowing that you can trust another person unconditionally is incredible comfort and blessing. Trust is the foundation of every strong marriage; a healthy relationship cannot exist without it. Trust is built by being open and honest with your spouse about your feelings, thoughts, and actions and reassuring each other, both verbally and through what you do, that you are each other’s “safe space.”

Trust can be built through being consistent and dependable in simple things, showing that you are true to your word in the small issues as well as big. Trust that has been broken can have a devastating impact on married life, but can be restored over time, provided that both partners are fully committed to building it up again. Trust needs to be constantly nurtured to thrive in a marriage.

3. Know each other’s needs and work to fulfill them.

Men and women function differently and have diverse needs that take priority. A man predominantly needs to feel respected by his wife to have his “love tank” filled; while a woman has an innate need to feel loved and cherished. In addition to gender-specific needs, every person is an individual and has been hardwired with a unique love language.

Often, we find that our spouse’s love language can be completely different from ours, and it takes effort and sacrifice to learn each other’s needs. Author Gary Chapman defines them as quality time, gifts, physical touch, words of affirmation, and acts of service in his popular book “The Five Love Languages.”

Committing to doing this early on in married life can reap much happiness in a relationship, and avoid resentment building up over time through unmet and often completely unrecognized needs.

4. Prioritize and schedule.

We often have great intentions to make our married life happier through spending quality time together, but work and children and distractions get in the way, and before we know it the weeks have flown past, and we wonder why we are feeling estranged from our spouse.

“Date night” is a tried-and-true way to prioritize focused one-on-one time, and this can take the form of any time slot or activity where a husband and wife commit to spending dedicated, uninterrupted time together.

Once it’s been recognized as a priority, it works well to schedule it in each other’s calendars, so that the time is blocked out and treated with the respect and importance that any other meeting or engagement would be. Far too often we (subconsciously) put our spouse at the “bottom of the list,” allowing the rest of life to take priority, but just a few small actions can help us to shift our view and get a proper perspective.

5. Communicate regularly.

Another make-or-break part of married life is communication. How we communicate with our spouse is the most important thing in our marriage as it transcends absolutely everything. Any stress or issue can be sorted out with honest, open, loving communication – the trick is to put aside our pride and natural reactions in favor of serving our spouse with words and responses that put God first.

Some of the tips to improve communication include spending at least twenty to thirty minutes a day speaking to one another and catching up; using “I” statements rather than “you” statements (“I feel sad when…”); being specific rather than using generalizations; avoiding mind-reading; expressing negative feelings constructively; listening without being defensive, and freely expressing positive feelings. All too often we keep those thoughts quiet rather than using the opportunity to affirm our spouse.

6. Fight and forgive.

In a broken world full of sinners, conflict is a guarantee in any close relationship between two people. A married life without any arguments or difference of opinion is unlikely and raises some questions about the true closeness of the marriage. Once again, it’s all about how you argue.

Counselors recommend sticking to the issue rather than making personal character attacks, taking a “time out” if things are getting heated and not heading towards resolution, refusing to enter into a discussion around a thorny issue if it’s past 10 pm, and resisting taking the bait if you know your partner is “pressing certain buttons”.

Of course, it’s easy to know all the strategies to minimize conflict, but the important part is confessing your sin to God and having Him work in your heart so that you can seek peace and offer forgiveness. The opposite of full-blown conflict – not dealing with it at all – is just as toxic, if not more, and it’s critical to be able to fight and forgive in marriage.

7. Keep some part of your independence.

While in the early days of dating and marriage it can be tempting to spend every waking hour with your partner, a happy married life also requires some independence. Partners need to ensure that they have friends that they can confide in, and separate hobbies that they enjoy as individuals and not as a couple (shared hobbies are healthy too). This helps to bring vibrancy into a relationship and prevents it from becoming stale.

8. Don’t neglect sex. 

God created sex to be a unique physical expression of love in marriage. It binds a husband and wife together in a way that no other communication can and strengthens a marriage. Sex can be neglected when life gets busy and isn’t always viewed as a high priority (either by one or both parties).

Counselors often recommend scheduling intimacy, just as one does the weekly date night so that it does not only come on to the agenda when both husband and wife are “in the mood”. It may sound unromantic, but many couples attest to this discipline helping to maintain the sexual side of their married life.

9. Don’t take life too seriously.

In multiple studies into happy couples, the one ingredient that kept coming up was a sense of humor. Life is full of things to be serious about, but if you can ensure that you inject daily laughs into your married life, you’ll be well on your way to a happier future. Remember the laughs that you enjoyed while dating and make a conscious effort to find the funnier side of life together. You may be surprised by how much fun you can have!

10. Get help when you need it.

Marriage is difficult and it’s all too easy to reach an impasse over a certain issue or personal characteristic. When you’re not on the same page in your married life, it’s hard to get a clear perspective and that is where a Biblical counselor can provide enormous value and support.

Don’t struggle along and risk getting to the point where you are simply co-existing, rather than thriving in a marriage that honors God. There is still benefit to counseling, even in instances where only one partner is willing to seek external help.

The quality of one’s married life has a huge effect on one’s overall functioning and ability to be the best version of the person they’ve been made to be. In a happy marriage, each person thrives and there is a virtuous cycle of joy as the commitment is deepened and enriched.

Conversely, being in an unhappy marriage leads to emotional deprivation and stunted growth. If we are married, we need to do everything we can to ensure that we are working towards the former; not only because we want a happy marriage for ourselves and our spouse, but because it is an act of obedience to God.