What’s even better for your relationship than a date night?
The short answer: a marriage meeting to discuss the logistics of life.
Now, this doesn’t seem very romantic, does it? But it’s magic.
In this episode, we’ll talk about:
- What a marriage meeting is and how it will reduce your relationship conflict in a big way
- How “Fly-by” communication isn’t effective for your relationship and creates resentment between you and your partner
- Why having a dedicated communication space is good for the partner and lover aspects of your relationship
Reduce relationship conflict with a marriage meeting
When you’re married, you share a life with your partner.
This means you share a front door and a toilet. Everyone who enters your home is also entering your partner’s home. All the nitty-gritty of life you want to flush away impacts your partner and your relationship.
When you and your partner don’t communicate well, these responsibilities can take you by surprise.
Weren’t you supposed to be here to meet the plumber?
I thought your mother wasn’t coming into town until next week.
Surprises cause resentment to build
How many times have you had the “Oh, I didn’t know that,” argument?
Surprises set us up for conflict. Busy life causes simple communication breakdowns because details slip through the cracks. But these tiny conflicts cause you to resent your partner.
Resentment is the enemy of sexual chemistry.
So how can you stop arguments?
A marriage meeting is your place to address these kinds of issues before they become a problem.
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Be kind to your partner and schedule a marriage meeting
Do you let your partner know about important things that are going on as they’re walking out the door or busy with some other task? Do they do the same to you?
“Hey, by the way, our friends invited us over for dinner tomorrow night.”
When we try to grab moments like this to plan logics, we are demanding our partner attend to our timing. This causes frustration and resentment to build.
This is why a marriage meeting is so important. Carve out an intentional time when you can sit down and figure out the logistics of your life. How would your life be different if you knew you had a predictable time to talk about whose turn it is to clean the bathroom or who’s in charge of making dinner?
When you have a dedicated, safe space to do this, you show up better. Then you’re able to create order in the chaos of those “fly-by” requests that annoy you.
It’s awkward at first. But your marriage meetings will get easier
The first marriage meeting I had with my husband, I put too many things on the agenda and we ended up just having a planned argument.
Take time to figure out the right flow for you and your partner. Keep it ridiculously simple at first.
Try to make the agenda small enough so that you have a guaranteed win.
The important thing is that you have a space to communicate with your partner. You’re making the invisible details visible. Tangible. Then you can talk about your shared life.
When you have marriage meetings with your partner, you stop having hidden expectations and you start to feel like teammates.
Date Night Discussion
This week come up with a list of topics you would like to discuss at your marriage meeting.
But here’s a warning: don’t try to cover everything at once. Start with the most important discussion and work you way up to the others as you get more marriage meetings under your belt.
Here’s some ideas of what you could put on your list:
- Chores
- Home repairs
- Meal planning
- Childcare
- Calendaring
- Planning vacations
- Finances
- Sex
For those of you who already have consistent marriage meetings with you partner, here are some graduate-level marriage meeting topics to visit annually:
- Career and ambitions
- Your bucket lists
A marriage meeting is good for the partner and lover aspects of your relationship
A marriage meeting makes the partner side of your relationship easier. But, it also helps the lover side of your relationship thrive.
The biggest threat to your sex life in a long term relationship is the niggling details of life that cause low-grade resentments.
When you’re able to figure out the logistics of life in your marriage meeting, you have more capacity to be a good lover to your partner.
Try this:
Invite your partner to have a marriage meeting.
If this is difficult for you, use a script to help ask your partner for what you want.
Here’s some scripts you can use to invite your partner to have a marriage meeting:
- If you think your partner will be game for the idea:
“I think we could benefit if we sat down and had a marriage meeting on a regular basis. I like the idea of being able to talk about the logistics that cause us conflict. Would you be wiling to sit down with me on _______and talk about some of those logistics?”
- If you’re not sure how your sweetheart will react to the idea of a marriage meeting:
“Could we pick a time to sit down and talk about the details of life? I feel like life is so fast paced and if we had a regular time to sit down, we would be able to stay caught up on plans and make sure we’re on the same page. This feels better to me than getting mad at each other when the expectations aren’t clear.”
- If you’re pretty sure your sweetheart DOES NOT want to participate in a marriage meeting:
“I have a couple things I want to chat with you about, and I want us each to be in a good headspace. Could you sit down with me on _______?”
After you have your conversation, say “Hey, this worked out well for me. Do you think we could do it again next week?” And just keep asking until it becomes a habit.
How about you?
I want to know how your first marriage meeting goes. Or if you’re already having marriage meetings with your partner, how do you keep them consistent?
Text me at 970-210-4480 and let me know.
Want to stop arguing and start connecting with your spouse? This FREE e-course will offer you habits to improve your marriage communication so you can smile more and fight less. Sign up to improve marriage communication.
