A successful marriage is a fluid partnership that requires making long and short-term decisions together as a team.A successful marriage is a fluid partnership that requires making long and short-term decisions together as a team. Since no two people think exactly alike on everything, that means that negotiation and positive compromise are imperative within a solid union. Such as, you might think your son should focus solely on sports as an outside interest, while your wife wants to balance sports with artistic endeavors like learning an instrument. A negotiated compromise is needed.
However, there are key areas within a marriage when compromising would lead to negative results and we need to stand firm to our beliefs. Let’s take a look at three of those critical times.
1. Core Values/Faith
This is the very essence of who you are as a person. Your sense of right/wrong, decency, and fairness. If you’re a person of faith, those core values are anchored to the foundation of a higher power and aren’t in your power to change. Early in my own marriage when my spiritual foundation wasn’t nearly as strong, I’d suggest things to my wife that seemed fun to me but she would refuse for just this very reason. Going along would have compromised her entire belief structure. I learned from and greatly admired her unwillingness to bend to me, and her strength enabled me to better myself as a man. To properly lead a family, we have to be rock solid at our core.
2. Our Self-Worth
Marriage is complicated in that there are times when one has to take a backseat to the other in order for the bigger picture to be successfully fulfilled. That type of positive compromise should never be allowed to diminish the self-worth of the person putting themselves second for the betterment of their family. Next to cheating and money woes, this is the area where many marriages hit the skids. I understand this better than most men because my wife is a highly successful businesswoman. It would have not only been cruel of me to stand in the way of her hard work and destiny, but I would have been a fool to allow pride to keep our family from the blessings her talent has given. My self-worth was never diminished because I refused to allow envy of her success keep me from my own. It has all worked out as beautifully as we could have ever dreamed. Believe in yourself, and believe in each other.
3. Life Goals and Dreams
These are the things that truly matter to us individually and as couples. Partners should be completely supportive of each other in this regard, and fully onboard with progressing those goals of the marriage. Successful outcomes require planning, commitment, and sacrifice. For instance, I’ve mentioned the support given by me to my wife, and she gives me the exact same in return for the creative ways I lead our family where it’s going. We did not compromise to appease the other but instead pooled our talents to achieve the best possible outcomes. Still to come are the goals and dreams we have for our later years, and to those, there will be no compromising.
Huddle up with your kids and ask, “What is something you have compromised on?”