You realize your marriage is deteriorating, now there are a variety of relationship issues that you have to address, and maybe you wonder where you should start. A suggestion: look in the mirror – when you decide to devote efforts to save your marriage, you need to start with changing yourself.
Understandably, at this point, you may have the question “Why should I be the first one to change? He/she also needs to change at the same time. Otherwise, it is unfair.” In this situation, you should be aware of one thing – you are the only one who wants to save the marriage now, and your spouse is willing to quit the relationship; so it is up to you – surely, you can choose to play the role of the victim, and just stomp your feet and complain about how unfair it is, but it is of no avail; anyway, the choice is yours.
When it comes to how to change yourself to save your marriage, first, you should avoid trapping yourself into feeling stuck; you need to adopt a growth mindset – everyone has a capacity for growth and change in a relationship, but many times we forget it easily.
If you decide to try to change yourself to save the marriage, you might follow the simple guidelines below:
(1) Recognize the fact that there are a lot of things that you can change and that you have a great capacity for improvement, change, and growth, regardless of the current relationship status.
(2) Reflect upon those things your spouse has talked about; you might write down several recurring issues or themes that he/she keeps naming as problems. By the way, don’t add “yeah, but…” when writing down those controversial things that your spouse has emphasized. Just accept that maybe those things are true, and write them down in a plain manner.
(3) Reflect upon those places where you often trip up in your married life. For instance, those can be patterns that seem to constantly repeat themselves; don’t miss them because those patterns reflect how you react and respond to relationship problems automatically; in other words, they reveal places that do not work well for relationship development; so add them to your list.
(4) Reflect upon the list. Unavoidably, there are some issues that you simply disagree about, don’t deny them, mark them with a red line, and don’t scribble them out no matter how annoying they are; after you give an honest account of those annoying issues, you might return to them later, then see whether they are true and ask yourself whether you would like to admit them.
(5) Make a list of what you are going to do to change each of those issues. And if you become confused about where to start when facing a variety of problems that are urgent to be solved, tell yourself that anywhere is better than nowhere. And just try to do everything step by step.
(6) Make it a habit to reflect upon what you want to be for your spouse, as well as what you have done to get there. Remember, don’t be a procrastinator when you feel the need to do something. On the other hand, a significant change takes time and effort, so on the way to recreating yourself, you must have patience with yourself.
(7) Allow some room for your “relapses”. It is impossible to turn yourself around overnight. Like diseases, you may have a relapse while you are working hard to reform yourself. So it takes some time inevitably. And as long as you commit to changing yourself to improve the relationship, one day you will be glad that you have become someone better.
(8) Don’t try to demonstrate to your spouse that you have changed. Remember, trying to prove something will only make your spouse feel that you are acting. So, just let nature take its course; as long as you keep trying to improve yourself, sooner or later, your spouse can sense your change.
(9) Last but not least, working on yourself never means that you can ignore the tough relationship piece. While working on yourself, you should also try to discover what you can do to transform the relationship. Many times, changing yourself and changing the relationship are two things that you can do synchronously.
While giving your spouse your best, you should also try to see the best in your spouse:
Maybe, you have already launched into a list of problems that your spouse has. And when you are keen on highlighting the worst part of your spouse, probably you have neglected to bring out his/her great qualities and your shortcomings, so you don’t take a rounded view of the relationship strengths and weaknesses.
If you often think about your spouse, “What a jerk”, probably you have missed all those good qualities of your spouse that ever attracted you at the beginning of the relationship. To be clear, your spouse must have places where he/she needs to learn and grow. This is not the problem; the problem is that you get caught up in seeing the bad part of your spouse and ignoring the other part. What if you flip it? What if you spend most of the time finding your spouse’s good qualities and strengths? What if you try to be supportive instead of being critical of your spouse? So, when you wonder how to change yourself to save your marriage, you might try to modify the biased view of your spouse.
Anyway, you can choose your attitude:
Amid a relationship crisis, we often lose our natural attitude and become something we are not; even we may not realize it throughout the process. Anyway, it is possible to correct this. More exactly, you should learn to choose your attitude when facing a marital crisis; otherwise, a negative, ego-centric, short-sighted, or incorrect attitude will choose you. A correct choice in attitude can lead you to patience, understanding, respect, love, creativity, hopefulness…
When it comes to how to change yourself to save your marriage, you should be open to adopting the positive attitudes below:
- An attitude of forgiveness:
You can choose to adopt an attitude of forgiveness, and let your spouse “off the hook” for his/her small faults and transgressions simply. Surely, it does not mean you should forget major issues; forgiveness is not about forgetting, but it is not allowing the unpleasant past to hold you emotionally hostage any longer – more specifically, it is letting the past go and discontinuing carrying the emotional baggage from the past. And many times, it is small issues that inflict strong damage to a long-term relationship; as the daily “slights” build up, you see your spouse as despicable.
For more tips on how to let go of resentment and anger in marriage, you might go on to read the posts below:
How to deal with resentment in your marriage – Reduce resentment.
How to manage anger in marriage – Deal with your & your spouse’s anger.
- An attitude of civility:
In your love relationship, you should obey a golden rule anytime (even more so when your marriage runs into difficulty): treat your spouse the way you would like to be treated. If you would not like to be yelled at by your spouse, don’t yell at him/her first. If you want to be treated lovingly, you should treat your spouse lovingly first; so remember what you have done to your spouse regularly, and ask yourself whether you have always been civil with your spouse.
- An attitude of acceptance:
Treat your spouse as a teammate instead of a kid that you can control, and accept your spouse for who he/she is. More specifically, give up attempts to transform your spouse according to what you desire; and remind yourself to stop being controlling in your marriage.
- An attitude of respect:
After you live intimately with your spouse for a long time, maybe you start to see him/her at his/her weakest level. Maybe, your attention focuses on the weak sides of your spouse, and hence you lose sight of the outstanding sides of your spouse; in essence, such an attitude means you lose respect for your spouse. But what if you choose to extend respect for your spouse by focusing on his/her strengths, gifts, and quirkiness? That may revolutionize your relationship.
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In addition to choosing positive attitudes, you should also pay attention to your communication patterns that may affect the connection between you and your spouse.
The following highlights 3 major communication patterns that you should improve:
- Resist complaining:
An adult’s endless complaining seems to be like a child’s behavior; and the more you complain, the more your spouse wants to distance himself/herself from you. If you are unhappy about a relationship issue, you need to have a serious discussion with your spouse. Maybe, for your spouse, nothing is more off-putting than constantly hearing your complaints.
To effectively stop complaining, you might follow the 6 easy principles below:
(1) Nourish a positive attitude: sometimes you can’t change things, but you always can change the way you think about them.
(2) Learn to adapt: accept that nothing stays the same in your life.
(3) Be less judgmental.
(4) Be more mindful of the consequences.
(5) Be assertive and spell out exactly how you feel.
(6) Be responsible for your actions.
- Listen:
When your spouse speaks, don’t try to interrupt. Your spouse has the right to express freely. And you can hardly know his/her perception if you are too busy defending your own and always want to have the last word. Probably, your spouse also badly wants to feel heard by you. So while he/she is speaking to you, try to give your spouse undivided attention; for example, you might put down your phone and turn off the TV. To recover intimacy, both sides need to take time to connect genuinely, so your listening is an important part of mutual connection and understanding.
- Give your spouse space when necessary:
Your spouse needs some alone time when the marriage is on the rocks. So if your spouse looks thoughtful and unhappy, take notice of it, don’t interrupt him/her, and just respect his/her space; in this situation, it is nonproductive to try to start a conversation. In doing so, you give your spouse space to take responsibility for what he/she is feeling. Furthermore, in response to your spouse’s pulling away, pulling away a little is also a good tactic to get him/her to talk later.
For more tips on how to improve communication with your spouse, you might go on to read the posts below:
4 annoying habits that cause communication barriers in marriage.
How to have effective communication in marriage.
The final word:
Probably your spouse has emotionally checked out of the marriage, but as long as you are sure that you do not want to end the marriage easily, now is not the time to retreat and give in to the sadness, doubt, frustration, and fear; of course, it is indeed a tough task to concentrate on making yourself the person you want to be; after all, it covers a wide range of aspects; and even probably you have to completely reframe your perspective on your marriage, your spouse, and your choices; anyway, it makes sense to you whatever the outcome is.
If you want to get more expert advice about how to change yourself to save your marriage, you might go on to watch the video below to follow the comprehensive guidance that is offered by Brad Browning, a marriage coach with 12+ years of experience helping couples survive their difficult marriages:
Maybe, you are also interested in the related posts below:
What to do when your marriage seems hopeless – Save your marriage.
What to do when your spouse wants to leave you – Save your marriage.
8 tips on marriage reconciliation after separation – Survive the separation.
How to stop divorce and save your marriage – 7 marriage saving tips.
What should you do when your marriage is on the rocks?
4 basic tips on how to get through a rough patch in a marriage.