The Secrets of Couples Whose Chance of Divorce is Very Low
I don't believe anyone should go into marriage believing that nothing could ever destroy their love and their marriage.
It's an unrealistic expectation.
Relationships can be complex, and we just don't know the challenges that life may bring us.
But there are things that if people know they can increase their odds significantly of having a happy and successful marriage.
What am I talking about? Here's an example.
From the 2006 State of Our Unions Report, "If you are a reasonably well-educated person with a decent income, come from an intact family and are religious, and marry after age 25 without having a child first, your chances of divorce are very low indeed.
" There are factors in life we have no control over, and they don't have to doom us.
A person can come from a broken home and have a successful marriage.
I tell couples in premarital counseling to talk about marriages they know that have failed, what went wrong and how they can keep from the same mistakes.
But there are other factors that we can control than can greatly increase our chances of marital happiness.
For example, getting married too young is one the leading predictors of divorce.
What's the best age to get married? Everything else being equal, the optimal age is around the mid 20's.
You're old enough that you've matured.
Beyond that age, you get firmly established in your single lifestyle and it's a little more of a challenge to merge lives with another person.
Let's take this another direction.
It's proven that couples who learn certain marriage skills and principles are much more likely to have a long and happy marriage than those that don't.
John Gottman, a popular marriage expect, can predict with a 91% rate of accuracy whether a particular couple will divorce or not.
There are certain communication patterns that so predictable, that if she says something in a certain way, he will react in a very predictable way.
And if he reacts that way, she'll counter in a predictable way.
If they are negative interactions, it spirals downward to an evitable result.
The failure of the marriage.
If there are things that don't work, you learn not to those things.
And you learn the ones that do work.
PREPARE is a premarital inventory that many counselors and ministers use.
It can predict with an 80% accuracy rate which couples will ultimately divorce.
10% of those who take it, break their engagements.
That is a painful thing.
But much better not to enter a marriage that already has 2 strikes against it.
And here's some of the good news about marriage today.
There are more resources and opportunities to learn the skills of marriage today than you'd ever have time for.
Glenn Stanton, who compiled years of research in a report called Family Formation Trends, said that we have better information and more resources to make marriage work now than ever.
Do you have to enter into a marriage believing you've got as good of a chance of failing as you do succeeding? Only if you are lazy! There's plenty of help out there so that you can get great start on your marriage.
It's an unrealistic expectation.
Relationships can be complex, and we just don't know the challenges that life may bring us.
But there are things that if people know they can increase their odds significantly of having a happy and successful marriage.
What am I talking about? Here's an example.
From the 2006 State of Our Unions Report, "If you are a reasonably well-educated person with a decent income, come from an intact family and are religious, and marry after age 25 without having a child first, your chances of divorce are very low indeed.
" There are factors in life we have no control over, and they don't have to doom us.
A person can come from a broken home and have a successful marriage.
I tell couples in premarital counseling to talk about marriages they know that have failed, what went wrong and how they can keep from the same mistakes.
But there are other factors that we can control than can greatly increase our chances of marital happiness.
For example, getting married too young is one the leading predictors of divorce.
What's the best age to get married? Everything else being equal, the optimal age is around the mid 20's.
You're old enough that you've matured.
Beyond that age, you get firmly established in your single lifestyle and it's a little more of a challenge to merge lives with another person.
Let's take this another direction.
It's proven that couples who learn certain marriage skills and principles are much more likely to have a long and happy marriage than those that don't.
John Gottman, a popular marriage expect, can predict with a 91% rate of accuracy whether a particular couple will divorce or not.
There are certain communication patterns that so predictable, that if she says something in a certain way, he will react in a very predictable way.
And if he reacts that way, she'll counter in a predictable way.
If they are negative interactions, it spirals downward to an evitable result.
The failure of the marriage.
If there are things that don't work, you learn not to those things.
And you learn the ones that do work.
PREPARE is a premarital inventory that many counselors and ministers use.
It can predict with an 80% accuracy rate which couples will ultimately divorce.
10% of those who take it, break their engagements.
That is a painful thing.
But much better not to enter a marriage that already has 2 strikes against it.
And here's some of the good news about marriage today.
There are more resources and opportunities to learn the skills of marriage today than you'd ever have time for.
Glenn Stanton, who compiled years of research in a report called Family Formation Trends, said that we have better information and more resources to make marriage work now than ever.
Do you have to enter into a marriage believing you've got as good of a chance of failing as you do succeeding? Only if you are lazy! There's plenty of help out there so that you can get great start on your marriage.
Source...