There are many marriage building tips and secrets out there, but not all of them are effective. Fortunately, we’ve gathered together some of the best ones into one easy guide so that you don’t have to worry about where to start when it comes to creating and keeping a successful relationship with your significant other.

In this article, we’ll take you through some tips on how to keep your relationship strong as well as how to avoid common pitfalls in your marriage building process. It can be an exciting time in your life, but it can also be overwhelming at times if you aren’t prepared!

Try New Things

In order to keep your marriage fun and exciting, you need to make an effort to try new things together for marriage building. It might be scary at first, but if you stick with it, there are bound to be plenty of laughs along with some great memories. And who knows? You might end up finding that doing new things together brings you closer together instead of driving a wedge between you.

Spend time together

There’s only so much you can do to build your relationship from afar. You need to see each other face-to-face—and be with each other—to really get things back on track. Even if your relationship is long distance, or separated by work or parenthood, carve out at least 30 minutes each day where you’re talking about things that matter, says Gottman.

And make sure it doesn’t happen when either of you are distracted. Turn off TVs, devices and newspapers; disconnect from email. Put away your reading materials—your spouse should be the center of attention!

Give each other space

One of the worst things you can do in your marriage is smothering each other. This not only breeds resentment, but it also removes space from your relationship that could be used to build it up stronger. So give each other space, even when you’re out of town on business.

Let them talk to their friends without fear of judgment or recrimination, and encourage them to work on themselves as well (something we’ll get into later). Also know how to compromise: Sure, compromise doesn’t sound like much fun; however, just because one partner wants something done a certain way doesn’t mean that they always get their way.

Learn from your mistakes

When you’re just starting out in life, it’s easy to think of marriage as something that will come naturally; a part of growing up. However, without first taking some time to consider what makes for a good relationship and how best to keep your significant other happy over time, there’s really no telling what sort of mistakes you could make along the way.

Learning from your mistakes isn’t always pleasant, but it can save you tons of heartache in relationships if you pay attention early on. It may seem like an overblown do as I say and not as I do type advice, but it’s important to recognize where your actions contradict your goals in relationships—it may be easier than you think!

Stop comparing yourself to others

Any time you start to compare yourself to others, remind yourself that your situation is specific and no two are alike. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t look at other people’s results to help inspire you—you just can’t obsess over them. (A good alternative is using comparative stats such as benchmarks.) At gurulex.com we’ve developed a simple three-question self-check:

1) What are my goals?

2) Am I keeping my eyes on them?

3) Am I taking action every day toward those goals? If you have a solid foundation in place, comparing your life to someone else’s will only help motivate you; otherwise it’s completely useless.

Go on date nights

When issues come up in your marriage, talk through them before they get out of hand. The last thing you want is to dig yourself into a hole that becomes increasingly difficult to crawl out of.

You don’t have to tackle everything at once or even make any big changes right away. All that matters is talking it out, assessing where you are and what you can do next—and then taking small steps together.

When you combine efforts with your partner, chances are good that whatever obstacles you may face will be less daunting than they seem if approached alone. Don’t keep problems hidden until they grow too big to handle; with open communication, there’s no such thing as too small for discussion!

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