Relationship Problems - Marriage Self-Help

Facing relationship problems in your marriage? Learn practical solutions to improve communication, resolve conflict, and rebuild a stronger, healthier relationship.

Fix a Broken Marriage

The quality of your life depends on the health of your relationship.

Build Confidence with Healthy Self-esteem

Be the best you.

Fix a Broken Marriage

The quality of your life depends on the health of your relationship!

Do something: Fix a broken marriage or committed relationship, the quality of your life depends on this. If you are in a conflict with your partner, it will affect you even when you are away from each other. If you have children, they too will be disturbed by the conflict in your relationship.

Relationship success is a science. You will have a great marriage or committed relationship when you follow specific guidelines. This does not mean everything will always go smoothly. Rather, there will be love, respect, and trust between you and your partner. These positive feelings will prevail over the occasional disagreement or disappointment.

Build a passionate marriage with my store’s online marriage counseling tools. I have carefully crafted each book with the knowledge I gained from years of clinical experience as a professional marriage therapist. Couples in successful relationships solve their problems and enjoy a healthy, happy, and long-lasting marriage or committed relationship.

Do nothing: You remain in a painful relationship and you will continue to experience loneliness, anger, rejection, and disrespect. Your miserable situation will probably become even worse over time.

If you have children, they will suffer right along with you! If you have serious relationship problems and you choose to do nothing, unfortunately, you will live a compromised life for many years. The saddest part is that you could have changed all of this and made yourself better if you had known how and made an effort to do so.

I encourage you to find the courage to fix your broken marriage or committed relationship. Even working alone, you can make great strides in repairing and building a healthy marriage or committed relationship.

Stop Anger

Live in peace!

Do something: Anger is love’s poison. Anger and love cannot exist together. It is a fact— if you want a peaceful and happy relationship, anger cannot be present. Most marriages fail because of anger, not because of different opinions, money, chemistry, etc., and other reasons, that most people assume.

When there is anger in a relationship, there is no respect, love, understanding, sensitivity, and intimacy. These are some of the compelling reasons to take a audio course in anger management so you can keep this destructive emotion from destroying your relationship.

Learn how to stay calm in all situations and build a healthy, happy, and long-lasting marriage.

Do nothing: There is the danger that your relationship will fail because of the anger. Anger has many faces. Anger includes shouting, sarcasm, deliberately not talking or cooperating, and making threats. Anger is the primary tool of disrespect, hate, emotional abuse, and domestic violence. None of this bad behavior belongs in a civilized home. However, if you accept anger in your home, it will be a sad legacy you leave your children and others, including yourself.

If you ‘accept’ anger in your relationship, you will live in misery, perhaps bring the police into your home to stop aggression, and may even end up divorced. If you choose to live with each other despite the ongoing anger, you will end up hating each other.

What a way to live each day of your life! I encourage you to learn anger management. Thousands of people have learned how to stay calm in situations that previously would have made them angry. You too, can learn this skill.

Defeat Depression

Happiness is a birthright!

Do something: Improve your emotional health by reducing or eliminating circumstantial depression and sadness. The majority of individuals unintentionally depress themselves. Negative thinking and unrealistic expectations doom them to gloomy feelings.

The idea of a ‘chemical imbalance’ is an unproven assertion fostered by the pharmaceutical industry as the cause of circumstantial sadness. Certainly, some people who suffer from circumstantial depression and sadness benefit from medication. However, at best it is a temporary solution. A better solution is learning how to properly manage your life.

Learn how to develop healthy thoughts and feelings so you feel good about yourself and your future. Your valued relationship with your partner also suffers when you are depressed and sad. No one likes to be around negative and depressed people. Transforming your feelings of sadness into feelings of contentment and happiness is important to the health of your marriage or committed relationship.

Do nothing: If you just ‘live’ with depression you are dooming yourself to unnecessary unhappiness and placing great stress on your marriage. Emotional attractiveness is just as important as physical attractiveness. Being depressed, which often leads to anger and moodiness, is emotionally ugly.

Your husband or wife will not want to be in your company when you are sad, depressed, and gloomy. As well, depressed individuals can’t enjoy a healthy sex life.

A sexless marriage puts your relationship at risk of many relationship ailments such as infidelity and divorce. I encourage you to seek effective treatments for your circumstantial depression and sadness.

Build Confidence with a
Healthy Self-esteem

Be the best you!

Do something: Feeling confident and strong is an inner feeling, and it is dependent on having healthy self-esteem. When you feel strong and empowered you are prepared to be an equal with your partner and others. Also, good relationships are built on respect. When your self-esteem is strong, you will not accept disrespect or abuse.

A person with healthy self-esteem will not tolerate abuse and instead will either fix the broken relationship or end it. When you take the position that ‘respect’ is not negotiable, you will be doing your part to contribute to a healthy, happy, and long-lasting marriage or committed relationship.

Do nothing: Having low self-esteem and lacking confidence will cause you emotional pain and will also contribute to you living in an unhealthy marriage or committed relationship. Often the difference between a victim of abuse and a person who does not accept abuse is the strength of his or her self-esteem.

Living with low self-esteem puts you at risk for depression, anxiety, and others taking advantage of you. Many emotional illnesses are rooted in low self-esteem. I encourage you to seek solutions to raise your low self-esteem.

Learn to Be Assertive

Get what is rightfully yours!

Do something: Being assertive is an essential life skill. When you know how to be assertive, you can advocate for yourself and more easily get your needs met. When you are assertive, you will have the emotional strength to be a positive contributor to your marriage or committed relationship.

When you are assertive, you can communicate effectively and interact with your partner in a healthy way. Behaving assertively will reduce the likelihood of anger, anxiety, and depression and will make you a more positive person whom your partner will enjoy spending more time with.

Do nothing: If you are not assertive, you are either aggressive or passive. Both of these character traits put you at risk for relationship breakdown. Passive individuals cannot communicate effectively and honestly, which causes frustration for both themselves and their partners. Aggressive individuals ruin their relationships with anger and revenge, leaving their partner feeling angry and resentful.

Living without the skills needed to be assertive is like using a car without engine oil. The engine will overheat, seize, and stop working. The same is true in a marriage or committed relationship lacking healthy assertiveness skills. The relationship will break down and come to a halt, leaving both partners polarized and lonely. As well, at the root of most depression and anxiety is a ‘passive’ lifestyle. Learning to be assertive is easy.

I have witnessed many people who have learned assertiveness skills which significantly upgrade their feelings of self-worth, improving their valued relationships at home and work. If you need help, I encourage you to get practical information on how to be assertive.

Learn to Relax

Relaxation is the key to health!

Do something: Knowing how to relax is a skill everyone can learn. Relaxation is essential to your physical and mental health. Ask any doctor, and he or she will tell you every disease is made worse by stress.

When you are relaxed, you are pleasant to be around. When you are tense, others will avoid you… especially your partner.

If you need help learning to let go of stress and how to hold on to peace, tranquility, and calmness, you have come to the right place. With our self-help books for men and women, you can learn simple and basic life skills that will upgrade the quality of your life and make your relationship with your partner more enjoyable.

Do nothing: Accepting stress as part of your busy lifestyle will cause you many unpleasant and even dangerous problems. Stress will predispose you to disease and relationship conflict.

When you emote negative energy, your partner will find you uncomfortable to be around and if he or she is also tense, there will be an increase in anger, negative judgments, and unpleasant interactions. As well, living with chronic tension will adversely affect your mental, emotional, and physical health.

There is nothing good about excessive stress! If you find yourself stressed often, I encourage you to seek ways to reduce the stress and live a much healthier and happier lifestyle.

Optimism

Expect the best!

Do something: When you are optimistic, you will feel much better about the circumstances in which you live. When you are optimistic, everything will seem easier to achieve and easier to overcome. When you look for the ‘positives’ in your life and you anticipate that good will happen in the future, you are automatically more pleasant to be around.

With a positive outlook, you will spread positive vibes to those around you, and they will seek your company. Marriages and committed relationships work when they are pleasant. No one can force you or your partner to spend time together or stay together.

The decision to be a functioning couple belongs to the two of you. When you are optimistic and upbeat, and your partner is likewise, you will naturally want to spend abundant time together. Spending time together as a couple is the starting point for building a passionate and loving marriage or committed relationship.

Do nothing: If you are a ‘negative person,’ you are unpleasant to be around which includes being around yourself. You will not be happy even when you are alone. Being negative is a definite relationship killer! Negativity also kills all positive self-feelings.

Without a positive mental attitude, life cannot be enjoyed! Being pessimistic is similar to bad body odor. It will repel all those who want to get close and spend time with you. Even you won’t want to spend time with yourself! If you just live your life as a negative person, you may very likely find yourself alone and isolated.

It may be possible you will attract another negative person into your life. However, as you probably know regarding the poles of magnets, ‘two negatives repel.’ You may hang together, but you will both be devoid of fun and happiness and it will probably not last long.

What do they say, “Misery likes company?” Is being a black hole the best you can be? If needed, get help to be a positive person.

Happiness

It’s a choice!

Do something: True, some people are naturally happy. If you are one of those people, you are fortunate and can stop reading. For the rest of you, you need to learn how to choose happiness and make ‘happiness’ a habit. Unhappy people are just that. Unhappy!

Sadly, unhappy people squander away life’s many opportunities to live a good life. I have seen many people who have acquired the happiness habit and upgraded the quality of their lives, and so can you!

Research has shown that we are naturally attracted to happy people. Who do people like to go to? A crying baby or a smiling and laughing one? The same is true for adults. No one wants to be around a sad and negative person.

Having a good marriage or committed relationship requires that you and your partner enjoy being with each other. Whether it is shopping together or making love… you must spend quality time together. ‘Happiness’ is the attraction energy that keeps both of you coming back for more.

Keep happiness strong. Your relationship will flourish and you will have a passionate marriage or committed relationship to enjoy for many years.

Do nothing: If you just accept being sad, grumpy, and unpleasant to be around, the obvious will happen… no one will want to be around you. You won’t even want to be around yourself! Your partner will want to end the relationship and just might end it. Simply, no one likes to be around unhappy people.

Having a depressed demeanor, unable to laugh or see humor in life will doom you to a life of loneliness. Sad, yes — but you are not a victim; rather you have done this to yourself! Just giving in to whatever negative experiences have happened to you and not realizing the importance of or trying to make an effort to be happy will probably be the defining characteristic of your life.

Due to your ‘unhappiness,’ everything else in your life will be negatively affected. For example, the quality of your relationship with your partner, your success at work, and your personal experience as you live your life. Even wealthy and privileged individuals can live miserable lives… and they often do (some even commit suicide).

Happiness and sadness transcend material wealth and personal circumstances. Let’s go… be happy… and see where it takes you! Need help? There are resources to help you learn the skills you need to be happy.

Be a Good Parent

It is best for your children and you!

Do something: The reason to be a good parent is obvious. Your son or daughter has only one childhood, and if you mess it up, it can never be recovered. Equally important, is that a child’s early years are the foundation for his or her adulthood.

Being a good parent ensures a good childhood and increases the likelihood that your son or daughter will grow into a successful teen and adult.

Many marriages or committed relationships are destroyed by arguing and fighting over how to parent. When this happens, it is a disaster for both parents and children. Good parenting is good not only for children, but it is also good for your relationship with your partner.

Do nothing: Bad parenting is one of the worst things anyone can do for many reasons. First and foremost, your children will be injured by this. Next, your marriage or committed relationship will be damaged. And if this isn’t enough, typically bad parenting causes children to grow up to be rude and rowdy and this of course causes problems when they become teens and adults.

Ignoring parenting problems is like ignoring a second-floor pipe that is leaking — doing so can cause huge damage to your home. Bad parenting also leads to major problems for your children, you, and your family.

If you are having parenting problems, please…. please… don’t ignore them. Get the help you need by reading books or consulting with others who are knowledgeable about how to be a good parent.

Learn to Stop Worrying

Live with peace of mind!

Do something: Most worrying serves no purpose. Worrying does not solve problems or make you feel better. Worrying does take away any positive feelings you may have about yourself, others, and life. In other words, ‘worrying’ is extremely dysfunctional in all ways.

When you worry and feel strong anxieties, you do not want to be around others, and others do not want to be around you. Worrying is a relationship killer! Worrying kills positive feelings between two people, communication, and all types of intimacy.

True, it is human nature to worry. However, that does not mean you cannot and should not try to regulate it or even eliminate it. With the correct effort, many people have learned how to reduce their worry, eliminate anxiety, and panic attacks, and go on to enjoy a relatively carefree life. With the right effort, so can you! Your mind is a very powerful organ in your body — put it to use to create ‘peace of mind’ and a happy life.

Do nothing: If you let worry and anxiety overtake your life, you may become an emotional cripple. Without dealing with the problem, worry can easily slip into anxiety and then depression. When this happens, you will feel helpless and hopeless. Naturally, your marriage or committed relationship will suffer. You will find yourself isolated, and others will avoid you.

People don’t like to be around a person who ‘can’t stop worrying’ and has a fearful expression on his or her face. If worrying and anxiety continue for months, it can eventually reshape your personality.

One day you will discover you are a different person… a person who does not know how to have fun and enjoy life. If you worry excessively, there is a lot you can do to reduce or eliminate it. I encourage you to find the help you need to rid yourself of anxiety.

Motivation to Lose Weight

Be healthy and increase romance!

Do something: There are many diets available to help you lose weight. Most of these diets are good! However, there is one missing ingredient… and this is the ‘willpower’ needed to stick with the particular diet of your choice. When you are unable to stick to your diet, the results are obvious! You will grow wider and wider!

On the other hand, when you acquire the tools needed to stay committed to the diet of your choice, you will become slim and trim and stay that way.

If you want to feel your best, then you need to be in control of your weight. Your self-esteem and relationship popularity — right or wrong— depends on how you look. Many relationships have an unspoken problem. It is such a sensitive topic that it is rarely raised!

Here it is: Being overweight kills sexual desire. A sexless marriage is a marriage of disaster. Romance, love, and sex are closely intertwined. Remove one of the three, and your marriage may be on the rocks. On the other hand, being physically healthy and attractive is a great aphrodisiac to ensure that both you and your partner are attracted to each other and that you will find together many enriching moments.

Do nothing: I know, how a person appears is a personal matter, and we should not be judged by our appearance. I agree with you, and I wish it were this way, but it is not! So the facts are, whether you like them or not, your partner will be influenced by how he or she sees your body.

If you let yourself go, regardless of your explanation of why it happened, your marriage or committed relationship will take a nosedive. Being physically unattractive to your partner will lead to less or no sex, which will then lead to less or no connection between the two of you. Eventually, you will find yourself alone and lonely, even though you may be a wonderful person with a great personality.

Research has demonstrated that in all aspects of our lives, how we appear to others strongly influences how they relate to us. This is true regarding your partner as well! Get trim… get healthy… and be attractive. It is worth the effort

Stop Emotional Abuse

Living with dignity is a human right!

Do something: Understanding you are being abused is the first step to freeing yourself. You need to know the truth of your situation, that your abuse— be it emotional abuse, verbal abuse, or psychological abuse—is completely wrong, that it is not your fault, and that it needs to stop. Knowing that in all situations all types of abuse are wrong, you can then design a plan to stop the emotional abuse by either correcting your relationship or abandoning it.

Staying in an abusive marriage or committed relationship should not be an acceptable option. (If you are being physically or sexually assaulted, you must go outside your relationship to get help from appropriate professionals such as the police, therapists, and doctors.) Don’t put your head in the sand and pretend emotional abuse, verbal abuse, or psychological abuse is not happening. To do so will only allow your dangerous situation to get worse and cause more injury to you and your children if you have them.

Learn everything you can about abuse so you can free yourself and live with dignity and respect — with or without your current partner.

Do nothing: Freedom, dignity, and respect are a human right. If you allow yourself to be emotionally abused, verbally abused, or psychologically abused, all of these rights are stripped away. If you do nothing to stop the abuse, you have become your abuser’s prisoner! When emotional abuse is allowed to exist over an extended period, it will erode your self-esteem and confidence. You may even begin to believe that you have done something wrong that justifies your partner abusing you. In effect, you will now have been brainwashed to believe your abusive partner’s lies!

Don’t let this happen to you. Don’t let someone destroy your life. Don’t live in fear! It is your birthright to be free and happy! Make it happen- stop the abuse. Emotional abuse, verbal abuse, and psychological abuse are harmful and inexcusable. In many cases, when it is allowed to continue, it can progress to domestic violence. Tragically, many people are killed by their partners. Get help and stop the abuse — regardless of what kind.

Be Emotionally Mature

Successful relationships require this!

Do something: Selfishness, insensitivity, anger, and stubbornness are all signs of emotional immaturity. All of these bad character traits will eventually destroy a committed relationship. No one can be happy and comfortable with a person of bad character.

The good news is character can be shaped for the positive. Exposed to the right information and the right people, it is possible to ‘speed up’ emotional growth. One of the unique characteristics of humankind is the ability to change. This human resource, the ability to change, can be used to improve one’s relationship IQ and thereby increase the likelihood of a successful marriage and committed relationship.

Personal growth is for everyone. And the more we evolve as human beings, the healthier our relationships will be.

Do nothing: Not everyone has the emotional maturity and good character traits necessary to succeed in a committed relationship. Immature individuals ruin their marriages and committed relationships and then suffer because they are now divorced and alone.

If you do nothing about this serious relationship deficit, your relationship will be an unhappy one and may eventually end in divorce. Being successful in a relationship requires skills that only mature people have.

Don’t let your relationship go down the drain because you or your partner lacks emotional maturity and relationship common sense. Seek help. It is there if you look for it.

Heal from Infidelity

Trust and love depend on this.

Do something: If your relationship has been hit with infidelity, you must undergo a rigorous recovery process to regain trust, security, and love. There are many good resources that you can access that will help you rebuild your marriage or committed relationship. Infidelity needn’t kill your marriage or committed relationship.

You can recover should you and your partner choose to, and it may even be possible to get closer and happier than ever before. Infidelity cannot be buried. It needs to be put front and center in your lives for an extended period until it naturally exits. Many couples require the assistance of a skilled and caring relationship specialist to help with the recovery journey.

Do nothing: Infidelity shatters trust, security, and love. Without ‘specific and consistent efforts’ to heal from this relationship wound, the negative effects of infidelity will never go away. It is natural for people to avoid pain. Whether it is physical, emotional, or mental.

Unfortunately, it is very common after infidelity has occurred and the screaming and crying subsided, to just forget about everything. Doing so is a grave mistake. Doing so leaves your relationship broken forever. Relationship trust, love, and security will never fully return. Like an infection that is allowed to exist under the skin that then spreads to the rest of the body, so too, infidelity if left untreated will spread relationship poison to every part of your marriage or committed relationship.

If you have been struck by infidelity, get the help you need. Don’t let cheating by your partner become a relationship death sentence.

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