Marriage Review – Evaluating the Good and Bad in Your Marriage

40ish year old couple on the sofa

Each year, at tax time, couples sit down and itemize every aspect of their financial picture. In fact, it’s not uncommon for people to analyze and review their financial situation monthly or quarterly, taking proactive measures to improve whenever possible. Your employer does the same thing during your annual review. Even your children’s school sets aside regular times throughout the year to monitor progress, allowing you to address any issues before they become problems. Human beings spend a lot of time in review mode, from something as simple as landscaping to something as complex as retirement. Yet, few engage in or even consider having an annual marriage review to logically dissect the good and bad of their marriage or formulate a plan to make it better. Sadly, marriage reviews often don’t happen until you’re sitting across from each other in a lawyer’s office, waiting to divide assets and children. It makes you wonder—why don’t we spend more time reviewing one of the most important relationships in our lives?

The Benefits of an Annual Marriage Review

For a marriage review to be effective, both partners would need to set aside their feelings and resentments so that issues could be discussed with level heads. In other words, each couple could write a few bullet points under “needs improvement,” and just because “sex life” is listed doesn’t mean anyone should get their feelings hurt or cast blame. It would need to be approached with a business mindset, which, in many ways, a marriage is. Additionally, the review process should have clear structure and direction, just like any other review. Perhaps a form containing a series of questions, true/false statements, and essay-style responses would be a good way to conduct the review. It may even be helpful to find a neutral party to act as a mediator in case either partner allows emotions to influence the discussion.

The goal would be to create a plan for your marriage that makes each year better than the last. One of the chief complaints in marriages is that each person no longer feels they can communicate with their partner. A marriage review could help bridge that gap. And in fairness, each partner would have the opportunity to address things that are important to them. For example, if the husband feels frustrated because his wife gained a few pounds or spends too much money, he can bring it up during the review. Meanwhile, she could express how his beer belly and lack of foreplay are issues for her. The point of the review would be similar to any other review—identifying issues and creating a plan for resolution. You could even include a rating system, ranking the most important aspects of your marriage on a scale of 1–10. Categories might include financial stability, division of housework, childcare, sex life, communication, general happiness, and more.

Another essential aspect of the marriage review would be to establish a plan for change in the coming years. As people and relationships evolve over time, it makes sense that your goals would change as well. What was important to your marriage five years ago might no longer be relevant today. By holding an annual marriage review, both partners could reinvent the relationship and discuss new goals to keep it moving forward. Just like in a job review, where your boss might offer you a raise or new responsibilities, a marital review could raise the bar for success in your marriage.

The most beneficial aspect of a marriage review is that it gives you the chance not only to critique but also to compliment. Both partners could have an open forum to affirm the areas of their marriage that are working well. You would have the opportunity to praise each other and receive praise in return, fostering feelings of gratitude for the partner you have. Focusing on the positives should actually be part of the review. Listing areas for improvement should be done with a solution-oriented mindset rather than a nagging tone. After all, if you can succeed as a team in many areas, you can use that same energy to work together toward achieving any goal.

It’s obvious that it would be difficult to avoid hurting your partner’s feelings—or having your own feelings hurt—during a marriage review. But grow up! You’re not going to like everything you hear. However, as long as the purpose of the review is to improve the marriage, it’s better to hear things honestly than to not hear them at all. Moreover, problems are easier to solve when they haven’t been festering for a decade or more. Conducting the review annually can help ensure your marriage doesn’t suffer from pent-up emotions or unresolved resentment.

Most people spend more time planning their wedding than they do thinking about how to make a marriage work. But the truth is, hosting an annual, honest, open marriage review could be one of the best things you do for your family. Marriage takes work, and often, two people become so entangled in responsibilities and emotions that they don’t take the time to assess the good, the bad, and the ugly of their relationship until it’s far too late. Sure, it might be a hard review to sit through. But instead of thinking of it as something you pass or fail, think of it as an opportunity to strengthen your marital bonds and help avoid divorce. After all, that’s what you meant when you took your vows.

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