What if you had only one day to change something in the way you did things or else your marriage would suffer irreversible damage? What if your spouse were considering giving up on you or wanted to find something exciting outside the marriage?
Or, what if you were feeling this way and your spouse could see it in you?
What if your children were at risk of losing their one and only chance to grow up in a loving, unbroken home and today was the last day you had to find a way to start turning things around in your marriage?
What would you do?
Free resources
You don't have to spend a fortune. In fact, you don't have to spend anything at all.
Visit one of the websites and find something--anything you think shows some promise of helping you improve your marriage and begin doing that immediately. Then watch for results.
If that helps a little or a lot, get good at it, and when you've mastered that skill, pick up another skill. And it doesn't have to be painful or miserable. Sometimes what helps the most initially is that which is most fun, but not necessarily. Sometimes it takes a little effort and faith and hope and strength just to make a change for the best, then endure patiently for awhile before the first signs of change will show up.
Non-Free Resources
Don't buy the notion that the more you pay the more you'll get. It's not how much you pay that matters, but whether you get started or not. You can buy and read books and ebooks all day year after year and still lose your marriage. I lost mine.
And I have to stop here and say I know. I lost my first marriage. By that fact alone, I should be very humble and know you and everyone else has every right to ask what I am doing here. If I could not save my own first marriage, then what business do I have making suggestions how others might save theirs?
Truth is, I have no qualifications. I don't have a degree in counseling. I am not a psychiatrist or psychologist. I am not a licensed counselor. And my first wife dumped me for another man. Based on that, I am about as unqualified as a person could be. And it is only by the grace of God that I am now in a great marriage with a very honorable, godly, loving, faithful, trustworthy woman of my dreams, and our marriage is better than I ever thought a marriage could be.
Maybe some will say it is because I studied marriage so hard for so many years trying to save my first marriage. And it would be great if I could capitalize on that and say, "Yes, here, buy the same books I bought." Truth is, I read many books on marriage and being a great husband and father long before I was married. I watched other successful families with great marriages and great children and hoped to model my life somewhat after them.
Hard Truth: No Guarantees
The hard truth that is difficult to accept is that there are no honest guarantees. Yes, the e-book sellers and others can promise to return your money if you buy something and it doesn't help save your marriage. But, saving marriages involves freedom to choose. And you cannot hold yourself responsible for the choices someone else makes. You will make your choices and your spouse will make his or her choices.
But, that does not mean we cannot learn to persuade better. And it does not mean we are helpless to learn good relationship skills that may actually help us save our marriages. But, whether your marriage is saved or not, the relationship skills you learn will help you tremendously in your relationships at home, with your children, with your parents, with your siblings, your friends, your coworkers, your bosses and your employees. And in the end, there is no way you can lose or be worse off studying marriage saving books.
Although I lost my first marriage ten years ago, I still benefited from all I read. I am now married to a more faithful, more loving, more sincere, more honest, more trustworthy, more godly woman who has never abused me or cursed at me or threatened to break up with me. And our relationship, our marriage, is much better than I thought a marriage could ever be.
Furthermore, since I have experienced both a good marriage and a bad one, I can empathize with those who have gone through the agony of betrayal and abuse and the extraordinary pain of family court injustice. And I know with all my heart that is something I would never want other people to have to suffer through.
Backpeddling: Yes Guarantees
I have to take back what I said because I see now that even if there are no guarantees that your marriage will be saved since you cannot make choices for other people, you also are guaranteed your freedom to make your own choices, too. And you can make great choices!
You can study and make an effort to be the best you can be, even if there is no promise of an immediate reward for it. Even so, if the very worst happens and your spouse leaves and your whole family and your church and friends all betray you at once, which is pretty close to impossible, nobody can make you be less that your best. Your past failures don't say anything about who you are. Only your current behavior and attitude and skills you have worked to obtain.
And if your spouse chooses to turn you away, you can make sure your spouse has turned away the very best.
So, how many books should you get?
As many as you want. As many as you can read, understand, grow from, benefit from, and put to use in your life.
The whole thing is to make life better, to have a dream, a purpose, and to know in your heart that no divorce, no rejection, no trial, no tribulation can reduce you to less than your purpose in God's eyes. He will give you the grace. In fact, He has already given you all the grace that you need, and all you need is faith, hope, love, drive, courage, and the will to take the first step. The second step comes easier.
If you will look for the signs that things are getting better, if you will look for signs that what you are doing is making a difference, if you will savor what you learn, what you read, what you observe in life, and cherish it so much it becomes part of you, then you can become so irresistable to your spouse and to others around you that your life is certain to get better!
And if in the end your marriage still breaks apart, you will know you did your best and that the person you lost was perhaps not so faithful, not so honorable, not so beneficial to you and your family. And if your spouse stays, then you'll be able to live with more confidence and have what it takes to make the best of your marriage and your family.
So, there is a guarantee--not that things will go perfectly or that all will go well, but that you can make a positive difference, and just as some choices are in your spouse's hands, some choices are in yours, too!
God Bless you,
Dan and Eileen Dick
founders of NoDivorces.com
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