I've been thinking. When a marriage is sour what can you do to sweeten it up or can it be done?

I've tried so many things over the years to make or should I say create a pleasant marriage. Two different people with way different perspectives with way different life experiences with way different ways of handling things. How can this work? So far, in my marriage it's a constant struggle. We communicate so completely differently that it's near impossible to even think of getting along.

I go to church, I read books on the subject, I research on the subject, I read articles published by the church on the subject, but I still am at a loss at how or what can be done or can it really be done.

In the April Conference 1995, Elder Joe J. Christensen of the Presidency of the Seventy's talk said,
"Marriage and the Great Plan of Happiness"

Now I'm thinking he's saying that marriage is part of the plan of HAPPINESS. Lucky him. His wife must be a doll. I don't see really that HAPPINESS is truly obtainable for most folks.

So, here's some of his advice in a nutshell.

1. Remember the central importance of marriage.
"There is nothing in this world as important as the creation and perfection of family units."

2. Pray for the success of your marriage.
Elder Kimball (at the time) shared this wise counsel:

"Well, don't just pray to marry the one you love. Instead, pray to love the one you marry."

3. Listen.
Make the time to listen to your spouse; even schedule it regularly. Visit with each other and assess how you are doing as a marriage partner.

4. Avoid "ceaseless pinpricking"
Don't be too critical of each other's faults. Recognize that none of us is perfect. We all have a long way to go to become as Christlike as our leaders have urged us to become.

Few people have ever changed for the better as a result of constant criticism or nagging. If we are not careful, some of what we off as constructive criticism is actually destructive.

5. Keep your courtship alive.
Make time to do things together----just the two of you. As important as it is to be with the children as a family, you need regular weekly time alone together. Scheduling it will let your children know that you feel that your marriage is so important that you need to nurture it.

That takes commitment, planning, and scheduling. It doesn't have to be costly. The time together is the most important element.

6. Be quick to say, "I'm sorry."
As hard as it is to form the words, be swift to say, "I apologize, and please forgive me," even though you are not the one who is totally at fault.

True love is developed by those who are willing to readily admit personal mistakes and offenses.

7. Learn to live within your means.
The time may have come to get out the scissors and your credit cards and perform what Elder Holland called some "plastic surgery"

8. Be a true partner in home and family responsibilities.
The task of caring for home and family is more than one person's responsibility.
Remember that you are in this partnership together.

Okay, that's all good advice we have all heard it before in one way or another. So, seriously when a marriage is sour can anything really be done to sweeten it up?

1. Remember the central importance of marriage.
So, what if you're at the point where you don't care about the importance of marriage with the person you're with. What if you're at the point that I'd rather throw it away and try someone new. Does that work for most people?
I've stayed married because I've been repeatedly told how important marriage is. I've stayed married for the children because they say divorce is detrimental to them. I've stayed married because the experts say that most people bring their problems into the next marriage, and the next marriage really isn't much different than the first - just different people - different problems, not necessarily better, just different.
So, if you couldn't pick the right mate for yourself the first time who says you'll be able to pick the right person the next time. Is it just luck? So, is it worth the family break-down for a lucky break? Gamblers do it all the time, some get lucky but at what expense? Most don't get lucky at all, they have just complicated their original problem. So, if I don't have much conviction on marriage anymore how can I replace it with conviction? Or is that luck as well.

2. Pray for its success.
Now, here's the pessimist in me. I feel that when you pray for something, especially something specific, then all the trials come and additional patience is required. So, why pray if it appears to get far worse?

3. Listen.
Seriously, do men ever listen? I think they put up with, tolerate, or just plain wait til your done, the whole while tuned out to what you said or the meaning behind what you said. I have tried this listening thing and really listening to what is said, not what I think they are saying or relating it to what is meant by my own experience. I'll admit it's mostly with my children. My spouse doesn't talk much about relationships, if an when he talks at all, its about his interests in deer hunting, hiking, flint-knapping, or now it's cage fighting. I'm so not interested in those things so out of fairness I don't listen much. So, we don't talk much about much. I say things all the time about what I'm thinking, my opinion about stuff which is nearly everything, and my struggles with our relationship which I'm convinced he could care less about, so, that's a problem for us both.

4. Avoid "ceaseless pinpricking."
Now this seems to me directed strictly towards women because I think a lot of us are good at pinpricking. Now in our defense it's because we have to raise children and we are to guide and direct them. So, because we have to guide children when we turn to our spouses we guide them, which generally isn't positive because positive doesn't stand out because it feels good what stands out is the negative because it feels so bad. So nagging, pinpricking or whatever you want to call it, is just an attempt to make the unpleasantness to stop. Unfortunately, in my experience it never stops, so, the reminding of the unpleasantness continues and the unpleasantness continues because I'm reminding I don't like it. Endless cycle.

5. Keep your courtship alive.
Okay. . . . . . .dating, I was told once that doing things that once interested the both of you is a good way to rekindle those old feelings. Well, I tried that it's fine and all, but if you don't like your spouse much what's the incentive to do activities with them. I've tried dating with him, lately going to the movies is fun for me because I've liked the movie itself. But the last couple of movies have reminded me how unsatisfying my relationship is. I know, I know, you're thinking movies are dream land type life scenarios, but with knowing that I still came away crying wishing that my relationship resembled even a little more like the love story I just watched.

6. Be quick to say "I'm sorry"
Yes. . . . totally good advice. My problem is that I don't feel I'm wrong very often, well, to be honest I hardly ever think I'm wrong. So, I guess I need this the most. I've worked at saying I'm sorry to my children more often lately, but I'm still real clumsy at it. Maybe if recognizing that being sorry for contributing to the conflict, or understanding the personality defect that causes the regular problems would be a good reason to say sorry and mean it. Tee-hee-hee. No seriously. I think there is something to feeling or being sorry for the imperfections (I guess this is the repentance part) and what those imperfections do negatively to your relationship is a good start to improving the down swings to the relationship. Huummmmmm

7. Learn to live within your means.
Well, this is pretty much self explanatory. But from experience if you can live well within your current means when the economy tanks it won't have as big an affect on your life. Sometimes even if you've planned well bad things still happen. But I think that all that practice of living within your means helps in the process of restructuring when the bad times hit. Maybe the hit won't be as hard for you.

8. Be a true partner in home and family responsibilities.
Now ladies, we all know that men don't really do a whole lot around the house. Any woman who lucks out and gets a man that is observant and thoughtful and willing to actually pitch in more is one lucky lady. (I'd like to meet her). For the rest of us, we basically are the ones who do the majority of the housework, (in my case the yard work too), laundry, child rearing, grocery shopping, cooking, bookkeeping, tax prep, bill paying, decorating, homework, chore charts, planning and carrying out Family Home Evening - family activities - family prayer - family scripture study, making sure everyone is ready for church and trying to get them there on time (real hard to do when you can't find the shoes for the little one, again), the list goes on and on; so, pretty much we do a mountain of work and they, weellllll, don't do as much of that stuff. They plan to play - golf or raft or hike or hunt or fish or sports or four-wheel or or or or or; but when it comes to planning a date with his "sweetheart" his brain turns into goo and he all of a sudden can't remember a thing.

So, what do you do? More just thinking another time.