God Knows Marriage Isn’t Always Easy
By Maureen Rogers and Lanny Law

Introduction

Having a healthy marriage is one of life’s greatest blessings.

In a thriving marriage, wife and husband are energized and can withstand just about any circumstances they face. As they move through life, each is blessed with a special companion, a best friend, a lover, a confidant—someone who calls forth from them all that is best in who they are.

However, other couples feel imprisoned in unhappy marriages. Despair, anger, fear, anxiety, and hatred fester. When a couple is living an unhappy marriage their growth is stifled, both collectively and individually. Their energies are drained away in bitter recriminations, and they have difficulty facing the challenges of life. Instead of the marriage making life easier and more rewarding, the relationship is destructive and only makes life more difficult.

For most of us, our marriages go along smoothly enough between these two extremes. We deal with the challenges of marriage the best ways we know how, realizing that we could do better and sure that we could do much worse. Getting married, staying married, and becoming happily married is a journey that may have detours, roadblocks, and breakdowns, so most of us stay aware that we can learn other ways to enrich our relationship.

God Knows Marriage Isn’t Always Easy: 12 Ways to Add Zest is a helpful guide of twelve ways for couples to work out some of the simple and not-so-simple roadblocks that crop up in any marriage. In our work as psychotherapists, we have helped others—not to mention ourselves—use these twelve ways to improve their relationships. Sometimes when people get discouraged about the state of their marriage a friendly dose of stories, insightful words, and well-timed guidelines can rekindle the sparks of their relationship. We hope that the ideas and stories in this book can encourage you to improve your own marriage.