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The Not So Excellent Wife

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There’s No Such Thing As a Perfect Marriage

There’s No Such Thing As a Perfect Marriage

Last updated on: December 20, 2019 at 12:51 pm by Sheila Qualls

There’s No Such Thing As a Perfect Marriage 2019-12-20T12:51:13-06:00 Sheila Qualls

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how can i have a great marriage When I wanted people to think my marriage was perfect, I was miserable.

What looked perfect on the outside was a mess on the inside. I compared my marriage to other people’s marriages and thought, “How can I have a great marriage, too?” Everyone else’s marriage seemed prefect.

I learned the secret to a perfect marriage: There are none.

When you see a marriage that looks perfect what you’re really seeing is the result of hard work and commitment.

But I let my idea of what I thought a great marriage should be mess up my perfectly good marriage.

The more I compared my husband and marriage to other people’s, the worse mine seemed.

Marriage wasn’t the fairytale I’d dreamed of.

We’d argue and make up and argue and make up. Soon we were doing more arguing than making up.

He wasn’t living up to my standard.

Do you have a similar problem?

Your husband is not the man you thought he was. You’re unhappy.

As I began to learn skills to fix my marriage, I discovered I was letting my idea of what I thought an ideal husband should be blind me to what the great husband I had.

Here’s what I learned about great marriages

Is he perfect? No.

The lesson is: You can have a really good marriage with a less that perfect man.

No matter who you’re married to, you’re still going to disagree. You’re still going to do things that irritate each other. You’re going to hurt each other’s feelings.

Women initiate about 70 percent of divorces. Usually for the kinds of reasons I’m talking about.

He isn’t the man you thought he was so you’re unhappy.

That alone is not divorce-worthy.

You loved him that way when you married him. So what’s changed?

Perhaps your perspective has changed.

You can adjust your perspective

In my case, some days I couldn’t stand to look at him. The way he walked bugged me. The way he ate made me cringe. I hated his laugh, and at night when he snored I considered smothering him with a pillow to shut him up.

Instead of focusing on the problems and looking for a way out, take an inventory of your thoughts.

1. Does the good outweigh the bad?

2. Is my focus on his flaws or his strengths?

3. How is comparing my husband and marriage to someone else’s making me unhappy?

4. How can I change my marriage by changing my attitude?

5. Just because he doesn’t behave as I think he should doesn’t mean he doesn’t love me.

Sometimes we can spend too much time focusing on his flaws and forget the reasons we married him.

We forget what we actually liked about him.

Are you in a hard place in your marriage? Are you thinking exiting would be the easy way out?

A lot of women have perfectly good marriages but make the mistake of comparing their husband to someone else’s.

Don’t let your idealistic expectations of what you think a husband is supposed to be –based on unrealistic expectations–mess up your great marriage.

Don’t expect him or your relationship to be perfect.

My marriage is far from being a fairy tale and sometimes my husband still gets on my nerves. I might even I bug him every now and then, too.

I recognize him for what he is, in spite of his flaws. A great man who loves me, takes care of me, values me and I wouldn’t trade him for anyone.

Need skills to build intimacy?

Get on the waitlist for my next group coaching session–Change Your Mind; Change Your Marriage.
Visit my website, like my Facebook page and join my private Facebook group.
Check out my FREE resources and download “How to Be A Wife No Man Will Ever Want to Leave” Challenge!
Apply for private coaching with Sheila.

Subscribe to updates from The Not So Excellent Wife here!

Also known as the Not So Excellent Wife, Sheila Qualls understands how tiring a tough marriage can be.

She went from the brink of divorce to having a thriving marriage by translating timeless truths into practical skills. She’s helped women just like you turn their men into the husbands they want.

After 33 years of marriage, she’s a coach and a speaker whose passion is to equip women to break relationship-stifling habits and do marriage God’s way. And you don’t have to be a doormat to do it.

In addition to more than 33 years of marriage, Sheila has a Masters Degree in Communication and countless hours of mentoring and coaching women.

She and her husband Kendall live in Minnesota with their five children and their Black Lab, Largo.

In addition to coaching, Sheila is a member of the MOPS Speaker Network. Her work has been featured on the MOPS Blog, The Upper Room, Grown and Flown, Scary Mommy, Beliefnet, Candidly Christian, Crosswalk.com, The Mighty and on various other sites on the Internet.

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