Marriage Coaching Articles

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Valentine’s Day is just around the corner. Commit to the seven core values of successful love and marriage and you can make your Valentine’s Day the best ever.

Simple Things Matter In Love and Relationships By Dr. Charles D. Schmitz and Dr. Elizabeth A. Schmitzr "the marriage doctors"

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. We have been engaged in marriage research for nearly three decades around the world and have never been asked this question until recently – “Are there words or phrases you listen for when you interview the best marriages around the world?” This is a great question and we are delighted to share the answer with our thousands of loyal readers around the world.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Recently, we discovered a new singing group called Pink Martini. Our daughter put us on to this group several weeks ago so we downloaded them from iTunes. We have been grooving to their sounds ever since! They are utterly delightful and we highly recommend them to you as we have to many others. They reside in Portland, Oregon.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. We believe that Prenuptial Agreements are a bad idea, period! Just imagine, telling someone that you love him or her, but you don't trust them! To us, this is analogous to having two separate checking accounts in a marriage -- one for him and one for her. In both cases it becomes a case of yours and mine. Or, how about this, “I love you with the following conditions.” Whatever happened to US? We? Love without conditions?

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. With our fast paced society and the ever increasing demands of everyday life, more and more couples are finding that negativity is taking over their relationship. An abrupt interject of positivity into a relationship is the only way to change the environment before it is too late. From our three decades of research with successfully married couples, here are the 5 tips for jolting your relationship out of a negative rut:

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. First, here are the facts. If you get married before the age of 24 in the USA, you have a MUCH higher chance of getting divorced than those who get married at 25 and beyond. The divorce rate for those getting married after the age of 25 is about 30% -- less than half the divorce rate for those getting married before the age of 24! This is a very significant difference we think!

Real Love Is Colorblind By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. The romantic 1955 movie, Love is a Many Splendored Thing, tells the story of an American reporter who falls in love with a Eurasian doctor. And as you might have guessed, they encounter prejudice from both of their families. Such prejudice was, unfortunately, all too common in 1955. It is all too common in 2011.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. While times are tougher than normal in the country today, the best marriages and love affairs will sustain the test of tough times for all the right reasons – during good or bad times the best loving relationships find ways to survive and thrive.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. We have said for many years, “Most marriages and relationships can be saved, but not all!” And our corollary has always been – “Most marriages and relationships are worth saving, but not all!” Here’s what we mean. In the case of abuse – sexual, physical, mental – many failing marriages and relationships are simply not worth saving. In fact, to attempt to save them puts one or both partners in the relationship at risk for further abuse. Frankly, we know that some marriages and relationships are not worth saving.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. The Cinderella Story is a wonderful story. It does, indeed, warm the heart. It certainly inspires. Love is always inspiring! But the truth is, it is an idealized version of falling in love that rarely ever approximates the reality or the truth of what love really means – of what love might mean for a lifetime. When young women hear the Cinderella story, they want to believe that their prince charming will sweep in with the wind. And for sure, every young man wants to find his Cinderella – someone to put the glass slippers on.

What Makes Love and Relationships Last? By Dr. Charles D. Schmitz and Dr. Elizabeth Schmitz "the marriage doctors" and Authors of the Book Golden Anniversaries: The Seven Secrets of Successful Marriage (Available at Amazon.com) . We have been saying for years and our 25 years of marriage research proves it – having a successful loving relationship is simple to understand! Yes, simple!

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Like us, we are sure many of you have been following the on-going saga surrounding the so-called “reality” show, Jon & Kate Plus Eight. Well, it seems like Jon and Kate are going to go their separate ways – divorce seems eminent. Ah, but apparently, the show must go on in spite of their impending divorce. Where to begin! As you know, we have been studying successful love, marriage, and relationships for over 25 years.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Tonight, we heard the sounds of love! Over the years we have seen love, felt love, heard about love, observed love, and been in love. But tonight, we heard the sounds of love! We heard love tonight through the magnificent sounds of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra (SLSO), the second oldest symphony orchestra in the United States of America. David Robertson joined the SLSO as its conductor several years ago after a highly successful tenure as Conductor in Lyon, France.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. While we have learned many lessons about great marriages from the thousands of interviews with successfully married couples around the world, we have concluded that what you do in the early stages of your relationship will go a long way towards determining the overall success and longevity of your marriage. Here are the seven most important issues we learned through our research that should be discussed before getting married:

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Prince William and Kate Middleton have dated each other since their days at the University of St. Andrews in England. However, some divorce lawyers say the second-in-line to the throne of England would be “well advised” to seek a prenuptial agreement. Kate was born in Reading, England. We are proud to say we have been there and have interviewed successfully married couples in that fair city.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. In the last several years a great deal has been reported about the purpose of marriage, lamenting the fact that Americans no longer consider children among the most important purposes of marriage.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Dear Friends: Tomorrow, we celebrate our 45th Wedding Anniversary! We got married at the Lutheran Church of the Master on Santa Monica Boulevard in Santa Monica, California in 1966. It is amazing to realize that so many years have passed so quickly! But we will say this to you -- we were lucky to find the love of our life so many years ago. Frankly, we cannot imagine life without each otherrnr

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. We are delighted this week to be in the romantic capitol of the world—Paris, France! We are here on another leg of our endless search for great marriages around the world. First, a few facts about love and marriage in France that you might want to know. In 2012, the French average age for marriage of woman is about 28 and for men it is about 30. The average birth of children to French woman occurs a little under the age of 30.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. You can learn a lot about love from a dog. Over the years, we have learned much about the essentials of a loving relationship by observing our dog, Jake. We are proud to tell you that Jake is truly a Wonder Dog. He is loving, caring, intuitive, intelligent, handsome, and a wonderful friend and companion. Frankly, we love him like a child. And the good news is, he loves us right back! And he loves us unconditionally! Jake is a mixed breed dog – half Golden Retriever and half Yellow Lab. He is a marvelous dog.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. It is said that some 200 million stems of roses will be sold in the USA on Valentine's Day 2011. Imagine that! That’s a lot of expressions of love don’t you think! We Americans love Valentine’s Day. We relish the opportunity to express our love to the one we love, and we do it through multiple venues.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. There are times when we just want to retire to a remote island in the South Pacific! Why, you ask? Simple, really.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. The on-line scams are numerous and recurring. Most of them cost you money. And worse! Just today, someone co-opted a friend of ours by using a fake email address similar to his and sending it to a zillion people asking them to wire him money. According to the fake message, he “had lost his bag with his money, his credit cards, and his passport” in England. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The Purpose of Marriage - Is It To Have Children? By Dr. Charles D. Schmitz and Dr.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Here we go again – interviewing successfully married couples around the world!

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Every once in awhile you meet extraordinary people! We had that great pleasure recently in Long Beach, California. Our lives will never be the same! We looked in the faces of love and saw an extraordinary marriage! We have seen this look before, but this one was very special!

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. The health benefits of marriage, both physical and emotional, have been well documented since the 1850’s when a British epidemiologist by the name of William Farr concluded that the unmarried die “in undue proportion” to those who are married. He offered, "The single individual is more likely to be wrecked on his voyage than the lives joined together in matrimony." We would offer that his conclusions of a century and a half ago still apply today.

By Dr. Charles D. Schmitz and Dr. Elizabeth A. Schmitzr "the marriage doctors"

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. As our loyal readers know, we have been researching successful marriage around the world for nearly three decades. We have travelled to 47 countries on six of the world’s seven continents in search of the best marriages.

Successful Marriage: The Secrets Revealed By Dr. Charles D. Schmitz and Dr. Elizabeth A. Schmitzr "the marriage doctors"

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. All too often in life, people fall in love blindly. They refuse to make note of how the actions of another person define them. They pay too much attention to words and way too little to actions. Here is an undeniable truth about people – actions speak louder than words! We know, you’ve heard this all before! But the truth is, you can, and must, judge a man by his actions and not by his words!

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Hard to imagine. People seemingly happily married for 25 years suddenly and surprisingly seek divorce. At 25+ years, divorce is, in the scheme of things, very unusual. Twenty-five years is a very long time for humans! It comprises about a third of the normal human life. So, how does this happen? Or more succinctly, why is Maria Shriver considering filing for divorce from Arnold Schwarzenegger? Well, it’s really not all that complicated.

Sex, Sex, Sex! By Charles D. Schmitz, Ph.D. Elizabeth A.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Successfully married couples literally trust each other with their lives, their wellbeing, and their sacred honor. The words they use to describe the one they love more often than not include words and expressions like trust, honesty, loyalty, respects me, admires me, always there for me, never lets me down, truthful, and never lies to me. Their trust for each other is about as complete as you can get.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. “You have to walk carefully in the beginning of love; the running across fields into your lover's arms can only come later when you're sure they won't laugh if you trip.” This marvelous quote by Jonathan Carroll is from Outside the Dog Museum.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. In our thousands of interviews around the world over the past three decades, we have discovered many truths. Among these are the warning signs of a failing marriage and relationship. The telltale signs of a relationship going down the tubes are very clear. We want to share them with you because while most marriages are worth saving, there are times when “getting out” of a bad relationship maybe in your best interest!

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. The “heart of the matter” is this – successfully married couples report a high level of satisfaction with the way they communicate. They talk about everything and anything with each other—there are “No Sacred Cows.” Great couples attribute their marital success first and foremost to the fact that they have honed their communication skills over time.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Marriages and relationships fail. Love sometimes ends as the flames of love die out. What started out with so much promise sometimes ends as a disaster. Now the challenge is how to pick yourself up, brush yourself off and start all over again. Here are the five important actions you need to take to avoid repeating the same mistakes from your failed relationship:

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Falling in love with another human being is easy, but making a commitment to love them forever is “up in the air” for many people. We like the term “up in the air” from the movie title for a whole bunch of reasons, primarily because it aptly describes the struggles so many folks go through when it comes to making a commitment to love somebody for a lifetime.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. You can learn a lot about love from a dog. Over the years, we have learned much about the essentials of a loving relationship by observing our dogs. We are proud to tell you that our Louie is truly a Wonder Dog. He is loving, caring, intuitive, intelligent, handsome, and a wonderful friend and companion. Frankly, we love him like a child. And the good news is, he loves us right back! And he loves us unconditionally!

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. As we prepared for the work of the day this morning it dawned on us while watching a television show – there is a lot of bad advice about marriage and relationships in the popular media today. We watched these so-called “experts” wax on about what they believed to be “truisms” about love and marriage and the more we listened the more appalled we became about what we were hearing. Understand, we are very tolerant people. We are accepting of the opinions of most everyone.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Let’s face it, holiday lights help put you in the spirit of the season. Like the holiday lights, the people you love and who love you light up your life. “Oh, there’s no place like home for the holidays,rn‘Cause no matter how far away you roam, When you pine for the sunshine of a friendly gaze, For the holidays, you can’t beat home, sweet home.”

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Every once in awhile you meet extraordinary people! We had that great pleasure recently in Long Beach, California. Our lives will never be the same! We looked in the faces of love and saw an extraordinary marriage! We have seen this look before, but this one was very special!

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. We are often asked this question – “Is arguing healthy for a marriage?” The simple answer is, “Yes!” When a husband and wife argue, they are engaging in a perfectly normal and expected part of what it means to be married. In fact, disagreement between two people in love is actually healthy for their relationship. To argue or not argue is NOT the question! The question should be, “How do we argue effectively and fairly?”

Happily Ever After: It Can Happen To You! By Dr. Charles D. Schmitz and Dr. Elizabeth Schmitz "the marriage doctors"

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. Okay, we are madly in love after all these years! We have been married for nearly 46 years and we cannot imagine life without each other. We are each other’s constant companions and wouldn’t want it any other way! But we must admit, we often think about “all the lonely people” who are, in their advanced age, all alone. They have no one with whom to share their days and nights with. Worse yet, no one to share their advancing age with.

By Dr. Charles D. Schmitz and Dr. Elizabeth A. Schmitzr "the marriage doctors"

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. WENN News reported that Madonna gave one piece of advice to the couple who got engaged during her recent Amsterdam concert. Madonna’s advice was, “ Never go to bed angry.” She just gave the couple the best advice possible. This is the same advice we have heard from thousands of successfully married couples who have lived on all seven continents of the world.

By America’s #1 Love and Marriage Experts. This week, we are on another one of our “love excursions!” As marriage researchers and writers (We have be engaged in this work for nearly three decades now!), we absolutely love to travel around the world and interview successfully married couples.