6 Important Practices For the First Year of Marriage

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“They say the 1st year is the hardest, but when you married your best friend nothing could be easier” – Kate Posh

By now, your honeymoon has passed and the long-term journey of your marriage has begun. Chances are you have already had some ups and downs during the first part of your union. You might be frightened, nervous, and worried that you didn’t make the right choice. But the more important thing is your willingness to grow, learn and improve on this journey ahead of you.

The foundation that you lay during the first year of marriage is essential to the long-term success of the relationship. Learning about your marriage, developing new relationship skills, and putting those skills into practice are all critical to your future. The desire to grow as a couple is a great building block. These practices will help you move together in happiness.

Here are six important practices to start doing now so that your marriage will be set for life.

Laugh Daily

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You have most certainly heard the expression “Laughter is the best medicine” and a similar sentiment is found in scripture, too. Proverbs 17:22 states, “a cheerful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit saps a person’s strength.” You can take this advice and put it towards your marriage. While it may sound like an oversimplification, couples that laugh together and have fun with each other will have a more meaningful connection. Marriage isn’t the easiest of relationships to maintain, which is why fun and laughter are important in order to release stress and pain. It will help keep your marriage grounded and remind you of why you chose to marry this person. Be a couple that has a goal to smile with each other each day, and you will be happier together.

Celebrate Differences

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In the first year of marriage you may begin to realize you married someone who feels completely different from you. That’s totally OK and no reason to be worried. The key factor isn’t how different your spouse is from you, but how you choose to handle those differences.

Many will try to change their spouse, which is a selfish decision. God made us all different for a reason, and wants us to accept others for who they are. Look inward and try to understand why you want to change them. Learn instead to try and appreciate the differences you two have. Learning to respect their differences will lead to embracing them fully. If you are having trouble, ask yourself the following questions:

What first attracted you to your spouse and then began to bug you? How are you doing with that difference now?
What makes respecting differences or even embracing them difficult for you to do?
Which of the differences between you and your spouse do you especially appreciate?

Fight Fear

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Fights are going to happen in marriage because conflict is inevitable. Unfortunately, we are not perfect human beings and we are going to do and say things that hurt our spouses. They, too, will hurt us. Learning how to deal with conflict is incredibly important in the first year of marriage.

When our spouse hurts us, fear (of rejection, disconnection, unhappiness, and the like) is awakened in us. When our fears are brought to the surface, we are more likely to respond and act negatively as a defense to protect ourselves. This further creates additional conflict and disconnection. Ask yourself, what fear is awakened in you when you fight with your spouse? Whatever it is, you will want to learn how to handle your fear and communicate with your spouse in a more positive manner. Just as Jesus forgave us for our sins, we then have to forgive our spouse for theirs.

Slow Down

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Getting ready for a wedding can be a crazy process, especially if you have a honeymoon right after or are planning to move somewhere new. The stress of it all can really take a toll on your new marriage. Stress will attack your marriage by dampening the quality of your communication and emotional connection with your spouse. Stress can even cause the best of marriages to drift, which makes slowing down in life an important lesson to learn. Couples that are choosing to be over-worked and busy will find themselves struggling. Instead, learn how to say “no” more. You do not have to take on every task that is presented to you. Say no not only to people, but also to clutter, your phone, the computer, your job, or whatever it may be that is stealing too much of your time. In addition, consider starting the 1 percent rule. This rule states giving 1 percent of each day to your spouse, which equates to about 15 minutes. That means giving 15 minutes of completely interrupted, focused, and active attention to your spouse.

Keep Your Promise

There is no such thing as a perfect, pain-free marriage and that knowledge should help give you the confidence to move forward with your spouse each day. When we marry our spouse, we are creating a promise to them that we will be with them to the end. It is an incredible profession for two people to make to each other in front of God. During the first year of marriage, you might find yourself worried and scared about the future. When this happens, look at your marriage vows and break them down. What parts of it are you still doing well on, and which ones are you slacking on? Have open conversations with your spouse about the importance of the promise you made together and areas you want to improve on so that you can keep your promises.