Our Love Maps

Have you ever thought what you can do to better your love life? One of my favorite authors is Dr. Gottman! He gives such amazing advice on how to have a lasting and loving relationship. One of the things that he talks about is building your love map. Dr. Gottman uses this term to describe the part of your brain where you keep all the relevant information about your partner's life. It is so important that you have a friendship in your marriage. You need to be constantly learning about your partner so you can have that solid foundation. You need that strong foundation, especially whens things get rocky. Gottman talks a lot of about we can DO to help build our love map. I am not married, but I am dating someone right now and although things are still pretty new, I am excited to do some of the exercises together with him so that we can continue to build a stronger relationship with each other. Some of these exercises include asking about your partner their favorite things, or their hopes and fears. Questions that range from getting to know you to really deep questions. It is SO important to keep that flame alive.  When big changes happen during our happen (which they will), we will be better equipped to deal with them if we have that strong friendship and the ins and outs of our partners life. 


We also need to 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. Brother Christensen once said,"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‘Ceaseless pinpricking,’ as President Spencer W. Kimball called it, can deflate almost any marriage. … Generally each of us is painfully aware of our weaknesses, and we don’t need frequent reminders. 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 offer as constructive criticism is actually destructive”. I think it is so important that we do not focus so much on our partner’s faults, but rather their positive. 
By doing these simple things, we will be able to help give our marriage a lasting chance!

Sources:The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work By Dr. Gottman