By Peggy Ferguson

There may be more to marital happiness than the anticipated ingredients of love, respect, honesty, and faithfulness.

But what does that really mean? Even with the desired relationships and partner characteristics of love, respect, honest, commitment, and faithfulness, one or both partners are unhappy in the relationship. What does it take for a marriage to be a happy one?

A missing ingredient may be “meaningful interaction”. While couples may be spending time with each other routinely, most couples neglect to nurture their relationship regularly. When both parties are feeling important, loved, and secure in the relationship, active attention to the relationship may not feel important. It becomes more important as one or both partners do not “feel” loved or important to the other. The need for active engagement and nurturance of the relationship is apparent when a partner complains that they “do not communicate” and do not spend enough “quality” time together

They often already know the problem and presumably how to fix it, but cannot seem to get started with enacting their solution. One of the stumbling blocks to being able to effectively bridge the gap and nurture the relationship is that each individual has made some attempts in his or her own individual way, but felt discouraged when it did not receive the desired response or effect. Each has different communication goals and expectations. They have different ways that they want to be shown love. Their ideas about what they want communicated are different. And there is great diversity in what “quality time together” means.

Attempts to solve the problem fail as one or both partners set out to fix the situation by giving to the partner what s/he wants from communication or time together. Since the partners want something other than what is being given, they stay frustrated. They are frustrated not only about still not getting what they are wanting but also about trying and not having their efforts recognized by the partner.

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