The main belief behind The Simple Marriage Project - life is choice. Therefore I choose to:

1. Grow deeper Spiritually
2. Live simply and passionately
3. Experience a marriage fully alive
4. Live in community with others

Please come on in and make yourself at home in our little fellowship. For more popular posts, refer to the top ten on the right and/or check out the bottom section.

If you’ve been living under a rock for the past year, you may not have heard of Zen Habits. If you’ve logged on to the Internet within the past year, then without a doubt you’ve heard of Leo Babauta.

Not only is Leo behind the incredibly successful blog Zen Habits (over 60K subscribers), he launched Write To Done (a blog for writers) earlier this year as well as Web Warrior Tools (an e-book publishing venture).

Today I am pleased to present an interview Simple Marriages had with Leo and his wife Eva. Hope you enjoy.

Q: Brief bio data:

Leo and Eva Babauta, of Zen Habits, have been married for five years and have a total of 6 kids (only the two youngest kids we had together). He’s a full-time blogger and former journalist, and she’s a teacher who is currently homeschooling three of the kids. They live on Guam. Leo is 35 and Eva is 31.

Q: How have you and your spouse simplified marriage effectively?

Marriage, for us, has never been a complicated thing. We’re two pretty unassuming people who just really like to spend time together. Our two main focuses in our marriage are simple: spend as much time doing things with the kids as possible, and always schedule time that we can spend together, alone as a couple. We like to exercise together and go on dates — usually a dinner and a movie or something like that.

Q: How do you find harmony in marriage, parenting, work, blogging, fun?

We try to stay on the same page and work together as a team in everything we do. So in parenting, we’ll talk over all our decisions and try to work together as parents, so we don’t have conflicting efforts. We solve problems together, so we agree on the solutions. We consult each other on any major career decisions, and support the other in what he or she wants to do. Eva has always been supportive of my blogging, and I owe her a great debt of gratitude for that. As for fun … we have the most fun doing things together, either alone or with our kids, so there’s no problem in harmony there!

Q: What can other couples learn from your marriage?

The basic keys for us, again, have been 1) working together as a team in everything; 2) talking everything over together; 3) spending as much time together as possible. That’s really all there is to it, I think.

Q: What are your marriage dreams?

We both hope we’re just as much in love in 50 years from now as we are now.

Q: Any other thing Simple Marriage readers would benefit from knowing?

Never take your partner for granted, and always show gratitude and appreciation for whatever the other person does. Try to show consideration for your spouse, and do kind things every day.
Most of all, keep your sex life alive!

If you missed the interview with Art of Manliness, you can read it here.

If you missed Awake @ The Wheel’s take, go here.

Have you bought the new 3G IPhone yet? What about the Wii Fit? Or the Apple Airbook? While there is nothing wrong with any of these items, as well as many others, do you really need them? Do they simplify life or make things more complicated?

On the surface, the latest cell phone/calendar/email server/game console/navigation system may help in organizing life, but at what cost? Many people will rush out and pick up the latest gadget before they can really afford it. Paying by the credit card shuffle in order to keep up with the trends. So do these gadgets really simplify life in these instances? No.

Rather than focusing this post on the materialistic pulls that may complicate life, it’s also important to look at how you can simplify schedules, family routines, marriage, parenting, and households.

1. The best way to simplify life and marriage: do less. Learning how to say no will simplify life in many ways. Face it, we get bombarded daily with opportunities to fill our schedule. Dinners with friends, birthday parties, work events, church meetings, trips, whatever. The old adage is true, if you don’t take care of your time, other people gladly will. To take charge of your time, learn the fine art of saying no.
   The fallout for saying no will most likely not be near as devastating as you’ve played up in your mind. Say no. It’s a complete sentence.
2. Declutter. I’ve written on this idea before. It really works. To try it out, take a moment this week and pick one drawer or closet or room (if you’re really ambitious) and declutter it. Begin by emptying everything from the drawer, then organize the stuff you still use as you replace it back into the drawer. Get rid of the rest of the stuff. Do this enough and you’ll cover your entire house.
3. Live in a simple home. Here is a guide that will help.

Rather than adding to this list, I’m going to keep it simple and end here. Feel free to add to this on your own in the comments below.

Did you miss the first parts of this series? No worries. Here they are. Part 1, part 2, part 3.

There were many new readers who joined us in July. Welcome to the Simple Marriage fellowship. We’re glad you’ve joined our bid to take over the world.

In case you missed anything in July, here are a few of the best posts.

• Ho Hum Marriage? 9 Ways To Add Some Spice
  
• The 5 Steps To A Simple Marriage- Part 3: Stand Up!
• The Lazy Marriage’s Budget
• The Simple Marriage Guide
• How To Choose A Shrink: Part 2
  

The Man Up/Woman Up series continues.

• Woman Up: Recognize The Beauty In You
• Man Up: Tuck Your Kids Into Bed

There was a major announcement!

• Simple Marriage Plans To Dominate The World!

Plus there was a new series of interviews on Simplifying Marriage.

• Art Of Manliness’ Take On A Simple Marriage

And there were a few ask the reader posts that had some good discussion.

• Ask The Readers: Guys Weekends/ Girls Weekends
  
• Ask The Readers: His And Her Checking Accounts
• Ask The Readers: Kid-less Weekends

I’ll be traveling a lot in August but I look forward to seeing what unfolds with our project. Blessings!

I leave Sunday night for a 9 day trip to Scotland with my father. The travel around Scotland will be planned as we go along by my father and I. At this point, the priority of things I want to see consist of 1) family roots and places my father went to school while there as a child, 2) Scottish history, specifically some William Wallace stuff as well as the highlands, and 3) anything else we decide to go see.

I fly into London, where I’ll have about 24 hours to see the sights before hopping on the train to Scotland where I will hook up with my dad. So this week’s question (nothing like waiting until the last minute):

What are some things I should be sure to see while in London?

Bear in mind, this is my first time to Europe so I will want to see some of the mainstays. St. Paul’s Cathedral, Parliament, etc. What else should I try to take in along the way?

Please give me your recommendations or experiences in the comments below. Thanks a lot. I will try and update you as to what I see after my 24 hour London plunge is complete. Updates will be in the comments as well.

Editor’s note: This is a repost from Art of Manliness.

Several weeks ago New York Governor Eliot Spitzer was forced to confess his involvement in a prostitution ring. The story has been all over the media and many blogs have done posts compiling lists of other prominent men’s fall from grace. But some of the most important questions aren’t being asked. Mainly, how does this happen, especially to a man who has spent his life crusading against corruption? And how can other men avoid falling into the same trap?

The Sptizer case, while certainly high profile, is hardly a rarity. 25% of all American men (and some studies put the number even higher) will have extramarital affairs during their lifetime. Will you be 1 of the 4? Or will you be able to stay true?

Many people look at infidelity as if it was a natural disaster; no one could see it coming; it just inexplicably happened. Perhaps this is because we are a country that has abdicated its belief in personal responsibility. The truth is that not only can men see it coming, they can prevent it from happening as well.

It is possible to affair proof your marriage. Will it be a lot of work? Yes. But that’s what you signed up for when you decided to marry your sweetheart.

What is cheating?

Before we begin our discussion on how to immunize your marriage against infidelity, we should establish what constitutes cheating. Having sex with another woman other than your wife is obviously cheating. But it’s also possible to be unfaithful without having to go that far. Infidelity has shades of gray that should likewise be avoided. It is possible to be emotionally unfaithful without crossing any physical boundaries. A perfect example of this is online infidelity. More and more married men are having online romantic and sometimes sexual relationships with women other than their wife. While there’s no physical contact, I would definitely say this is cheating. Men who “date” online are violating a trust that their wife has put in them to be faithful-both body and mind.

Now let’s get down to business. Here are 14 ways to affair proof your marriage:

Make your Marriage Your #1 Priority

This past summer my wife and I spent a week in Montpelier, Vermont. If you were to picture the ideal small American town, Montpelier would be it. It’s an absolutely charming place. One of the town’s tourist brochures carried the tagline: “Places like this don’t just happen.” The citizens of Montpelier have put in a lot of work to maintain the town’s magic.

Similarly, successful marriages don’t just happen. You have to be willing to put in the effort. This is especially true as couples get busier with careers, kids, or community activities. Those things are important, but if you want a strong marriage, your wife must come first.

Keep dating your wife. We’ve written about this before, but it deserves repeating. Establish a weekly “date night” with your wife and treat this time as sacred. Your dates don’t have to be fancy, but you do need to work to keep them fresh. A recent study showed that injecting novelty into your dates can bring back the butterflies you experienced when you were first courting. So visit a new restaurant, try a new hobby, or take a class together.

Quit the porn. Bringing porn into a relationship is not healthy. It’s like bringing another woman into your marriage, except she’s glossy and airbrushed. Porn will only create an unrealistic expectation in your mind about your spouse’s libido, body, and comfort level with weird sex positions. Pretty soon you’ll find that your wife isn’t satisfying you and your eyes will start to wander. Dump the porn.

Focus on being romantic. Any woman will tell you it doesn’t take much to be romantic. A romantic letter or email only takes a few minutes to write. Flowers are always welcome, even if you picked them up from the grocery store on the way home. These small gestures show your wife that you’ve thought of her and help you reinforce your commitment to your wife.

Initiate affection. Studies show that couples who are affectionate with each other stay together. Make an effort to initiate spontaneous affection with your wife. Give her a hug or surprise kiss and tell her how much you love her. Hold hands with her when you’re out together. Also, don’t make your wife cuddle-rape you. Invite cuddling with her without making it a precursor to sex. These small gestures will help strengthen the physical connection that every relationship needs.

Have sex regularly. Many men stray because they’ve gotten bored with their sex life with their wife. It’s pretty easy to get into a slump in your sex life when you’re married. Things just get busy and by the end of the day, couples are just too tired for it. Make sex with your wife a priority. It doesn’t have to involve kama sutra and edible underwear. Just do it. Frequent sexual encounters with your wife will strengthen your emotional and physical attraction to her.

Spend time just talking. Find some time each day to have meaningful conversations with your wife. If you have kiddos, do it after you put them in bed. Talk about what you did during the day. Discuss what you’ve been thinking about lately. Share your dreams with them. The idea is to deepen the bond between to you and your wife. It’s harder to cheat on her when you’ve made such an emotional investment. Deposit into this investment by frequently engaging in meaningful conversations.

Share a common interest. A big reason men stray from their wives is that they begin to find less and less in common with them. When you first started dating, you probably had everything in common. Well, at least you thought you did. So you would spend lots of time together doing things you both enjoyed. Then you got married and started working and your wife either started working too or stayed home to take care of the kids. Pretty soon there begins to be much fewer areas in which your lives overlap.

Avoid this by maintaining a common interest or hobby with your wife. For example, my in-laws do ballroom dancing lessons. Every weekend they’re out dancing. When they’re at home in the evenings they practice in the living room. My wife and I have made it a goal run in a 5K and we’ve started to run together. We also have this blog that we do together. Just find something that both of you can enjoy and participate in it together.

Have a sense of honor and duty. Remember that when you got married you made a sacred promise or vow that you would be faithful to your wife. There was a time when a gentleman was judged on whether or not he was a man of his word. Sadly, people today don’t take those sorts of things seriously. Many people feel justified in breaking their promises when something stops being easy and pleasurable. Buck the trend. Be a man of your word. The honorable thing is to fulfill the duty to your wife that you freely took upon yourself the day you got married. I know some will say, “You shouldn’t stay in a terrible marriage just to avoid breaking your vows.” Perhaps not, but you do have the duty to do everything you can to save that marriage before calling it quits. And I mean everything.

Establish boundaries

Many men feel they are manly enough to handle any situation with a woman. For them, setting firm boundaries reeks of weakness or unnecessary zealotry. But that is what every man thinks right before they take it too far. Far better to be safe than sorry. If people think you are a prude, so be it. You are prude going home to the love of your life each night with a head held high.

In your quest to avoid temptation, it should be understood that there’s nothing wrong with having friendships with other women. In fact, it’s inevitable. You probably work closely with other women at work or school. The key is to know where to draw the line and then to stay as far away from it as possible. This will require you to do some serious introspection and figure out what your boundaries are. Here some things you can do to help you in that process.

Establish boundaries with your wife. Sit down with your wife and find out what she’s comfortable with in regards to your relationships with other women and vice versa. It will be different with each couple. For example, you might make it rule that neither of you will drive or ride alone in a car (unless absolutely necessary) or dance with a member of the opposite sex.

Evaluate your vulnerabilities. Sit down with your wife and evaluate your vulnerabilities. Many people don’t realize that they may have personality traits that open themselves up for infidelity. These traits don’t have to be bad either. For example, you might naturally be an empathetic listener. There’s nothing wrong with that, but some women may take this attention the wrong way.

How do you know if you’ve crossed the line between friendship and something more?

There are three signs that indicate that you may have crossed the line into infidelity:

1) Emotional intimacy

Do you find yourself sharing more of your feelings and thoughts with your female friend than with your wife?

2) Sexual tension

You instinctively know when it is present. Huge red flag. Don’t rationalize it away.

3) Secrecy

Do you close your email window when you wife walks by? Do you leave out details of your day because they include encounters with your friend? The minute you fudge anything about your relationship with your female friend, you’ve stepped over the line.

If you see any of these signs, it’s time to re-evaluate your friendship with that other woman. You may need be broaden your boundaries in order to avoid any temptation in the future.

Avoid temptation

Meet in groups, if possible. If you know you can’t handle situations of being alone with another woman without it crossing the line, avoid being alone with another woman.

Avoid frequent conversations about your personal life. Many an affair begins when people start talking about their problems with another woman besides their wife. They feel like the other person understands them better than their wife. They feel a closer connection with them, so they start spending more time with them. If not checked, it may eventually lead to infidelity. Not always, but why risk it?

Stay away from online dating sites. A recent study shows that a large percentage of men who surf online dating sites are married. Virtual affairs are still affairs.

It’s harder to cheat on your wife than stay faithful

Think about the consequences. It’s actually much harder to cheat on your wife than it is to be faithful to her. When you’re unfaithful, you have to start sneaking around, hiding phone calls, and lying. That’s a lot of damn work. While being in a committed relationship takes a lot of work too, it pales in comparison to the rigamarole you’ll have to go through to have those few moments of excitement with another woman.

Another way cheating makes your life harder is having to deal with the consequences when you’re finally caught. Imagine having to face your children and tell them you haven’t been completely faithful to their mother. Imagine the look of hurt and sadness you’ll see in the eyes of the woman you told you would love forever. If that doesn’t make your stomach sink a bit, you’re a giant douchebag.

Conclusion

Making your marriage affair proof requires a large investment of time and emotional capital. But the investment is well worth it. Set high standards for your marriage and for yourself. Man up and you’ll never stray.

If you happened to miss the initial guide, be sure to check it out.

One reader posted a comment asking a few very good follow up questions based on part one. Here is an excerpt of the comment:

Finding a therapist, especially when there isn’t anything catastrophic wrong, is a challenging thing. There just seems no good way to find someone without a referral from a friend, which most people (including myself) are too uncomfortable asking for.

How do you do a phone screen? How do you know if the counseling is “working”? How long is a fair trial?

Allow me to attempt to tackle the stigma of going to counseling. I realize that many people do not wish to let it be known that they are indeed human. That they experience difficulties and struggles in life. That they make mistakes and some struggles they’ve brought on themselves.

The simple fact is, everyone who has walked on the face of the earth would benefit from counseling at some point in life. Being willing to express your humanness with another person may bring about a deeper friendship with them in the future.

On the other hand, I do understand there are those who don’t want to let others know they are having problems in life.

In this case, after you do a quick search through the local services, Internet, Superpages, or insurance provider lists, check out the websites of those offering services. That way you’ll at least get a bit more information about them and their practice. If you dig around on their site a bit, you may discover all the paperwork needed, information about fees, as well as anything they may have published or written which will give you more information about their views.

As for a phone screening, it begins by getting them on the phone. Which can sometimes be difficult. Sadly, there are many clients that report to me that other therapists didn’t return messages. It may be easiest to make first contact via email. If so, feel free to ask some of these questions in your email exchanges.

Through whichever medium you use, here are a few things to ask.

• What types of clients and issues do you specialize in?
• How much experience do you have working with your particular issue?
• What is your view of the counseling process?
• What are your fees?
• What types of payment do you accept?
• How do you structure the therapy process? Weekly, monthly, intensive.

I believe it’s important to get these out of the way up front, that way you can get down to business during the first session

How long is a fair trial to see if it’s working?

The answer to this question depends on you, your situation and your goals for therapy. Often, clients will be in therapy for 6 to 8 sessions. At least that’s what research shows. I see my clients on average 4 to 6 times. Again, this varies greatly according to issues being addressed.

My belief is that as a therapist, I am trying to work myself out of a job with each client as fast as I can. At the same time however, I encourage my clients to keep coming if they are getting good benefit from our time together.

As for if therapy is working or not, you are the judge and jury.

The number one key for success in therapy is the connection made between therapist and client. Everything else builds from there. If you don’t connect, then keep looking. You can also use the therapist as a resource at this point. Ask them to help you find someone with whom you may better connect. This may seem awkward, but it’s a good strategy to try if the initial match is not there. On a side note, if your therapist is offended that you bring this up or their feelings are hurt because you no longer want to come to them, then maybe they don’t need to be conducting therapy, instead they should be going to a therapist of their own.

There’s no magic formula for knowing if the therapy is working or not, other than trusting your gut. More often than not our gut looks out for us. But it is often ignored too much. If you are unsure about how things are progressing, bring this up in your next session. Your therapist should have your interests in mind throughout the process. Work with them to reach your goals.

I welcome any comments or questions if these 2 guides don’t address your concerns. Please feel free to comment below or use the contact form.

While this may not be feasible for every couple, thanks to close friends that live nearby (actually so close they’re considered grandparents), my wife I get a weekend with no kids! Uninterrupted dinners, movies in one sitting, sleeping in, going out with other couples and not having to entertain the kids while we wait for our food.

Thank you Nana and Papa G. for loving and taking care of our kids.

This week’s question:

How often should a couple have a kidless weekend?

As always, post your response in the comments section.

Bonus question: Ideas how you and your spouse would spend a kidless weekend?

Maybe my wife and I will try out some of your ideas. I look forward to the discussion. See you in the comments below.

Let’s get down to business.

You may have noticed a few new additions to the design of our little project. First there are now a few ads running between the posts. I hope these don’t get in the way or detract from our blog, and I will commit to you that this blog will not be overrun with advertisements in the future. But I do want to experiment and see if I can make a go at earning a few pennies with this project. The other addition, I am now displaying the subscriber count. With the influx of subscribers the last few weeks I’m experimenting to see if displaying the count adds to the momentum.

I welcome your feedback and input in the comments on either of these additions.

Facebook. Is anybody out there?

I’ve know ventured into the vortex also known as Facebook. Already I have been found by some long lost friends, and met several new people as well. I have no idea what Facebook is all about or really how it works, I’m at the beginning of the learning curve. But feel free to “friend me”, or look for Corey Allan. There is also a Simple Marriage Group set up as well as a Simple Marriage Page (thanks to the wife of Wife Advice for the idea). See you in the abyss.

Simple Marriage’s world takeover.

Our numbers continue to climb! Thank you to all who have latched on to this simple idea and are spreading the word. I am going to be guest posting at several big blogs in the coming weeks, which should help spread the word even faster. More details later!

Month Long Adventure

Next Sunday I’m off for the beginning of my month long adventure. The first leg is in Scotland with my father. While I’m taking my MacBook, I may not be as present with comments and responses. There will still be regular postings while I’m traveling and I have a good friend lined up to ensure everything runs smoothly. Upon my return from overseas, my family will be in the mountains for a week enjoying some time relaxing together.

I hope to be able to check in regularly, but don’t know if I’ll be able to as often as I’d like.

Thank you for continuing to visit our project. None of this would be possible without your input and support.

Brett and Kate McKay of The Art of Manliness have rocketed up the blog-o-sphere this year. In an effort to learn more about the people behind the blogs, here is a brief interview Simple Marriages conducted with them recently.

The hope for these interviews are for the rest of us to get a glimpse of life behind the blog scenes and perhaps a few nuggets of information we can apply to our lives and marriages.

First a bit of biographical info.
Brett and Kate have been married 3 blissful years. Kids are only a twinkle in their eyes at this point. Brett is a full-time law student going into his third and final year. This summer he is interning at two law firms. Kate is an instructor of US history and an English tutor at a community college.

Q: How have you and your spouse simplified marriage effectively?

For us marriage is really simple, so we’re not sure how to answer this one. Basically marriage is getting to hang out with your best friend all the time. And what can be simpler than that? Of course we don’t have kids yet, so with their arrival I’m sure things could take a turn for the complicated.

Q: How do you find harmony in marriage, parenting, work, blogging, fun?

Finding balance between all of those things takes a little work. Our schedules have been less than ideal for the last couple of years. During the school year, Kate drops me off at law school 9AM , and then teaches and then goes to her tutoring job. She gets off at 9PM and then picks me up. So we don’t get to spend very much time together.

What helps is the fact that we share a car. The ride is 30 minutes each way, so we at least get an hour alone each day to simply talk to each other. We also try to be in a good mood when we see each other. We both have long days, so it’s easy to be cranky, but we realize our time together is limited and so we try to put have fun whenever we’re together. We also make time for a “date night” each week. This usually consists merely of going out to eat and perhaps to Borders, but it’s a valuable time to connect and be romantic.

We do the blog in any of the free time we have remaining. Since it’s something we share, it brings us together instead of separating us. Of course we fight about it sometimes, but in general it’s totally fun to bounce ideas off each other and brainstorm and share in successes. Sometimes Kate writes a post and I edit it, or I write a post and she edits it, or sometimes we each write a little and both edit it. This naturally requires a lot of communication and a lot of humility. You have to learn to not be prideful and respect each other’s opinions.

Q: What can other couples learn from your marriage?

The biggest thing to do is to keep your love and passion alive. Everything else goes smoothly if you are still crazy about each other. We hardly ever fight and when we do, we end up laughing and hugging soon after. We’re so nuts about each other we both find it nearly impossible to stay mad. If you keep the level of your love high, then the little annoyances seem like just that instead of huge emotionally charged issues. And keep a sense of humor. We just have a lot of fun and don’t take things so seriously. Laugh a lot.

And of course a big part of keeping the love alive means keeping intimacy alive. This need not involved wacky positions and dress-up role playing. Instead, if one partner is in the mood then the other partner is there for them, no questions asked.

Q: What are your marriage dreams?

We’d like to be as happy and in love when we’re 90 as we are now. We’d like to have a few kids, have success in our careers and with the blog. In our fondest dreams we’d like to have a cabin in Vermont we could visit whenever we want. We always say that we don’t want our lives to be ordinary. So basically that’s the dream-to make our lives extraordinary.

Q: Any other thing Simple Marriage readers would benefit from knowing?

Well, I guess this is not that helpful to already married couples, but really the big secret to a happy marriage is simply to marry the right person. We’re two absolute peas in a pod. We’re best friends and soul mates and as Kate says, “Marriage is like a party every day.”