Would you like to be friends?
Not necessarily with me … but with your spouse?
Popular culture would say we should start with strong lust, but if your goal is a marriage that will last, friendship has more staying power than desire and needs to be acted on first, middle, and last.
Paul Coleman, Psy.D., author of The 30 Secrets of Happily Married Couples and a contributor to All-in-One Marriage Prep, says, “Friendship is a form of intimacy. It represents a sharing, an openness, a willingness to be vulnerable. It requires a degree of trust. Friends show caring to one another by their availability, their thoughtfulness.”
All of that translates into ensuring you have many different experiences with your partner over time before your engagement and definitely before your wedding.
When we are friends with our partner, we watch out for what’s best for one another. We support through thick and thin. We enjoy each other’s company, help each other laugh, and work and play well with each other. We don’t squabble over the toys in the sandbox; we are adult partners together. Although a water balloon fight once in awhile might be a fun idea!
A key part of being friends is offering encouragement. We help each other excel. We anticipate potential pitfalls. We make connections. We nurture creativity. We listen to the tears and complaints…for awhile…but then nudge or boot each other along into the light.
Friends pray together and play together.
Who wouldn’t want this in a spouse?
Is it everything? Not hardly, but it’s a key piece.
Dr. Coleman says, “It is the brick in the foundation–a necessary part of a marital foundation, but incomplete without other factors that hold the brick in place.” Like faithfulness, love of children, and more.
When we are friends together, then we also recognize when we have mutual friends who are in support of our relationship or marriage. These friends help remind us of what we love in our mates, encourage our commitment, and support the strength of our bond. They validate that our relationship is healthy and viable…or that we need to get some help.
Not everyone is a fan of checklists, but sometimes it really is a good idea to take a gentle, loving inventory so we can set goals to improve.
Here’s mine so you can say whether your relationship is at low, medium, or high level on each factor:
Qualities of an Excellent Friendship
- Good communication; ability to share honestly about positive and difficult matters
- Acknowledgement and affirmation of positive qualities in each other
- Enjoyment of quiet, peaceful time together
- Play, fun, and laughter
- Acceptance; allowing both partners to be themselves
- Support and appropriate sympathy, empathy, and help during difficulties
- Enthusiasm for individual and shared goals and achievements
- Loving, spiritual connection (such as through prayer, meditation, activities)
- Encouragement
- Loyalty
- Trust that shared information will kept confidential and not used hurtfully
- Reliability; trustworthiness
- Willingness to suspend judgment and avoid jumping to conclusions
- Common experiences and bonding memories
- Ability to work together on projects
- Agreed-upon boundaries and expectations
- Shared interests
- Willingness to learn together and from one another
- Ability to disagree peacefully and constructively
- Shared values
- Ability to reconnect easily after being apart
- Motivational feedback or nudging that constructively influences the other to grow
- Attitude of forgiveness, not holding grudges, and willing to grant another chance
- Respectfulness and equality
If you measure up well on these factors before marriage, then check them out again each anniversary and keep going. As Dr. Coleman says, “When passion has its ups and downs, friendship is the stabilizing force. It says ‘I care…you are important to me…’.”
Couldn’t agree more, what a great read. I think if people start out by nurturing a strong friendship that develops into something physical, rather than the other way around, the chances of staying together are higher. I know in my own marriage, there was a huge distance between us, so this was the way we HAD to do things. Even though it was difficult at the time, I wouldn’t have had it any other way
Liam: So glad to hear that this worked for you and your wife. I’m seeing it over and over again where couples who take time to build a friendship are so much more solid as married couples. I really believe that true friendships are an eternal connection.
Susanne
Love number 3 – play, fun, and laughter. It has occurred to me that the only time adults really “play” like children is when they are feeling out a new relationship with someone. I think it’s important to keep this aspect of a relationship once you get past the ‘getting-to-know-you’ stage. My partner and a I play a lot, and it definitely makes us feel closer – both romantically and as friends
Taz: My husband and I set that one as a goal when we married, but it turned out to be the hardest one to do. We seemed to help each other get more serious and responsible instead! We were at a marriage conference one year though, and the message was clear that couples who have fun together stay together. So, we cashed a holiday check, set up a “fun and culture folder” and put the money in it, and just started having regular date nights. We finally got better at having fun!! Thanks for your comment. Susanne
I love this article. My husband and I are best friends and there is no better feeling. I really like #5 Acceptance; allowing both partners to be themselves. I’ve found that I have blossomed since being married in part due to my husbands complete acceptance and amazement of everything I am. To have the freedom to completely be myself and express my supposed “vulnerabilities or weaknesses” has been liberating.
Ashley: That’s so very special! People often don’t realize the enormous gift there is in acceptance and that we are much more likely to grow, change, and be our best with that rather than criticism and nagging to change! I’m happy you are feeling the freedom that comes with truly being loved in this way.
Susanne
p.s. And I hope you are encouraging your single friends to focus on building friendships!
I am not friends with my husband and don’t ever think we were. Many things in the 24 Friendship list are not there. I will say that the comments are right, friendship first leads to a better more solid and balanced marriage. What the post decribes is what I had so dearly hoped for, but most people are attracted physically first, so how does this work?
Mia: If transforming this situation is important to you, then it may not be too late. The ideal is to have friendship first, but it can still be built. Can you share this article with your husband and lovingly request that you make progress on one or two of the items on the list every few months or each year? What can you do to be more friendly towards him? What could offering friendship to him look like? Often if change happens with only one of us in a couple relationship, it causes shifts to happen for our mate. It’s never to late to have a happy marriage. It takes commitment, creativity, and courage….
Susanne
I’m well aware that there are few men who seem to respond positively to blogs like this, and aware that maybe not too many readers got especially high “grades” after going through the list above, but I dare to humbly offer that my wife and I
have been so unusually “blessed”, that after almost 28 years, we agree that we now have all of the attributes on this list in place. I know some will be highly skeptical, or jealous, or angry with me, but I’m only sharing this to encourage the other readers. I can say that if you aim at “goals” like the above list, you will never look back some day, and regret whatever price you may have had to pay to get the amazing rewards of a marriage based on an awesome friendship!
Blessed indeed…. This list was generated through us asking people at workshops what they valued in friendships and it evolved into being more formal. It’s actually good that you referred to them as goals, because we can regularly assess how we are doing on all sorts of marriage measures and make commitments and take actions to improve.
I’m so glad that you are reaching out to encourage others. I was recently interviewed on the radio about an article I wrote encouraging men to form and join men’s groups. So many men need your mentoring to help them also be awesome friends and husbands to their wives. The more we support one another in this process of creating strong, happy marriages, the better.
Thanks for sharing…
Susanne
A brief personal note…I wrote this article in part right now in honor of my late husband and best friend Craig. Widowhood (he had brain cancer) is two years old tomorrow, and I miss him every day. I wouldn’t have known what it was like to be friends with a spouse if it weren’t for him, and I’m very grateful. Your prayers for his soul and uplift for my sadness are much appreciated. I wasn’t sure I could keep my commitment to Corey Allen to interact with readers tonight, but I’m glad to have had the help of friends this evening to lift me up enough to answer your generous comments. I look forward to meeting Corey next week at Better Marriages Fiesta where I’m doing a workshop on Caring for the Soul of Your Marriage.
Susanne
What a great article written from a space of love and pain it would seem
But how else can it be, to have loved and lost is painful.
Thank you for reminding me to love the one Im with and to be more with him in the moment. For that is all we have – now and our past memories.
You’re welcome! I painted the room he passed in and then headed off to Albuquerque for Better Marriages. It was excellent meet Corey Allen and in person hear his commitment to this site and all of you/us. Life does go on, but I’m very grateful for how fully we lived during our marriage. I’m glad you took my comment as a personal encouragement.
Susanne
This is my second time to respond here. I won’t be long. I’m in the process of developing my own marriage blog, based primarily on “nuggets” my wife and I have found worked well for our marriage. I also see that I want to give links to other top articles, books and blogs, such as this one on friendship. Do you have some place I can go and find out what you require to do this?
Excellent explanation.Friendship greatly contributes to the success of a marriage.“You are the master of your words until they are spoken”,Think about how you act and speak toward those you call friends, and begin to treat your spouse as you would treat them.
Thanks, what a nice article it is! enjoyed very much and going to make it practical, lots of points are missing from my life, I really need my husband to be my friend. I don’t have any topic to discuss with my husband any more, distance between us is growing.
Ann: I hear the pain in your message! I encourage you to be very specific and intentional about reading and being involved in activities that help to generate conversation between you. You may find new couple activities to do as well. Perhaps there are questions about what he is doing that would show interest in him. If you make changes, it will have an effect on him and on the relationship. It can be so easy to slide and just let things get worse. Maybe he simply needs to hear that you still care and that you want to be more closely connected. Be very aware of your tone of voice and body language as you do those types of communications though – no whining, pouting, complaining, criticizing. Show genuine love and interest! Be an advocate for and a champion for the health of your marriage…
Susanne