How To Live Longer, Stay Healthier, Have More Money And Great Sex
At the risk of preaching to the choir, do you want to know the secret to living longer, staying healthier, earning more money and having great sex?
Get married and stay married.
Marriage has been beat up lately in our society. It’s used as a punch-line or a political hot button whenever it serves a group’s particular purpose. The interesting thing is, on the whole, most people aren’t anti-marriage.
Simple Marriage is a big proponent of marriage (duh!). Where else can you find the best mechanism to grow-up and experience more in life than marriage? Yet research shows people are waiting longer to marry and around half of all marriages in America still end in divorce.
In spite of this, marriage offers many benefits that can’t be found anywhere else.
- Live longer. Especially men, who on average will engage in risky behavior when single. Married men live on average 10 years longer than single men. And statistically speaking, divorce is more dangerous to men than it is women. 9 out of 10 married men will live to at least 65, while only 6 out of 10 single men will. While 9 out of 10 married women make 65 and only 8 out of 10 single women will.
- Have more money. This fact is the result of more long-term plans and decision making strategies. Married couples have a different outlook on money and long-term goals than single people. The difference between the two groups rests largely in the added ingredient of commitment.
- Experience more and better sex. Research continues to show that the best place for hot sex is the marriage bed. This is due to the increased connection physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. Married couples have already made a huge investment in establishing and maintaining the sexual relationship so they often can relax and enjoy the dividends.
- Things can get better. Even in bad or high conflict marriages, divorce generally creates more problems than it solves (except when there’s abuse). These problems are often worse for the children. Divorce negatively impacts a child’s educational, emotional, financial, and psychological well-being.
Being able to “stick it out” when things are bad is good advice. 86% of unhappily married people who stayed committed and stuck with their marriage for five years reported their marriages became happier. Plus, 77% of those who rated their marriages “very unhappy” reported a change to “very happy” or “quite happy” five years later. There are natural ebbs and flows to everything, marriage is not immune.
So what is ending so many marriages? Is it boredom? Unmet needs? Unhappiness?
The answer – most people don’t like conflict and pain. In the midst of conflict, you may think your marriage will only get worse. What you fail to realize is research shows otherwise.
Don’t give up without a fight.
Marriage is more than an institution or a social convention. Marriage is personal development bootcamp.
So whether you’re married or thinking about it, listen up, marriage is not about happiness… it’s about growing up. All of life is – BUT grown ups have the most pleasure and fun!
*Taken from The Case for Marriage: Why Married People are Happier, Healthier, and Better off Financially, by Linda Waite, Maggie Gallagher
Corey is the editor of Simple Marriage as well as a licensed marriage & family therapist. While he has a Ph.D. in Family Therapy, he only occasionally likes to be called doctor. If you enjoyed this post, please subscribe so you don't miss any future posts.10 Responses to “How To Live Longer, Stay Healthier, Have More Money And Great Sex”
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It’s amazing to me how many couples are willing to surrender so easily. Marriage can be hard, just like the rest of life, but more often than not it is worth working through any difficulty. Certainly more than the statistics would suggest.
You’re right Corey, five years can make a huge difference. Five years ago I thought my marriage was not going to make it but we both stuck it out and worked really hard to figure it all out. Funny thing, after I stopped worrying so much about how he could change and really worked hard on myself (both as a wife and as an individual) and make some changes in me, things got better really pretty quickly. I took the focus off of “us” and put it on “me”. Now five years later, I feel really good about myself and really good about us as a married couple. Life has never been better (including the sex) and I look forward to what lies ahead for me and us together. I do have to give a TON of credit to a wonderful counselor who helped us out. So Thank you Corey. You are the BEST!
Laurie, Your comment inspires me. I am experiencing similar issues as you have in the past. I too am trying to work on myself. Sometimes it’s just so hard not to put pressure and expectations on your spouse. Working on it though.
Hi Corey,
This is a lovely post. You’ve sold me on marriage.
Hi Corey,
2 quotes from your post that I love:
1. “Marriage is personal development bootcamp.”
2. “marriage is not about happiness… it’s about growing up” These are so true!
It disappoints me to hear the divorce stats are still that high and how marriage has become somewhat disposable in today’s society. “Sticking it out” is the best advice. I think if more people gave their relationship a fair shake the stats would improve dramatically. I know a few people, who when dating, say “when we get married things will be better” (in the sense that all their problems will disappear). I’ve always thought – I don’t know about better…certainly different but I’m not sure about better.
For me marriage has always been about love – sacrifice, showing appreciation, and open and honest communication. It’s nice to know we’ll also live longer, have more money, better sex and be happier.
Lovely post!
Watching my sister go through her second divorce has reinforced to me how true your 4th point is. She had no kids from her second marriage, but she has 5 kids from this second marriage. It’s so sad to me to see how deeply this has impacted the kids. They are the happiest, sweetest kids I’ve met, yet they have so much hurt and anger and insecurity in them now that they’re not sure how to handle. I’m amazed at how well they do. But even more than that, it’s amazing how much unhappier my sister is. She was unhappy in her marriage for years, but it has increased ten-fold since her divorce. It’s hard for me to watch it all so helplessly!
being married is like having a second job. both have to work at it, in order for the marriage to work. been married 43 to the same lady. respect is the name of the game in our marriage. once you have respect, everything else falls into place. we are still having fun together and always will. i found my love for life. i was fortunate. we vowed to be one person against the world, from our wedding day. it has worked for us. never let an arguement go unresolved overnight. it much worse the next morning.
Sometimes you have no choice but to give up on a marriage. Sometimes you’ve put your whole heart and soul into sticking things out, improving yourself, trying to make it work, but the other person has already made up their mind, is adamant, and leaves you with absolutely no choice. What then?
Hooray! Another person who stands up for staying married and honoring the vows! (except in the case of severe abuse of course) I very recently started writing a column for examiner.com and am writing about marriage. I’m trying to support marriage as well. I love your article!