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Welcome to Lasting Love

The Lasting Love Skills Building Course is designed to help couples improve their chances of having a healthy, happy, enduring marriage built on mutual respect and love.

Marriage and relationship education classes are designed to give people skills they need to build strong, permanent marriages, or to strengthen existing non-marital relationships.

Facilitator Manual

Participator Manual

Skills to a Better Relationship

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10 Rules for a Healthy Marriage Print E-mail

1.  Never hit, threaten, intimidate, or demean your partner.

2.  Practice fidelity.

3.  Never take your partner for granted.

4.  Remember the little things.

5.  Practice forgiveness and learn to apologize.

6.  Never go to bed angry.

7.  Never miss a chance to say “I love you”.

8.  Say something supportive every day.

9.  Never insult your partner.

10. Touch daily.



In addition to providing participants with skills, we also need to teach a set of rules for healthy marriages. If participants follow these Ten Rules for a Healthy Marriage, their relationships will grow stronger every year. These rules should be posted at the front of the class and the leaders should make reference to them each class.

We start with the first principal of marriage: It is all about the kids: marriage is the best way to raise kids. After you have children, their needs must come first. You must work hard to improve your marriage for the sake of your children because their lives will be damaged if you fail.

Next, you must not be abusive. This seems obvious, but we must work to reduce and eliminate abusive behavior. Too many people live in abusive relationships. We must commit ourselves to recognizing that many of us cannot always control our tempers and that there are skills and behaviors we can learn to reduce this destructive behavior.

We live in a culture that promotes promiscuity and infidelity. If we are to overcome these pressures, we must be committed to having the best romantic life possible, and to remaining faithful to our partners.

Learning to apologize and forgive are both necessary to form a lasting, secure marriage. Everyone makes mistakes. But not everyone can admit a mistake and take responsibility for the mistake. Learning to forgive is also difficult for many people, so we must constantly work at it.

If we can learn how to make up before going to sleep, we will start every new day with affection.

We must learn to express affection daily. Saying “I love you” every day is a simple but critical part of a loving relationship.

Giving small compliments on a regular basis is one thing that makes us so special to our partners. Never take your partner for granted. The way you say “you are so important to me” is by letting your partner know that you appreciate him or her.

Physical contact is another way we say “I love you—you are so special to me.” Too often we go for days without physical touch. It can be holding hands, kissing, hugging, or a pat on the back.

All the tiny little things we do every day are what define our relationship. If we remember the little things, we have the trust and love needed to sustain a marriage.

 
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