How Is Your Marriage?
Step 1: Self Evaluation
“How am I really doing in my marriage?”
If you were to grade yourself on how responsive and loving you are in your marriage what would that grade be?
Rate yourself with an A–B–C–D–F scale, (feel free to use “+” or “–”).
What grade would you assign for YOURSELF in each of the following areas of your marriage?
___ How affectionate are you?
___ How romantic?
___ How physically desirable?
___ How generous?
___ How trusting?
___ How kind are you?
___ How much fun are you to be around?
___ How emotionally present are you around your mate?
___ How physically present are you around your mate?
___ How sensitive and compassionate are you to your mate’s feelings?
___ How good a listener are you with your partner?
___ How emotionally nurturing are you?
___ How physically nurturing?
___ How financially nurturing?
___ How much of a friend are you to your intimate partner?
___ How in control of your negative emotions are you, such as anger,
volatility, insecurity, jealousy, anxiety, fear and mistrust?
___ Showing your mate that you value him/her.
___ How affectionate and physically tender are you?
___ How affectionate and physically tender are you without ulterior motives?
___ How responsive and accommodating are you to what your partner says
she/he wants or needs?
___ How financially responsible and accountable are you?
___ How respectful are you of your partner?
___ Overall, how much effort do you give to your relationship?
___ Your level of commitment to the relationship.
___ Your flexibility and receptivity to other ways of seeing or doing things.
___ Your willingness to address difficult issues or deal with conflicts
proactively.
___ Your willingness and ability to engage in a disagreement wisely and
effectively
___ Your overall attitude in the relationship.
___ Your sense of humor.
___ The division of chores, roles, responsibilities, duties.
___ Behaving, thinking and planning as a couple rather than as two
individuals.
___ The time, attention, effort, skill and patience you bring to parenting.
___ How you operate as a team player in the relationship.
___ Your ability and willingness to make up after a fight or a disagreement.
Step 2: Humble Yourself
Take the questions you just answered and ask your spouse to grade you as a marriage partner using the same questions.
Then schedule 1-2 hours where they share their answers and you simply listen.
This might just be the most difficult and most rewarding exercise you have ever done.
Step 3: Intimacy Survey
Intimacy is never about the absence of conflict. It is about the presence of a deep connection emotionally, relationally, and spiritually.
Take this quiz to find out:
Do you get angry a lot with your mate, even over small things?
Do you tend to be mistrusting, only to discover that your mistrust is largely groundless?
Are you frequently sarcastic?
Are you having an affair, or do you have a history of affairs?
Do you tend to focus on your mate’s shortcomings or bad traits more than his/her good traits?
Do you berate your spouse for making mistakes, and do you use mistakes as leverage against him/her?
Do you have the tendency of pushing away intimacy and closeness when it’s offered to you, but then wanting it when it’s not offered?
Have you been accused by your partner—or by a previous partner—of being emotionally unavailable or remote?
Are you insecure?
Do you have a difficult time trusting?
Do you tend to be emotionally hidden in your relationships, fearing that you’ll be discovered as somehow inadequate or fraudulent?
Do you not have close friends other than your spouse or family?
Do you have a fear of being controlled, of losing your identify or your “selfhood”?
Do you have a fear of getting rejected, abandoned or betrayed in a relationship?
Do you tend to put your mate in second or third position a lot?
Are you very critical or judgmental?
Do you take constructive criticism from your mate poorly?
Do you have a strong fear of being negatively judged or criticized?
Do you have a fear of being too vulnerable in a relationship?
Has your mate ever described you as emotionally standoffish, armored or hard to be close to?
Do you have a history of repeatedly getting involved with emotionally standoffish, disapproving or angry people?
Do you tend to get mean, punitive or vindictive when you’re upset?
Do you tend to give money or sex to show your love, instead of compassion, friendship or emotional closeness?
Do you have a pattern of not emotionally risking a lot or of not giving your intimate relationships a whole lot of effort?
Do you have a pattern of withdrawing or emotionally withholding yourself a lot?
Do you tend to put work above all else?
Do you drink too much, watch too much TV, worry too much or have an addiction to any substances, including food?
Do you sometimes push your partner away because you don’t wish to be dependent or beholden?
Do you have the vague sense that you repeatedly sabotage love?
If you answered “yes” to 10 or more of these questions, you are emotionally walled off.
If you answered “yes” to more than 15 of these questions, your wall is so thick and impenetrable that the chances of you having a close loving relationship are dramatically diminished.
All of these questions are designed by marital research expert, John Gottman, Ph.D.
