Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts Workbook for Men Updated: Seven Questions to Ask Before---and After---You Marry
128
Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts Workbook for Men Updated: Seven Questions to Ask Before---and After---You Marry
128eBook
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Overview
You can do more than hope. Safeguard your relationship and build a love that not only goes the distance but fulfills your deepest dreams.
More than a million couples have used the award-winning Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts (SYMBIS for short) to prepare for life-long love.
The Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts Workbook for Men will help you uncover and understand the unique shaping factors you bring into your marriage as a man. Prepare for some surprising and helpful insights, for honest, intimate, and enjoyable relationship-strengthening conversations with you and your fiancée, and for engaging discussions with a small group.
Over the course of twenty-four exercises, this workbook will shed amazing new light on the way you're made, how that affects the way you and your loved one relate, and how you can improve those areas to build a better relationship. You will gain unprecedented insights into topics such as:
- your personal "Ten Commandments"
- making your roles conscious
- exploring unfinished business
- assessing your self-image
- getting your sex life off to a great start
- cultivating intimacy
- listening to your self-talk
- avoiding the blame game
- how well do you communicate?
- your top ten needs
- mind reading
- how to listen
- identifying your "hot topics"
- money talks
- your spiritual journey
The personal exercises portion is followed by a discussion section: 7 Questions to Ask Before—and After—You Marry. Les and Leslie will help you enjoy lively and eye-opening interaction with each other and with a small group through seven sessions on the DVD (sold separately). The discussion guide takes you through an opening exercise, note-taking as you watch the video, linking to the workbook exercises, and group discussion, concluding with an exercise each couple can do together over the next week.
Designed for use with Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts Workbook for Women Updated (9780310875475) and Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts Updated Video Study (9780310875734), both sold separately.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780310875444 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | HarperChristian Resources |
| Publication date: | 11/24/2015 |
| Sold by: | HarperCollins Publishing |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 128 |
| Sales rank: | 740,147 |
| File size: | 2 MB |
About the Author
#1 New York Times bestselling authors Drs. Les and Leslie Parrott are psychologists and founders of the game-changing online assessments: SYMBIS.com, BetterLove.com, and Yada.com. Their best-selling books include Love Talk, The Good Fight, Crazy Good Sex, and the award-winning Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts. Their work has been featured in the New York Times and USA Today and on CNN, Good Morning America, the Today Show, The View, and Oprah. LesAndLeslie.com
Read an Excerpt
Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts Workbook for Men Updated
Seven Questions to Ask Before â" and After â" You Marry
By Les Parrott, Leslie Parrott
ZONDERVAN
Copyright © 2015 Les and Leslie ParrottAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-310-87544-4
CHAPTER 1
Exercise One
YOUR PERSONAL TEN COMMANDMENTS
This exercise is designed to help you uncover some of your unspoken rules. It will take about fifteen to twenty minutes.
Try to articulate some of the unspoken rules you grew up with. Take your time to think it over. These unspoken rules are generally so ingrained that we are rarely aware of them. If you're not married yet, by the way, you may have discovered some of your "rules" with a previous roommate.
We've provided you with sections to stimulate your thinking. The best way to come up with your own commandments is to think of what "unspoken rules" you grew up with in your family.
RULES ABOUT FINANCES
Example: "Credit cards are to be used only in an emergency."
1.[Your Response]
2.[Your Response]
RULES ABOUT MEALTIME
Example: "Dinner should be served at the same time every night."
3.[Your Response]
4.[Your Response]
RULES ABOUT CHORES
Example: "The towels from the laundry should be folded in thirds (not in half)."
5.[Your Response]
6.[Your Response]
RULES ABOUT OTHER TRADITIONS AND HOLIDAYS
Example: "You should open presents on Christmas Eve (not Christmas morning)."
7.[Your Response]
8.[Your Response]
RULES ABOUT QUIRKY THINGS
Example: "Never put a bottle of ketchup on the table (put it in a dish)."
9.[Your Response]
10.[Your Response]
Once both of you have written your "personal ten commandments," share them with each other.
As a man, think about how your dad modeled certain behaviors in each of these areas and consider how this may shape your expectations as a husband.
What surprises you about your partner's rules and why? Do some of her rules cause you to immediately push back?
Are there any specific rules you would like to change (on your side or hers)?
The more you talk about your unspoken rules, the less likely they are to affect your marriage in a negative way.
In addition, here's a helpful tip. Any time you have a fight or disagreement, ask yourself, "Is this fight a result of one of us breaking an unspoken rule?" If so, add that rule to your list and discuss how you will handle that situation in the future.
CHAPTER 2Exercise Two
MAKING YOUR ROLES CONSCIOUS
If you have taken the SYMBIS Assessment (SYMBISassessment .com), this particular exercise will look familiar. The SYMBIS Assessment Report presents the content in a far more personalized format. If you're not using the SYMBIS Assessment, you will still benefit greatly from this workbook version of the exercise.
Following is a list of chores or life tasks that will need to be handled by you or your fiancée (wife). To make your unconscious understanding of roles conscious, first indicate how your parents handled these tasks. If they shared the task, then check both boxes. Then write down how you would like to divide the tasks, according to your understanding of your own and your partner's interests, time, and abilities. If you expect to share the task, check both boxes. Finally, compare your list with your partner's list and discuss the results. Put your joint decision of who will do what in the last column, and be prepared to renegotiate when your circumstances change. This exercise will take about twenty to thirty minutes.
Once you have both filled out this list, compare notes and answer these three questions together:
1. What role behaviors do you tend to agree upon?
2. What role behaviors do you tend to see quite differently?
3. How are you going to adjust your expectations on the role behaviors where you are currently not in sync?
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts Workbook for Men Updated by Les Parrott, Leslie Parrott. Copyright © 2015 Les and Leslie Parrott. Excerpted by permission of ZONDERVAN.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Contents
How to Use This Workbook, 7,A Quick Note to Leaders, 11,
EXERCISES 24 Self-Tests to Put the Book into Action,
1. Your Personal Ten Commandments, 15,
2. Making Your Roles Conscious, 18,
3. From Idealizing to Realizing Your Partner, 21,
4. Exploring Unfinished Business, 23,
5. Assessing Your Self-Image, 26,
6. Defining Love, 29,
7. Getting Your Sex Life Off to a Great Start, 31,
8. Your Changing Love Style, 38,
9. Cultivating Intimacy, 41,
10. Listening to Your Self-Talk, 43,
11. Avoiding the Blame Game, 46,
12. Adjusting to Things Beyond Your Control, 49,
13. How Well Do You Communicate?, 51,
14. The Daily Temperature Reading, 54,
15. I Can Hear Clearly Now, 56,
16. Couple's Inventory, 58,
17. Your Top Ten Needs, 61,
18. Identifying Your Hot Topics, 63,
19. Money Talks and So Can We, 65,
20. Mind Reading, 75,
21. Sharing Withholds, 77,
22. Your Spiritual Journey, 79,
23. Improving Your Serve, 83,
24. Study Your Spouse, 85,
SESSIONS For Group or Couple Discussion with the Group Video Series,
Introduction, 91,
1. Have You Faced the Myths of Marriage with Honesty?, 94,
2. Can You Identify Your Love Style?, 98,
3. Have You Developed the Habit of Happiness?, 102,
4. Can You Say What You Mean and Understand What You Hear?, 106,
5. Have You Bridged the Gender Gap?, 110,
6. Do You Know How to Fight a Good Fight?, 114,
7. Are You and Your Partner Soul Mates?, 118,