A Marriage Love Map

A Love Map? 

John Gottman did it again. Yet another book full of awesome ideas -- this time marriage. Marriage is where it all begins; A happy home full of children starts with the parents. The parents always need to work on their relationship. Marriage is a beautiful thing but it takes some work. It's important to remember this when times get busy and rough.

In John Gottman's book, "The seven principles for making marriage work," Gottman talks about having a love map with your spouse. He gave an example of one couple in particular. The husband was a doctor, working all day and sometimes all night. He didn't know the name of the family pet or the friends of the kids. Yes, he was valued at the hospital, but at home their was a major disconnection between he and his wife. She knew nothing about his day-to-day events -- and Gottman says this is an important thing to know as a couple.

A love map is simple yet hard if two schedules are very different and busy. It's so important for a couple to work on their love map, even if it takes hard work.

"Successful Marriages and Families" (Chapter 3) says, "A love map is like a mental notebook where we collect personal information about our spouse that we want to remember. The notebook includes the spouse's dreams, joys, fears, likes, dislikes, frustrations, and worries. The map helps us to...know how to love him or her better."

Gottman says, "emotionally intelligent couples are intimately familiar with each other's world." He talks about knowing what your spouses favorite meal is or what their favorite show is so that you can make sure to record it. These little things can add to a love map and create many emotional blessings to a couple in need of them.

One example that I thought of as sharing a love map is asking my husband how work was that day. I'm not just saying that I should ask, "How was work today, honey?" I'm talking about asking it and then looking for details. Why not ask, "So what happened at work today?" These two questions can bring very different answers and can bring very different outcomes.

If I were to just ask how work was, my husband would probably give me a vague one-word answer. This wouldn't do anything besides let me know what kind of mood he could be in. If I were to ask my husband to share the things that happened at work, I could better understand what his stresses are, what he needs help with, the things he's happy about, and overall just the things that are weighing on his mind the most. Compared to just asking how work was, asking what happened can bring many added emotional blessings to a couple.

Test your love map

 

Gottman gives an activity to do to test your love map. He has sixty questions to ask your spouse, the couple chooses 20 numbers from those and asks those questions to each other. Each question has a point or two and whoever gets the most points at the end wins! Just to give you a few sample questions:

1. Name my two closest friends.
2. What was I wearing when we first met?
3. What stresses am I facing right now?
4. Who is my favorite relative?
5. What is my favorite meal?
6. What is my favorite way to spend an evening?
7. What do I like to do most with my time off?
8. What is my favorite getaway place?
9. What would I consider my ideal job?
10. What was my most embarrassing moment?

These are just a sixth of the questions Gottman gives. I recommend just asking your spouse questions like this. Maybe make it a game to make it fun! How well do you know your spouses love map?