
What Keeps Couples Happy Long Term - adamqureshi
http://www.wsj.com/articles/what-keeps-couples-happy-long-term-1454961956
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Diederich
Work. My relationship with my wife is the most important project in my life,
period.

I work hard on important projects. So does my wife.

We sit down and _communicate_ about an hour, most every day.

For years, we asked each other these six questions, and listened to the
response:

1\. What's the worst thing that happened to you today?

2\. What's the best thing that happened to you today?

3\. What's the most surprising thing that happened to you today?

4\. What's the most interesting thing that happened to you today?

5\. What's the worst thing you did today?

6\. What's the best thing you did today?

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Someone1234
How uhh structured.

I'm all about good communication but asking those exact six questions every
evening would get old fast. Do the two of you have so little in common that
all you have to talk about is your monotonous work day?

There is something to be said for having shared hobbies in a relationship
(yes, also individual hobbies) if only to give you something to talk about. We
talk politics extensively for one example.

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jchendy
> Do the two of you have so little in common that all you have to talk about
> is your monotonous work day?

Wow, so many assumptions there:

1) All they do in a given day is work

2) Their work is monotonous

3) These questions result in boring, factual answers (perhaps instead they
lead to long, interesting conversations far away from the original topic)

Etc, etc. IMO, it's much more productive to take the time to think about
reasons why something would work for somebody else rather than immediately
dismiss what they do.

~~~
Diederich
Right. The questions are (were) a gateway. What we talk about is certainly
factual. And all too often our days have monotony in them. What's important is
hearing how my wife _feels_ about these things in her life, and she hears how
I feel about those things in my life.

I like to say that one of my biggest advantages at work is that I have an
intelligent, invested and attentive counselor at home. My wife gives me tons
of excellent work-related feedback, because she sees things differently than I
do. And that's an incredibly valuable thing.

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mchahn
My wife and I have been happily married for 40 years and we attribute our
success to negotiations. We recognize that we don't always want the same
things and we make deals. I know this sounds cold but it reduces our tension
to near zero and really works for us.

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adamqureshi
The secret to a happy wife / life. Keep laughing everyday! its our secret
sauce. Don't be so serious. Do new stuff. Make sure you tell your wife you
LOVE her as much AS possible. Good Lucky!

~~~
cylinder
Your wife will be quite serious if there's financial strain on the family, or
other stressors. And laughing about it will just make you look like an aloof
idiot.

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Spooky23
ProTips: Don't be a dick. Listen. Talk.

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noffy
Fox news has a mirror

[http://www.foxnews.com/health/2016/02/09/what-keeps-
couples-...](http://www.foxnews.com/health/2016/02/09/what-keeps-couples-
happy-long-term.html)

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toyg
Lol. Couples having more/better sex are happier and communicate more; and they
likely have more/better sex because they communicate more and are happier.
Great analysis there.

I'm really waiting for the next study on what keeps water so wet.

~~~
scott_s
This kind of dismissive thinking is counter-productive. Our intuitions are
often wrong, and hindsight-bias allow us to fool ourselves that our intuition
would have been right when we already know the answer. In order to figure out
what is actually happening, we need to do studies and experiments rather than
just _thinking_ about it, to find out where our intuitions are wrong. When our
intuition happens to match the outcome, that is not failure, nor is it a
reason to mock the people who did the work. They are advancing our
understanding.

~~~
toyg
My point is that this sort of studies has been done over and over again, and
they repeat the same results pretty much all the time. Have you ever heard
anyone say that a good relationship is due to partners not talking and not
having sex?

Ever since the myth of the "obedient and silent wife" was dispelled in the
'60s and '70s, it looks to me as intuition and research in this particular
field overlapped fairly consistently. The interesting question would now be "
_why do people not do this already, even when rational and well-educated?_ ".
_That_ would be noteworthy.

I don't know, maybe the point of this research was getting down to the details
(which they do, a bit), but the overall structure is the same as always.

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infinite8s
The answer to "why do people not do this already, even when rational and well-
educated?" is likely because in most families both parents have to work, and
are probably tired at the end of the day. Relationships take work and it's
sometimes easy to slip into a routine where you let the relationship just
coast (especially once you have young children and any free time you used to
have is out the window).

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a_shiri
What Keeps Couples Happy are love, Loyalty and forgiveness

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xutopia
How do we get passed this paywall?

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aaronbrager
Google the headline in incognito / private browsing mode.

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emodendroket
I still get the paywall message.

