766+ Years of Marriage: Workbook Edition with Notes

How do you keep a marriage together for the long term?

This question came into the light when my daughter began to plan her wedding. What makes love last? What holds the hearts bound with excitement and compassion? What brings unity and collaboration through the years of relationships? What does it take to keep a marriage together?

Love… the elusive obvious…

This workbook began with these questions given to a group of 14 women who together had over 766 years of marriage. Their insights and revelations pieced together a quilt of events and thoughts including threads from the first meetings to the death of a beloved partner.

Transformation within partnerships is a pathway to longevity. This is a tool for couples to dive into conversations which will help to build trust and knowledge about each person individually and together as a couple. Being able to have easy and difficult dialogues strengthens the woven cloth of love and family.

To choose the questions and seek the answers with due diligence may be one of the factors in finding a relationship that will mature through the years. Asking for information and listening for answers, reading between the words, beyond personal desire to fill the emptiness with the understanding that conversations are built in layers. Years of words beginning with the first interaction, rich with many opportunities to guild or destroy the fragile thread weaving the tapestry of two lives intertwined.

Longevity builds from the depth and breadth of passion, gratitude, patience and experiences shared in a committed marriage.

Love is a journey, not a destination.

It is built one breath, one choice, one moment at a time. As you step forward into your own partnership, may you carry with you the wisdom shared here. May you breathe deeply, speak kindly, laugh often, love fully and imagine boldly.

Above all, may you never forget that love is not something to be found or lost. Love is something to be lived.