Navigating Marital Drift: 7 Keys to Satisfaction

Did you know marriage is supposed to be satisfying?

Marital satisfaction depends on several factors and skills that couples are empowered to do something about in any season or stage of life. Know this, that your marriage will go through different stages and seasons through the years. To be successful in them you will need to know these stages and how to navigate them. When you don’t navigate well you will end up in something called marital drift.

This may come as a shock, but did you know that God wants you to enjoy marriage. I can’t tell you how many couples I have counselled who said they didn’t enjoy marriage. In fact, I have not met a couple yet that says they enjoy marriage. That is very sad. 

Here are four things you need to make a mental note about your marriage.

• One, find ways to enjoy each other.
• Two, stop waiting to enjoy marriage.
• Three, what was natural early on must be intentional later.
• Fourth, in marriage intentionality is king. 

Let me share about marital drift. Right now, your marriage is either deciding to go in a godly way or drifting from a godly marriage. Most marriages start with this attraction and chemistry for each other then you move to a deep connection, then you stay in a state of “decision” of being married or you decide to drift. Make no mistake both are a choice, drifting or staying. 

No one really makes the decision to drift. But it is the absence of decision that brings you there. You are no longer being intentional about the skills that makes marriage satisfying. 

Remember seasons and stages of life change in the marriage. The two of you are not the same people after you have kids versus when you don’t have kids. You are not the same after the kids leave home and you are empty nesters. You are not the same at year one of your marriage as you will be at year ten or twenty. 

Think about this, you are five to seven different people during the course of your marriage. Health issues, jobs, kids, work, moving and more all change you. 

But you must decide when the changes come you will live in discovery, devotion and dedication with your mate.  

But when you are in that unintentional season of drift and the stages of life come the drift season will cause you to be disillusioned. This is when people begin to say, “this is not what I signed up for, he changed she changed.” Of course you are changed. But you must now move to discovering the new you. 

If you are in marital drift right now, it’s a momentary decision you will not love but decide to move back to discovery. When you make this decision there will come discovery then devotion and then dedication. 

If you stay in drift the progression is drift, to disillusionment and then disconnection and finally divorce. 

Drift is like the rumble strips on the highway. You know the ones that jar us awake if we ride over them. We experience the rumble strips in marriage too. And when we are feeling them, we are too close to drift. You and your mate will need a course adjustment because drift is upon you. 

In the marriage course we go into more detail on how to stay out of drift but let me share seven factors that you need to keep you and your spouse out of drift. I go over these in more detail in the course but wanted to give you a sample of them here. 

Factor #1 What do you really believe about marriage? Decide before you get married and after what you both really believe about marriage. Do not look at what the culture says but what God says about what marriage is. Marriage should be honored by all and esteemed. Honor people that are married around you. Ask questions of them. Find those that have good marriages and honor them for it.  Keep the marriage bed pure for a lifetime. One man and one woman for a lifetime. Then, if you adopt these beliefs decided how you get there and live them out for the rest of your lives. 

I like to give the illustration of the “US BUS”. In the bus are scripture, experience, tradition, reason and emotion. Scripture is in the driver’s seat of the bus with tradition next to him.  Experience or your experiences are not the authority even though they are on the bus. The experiences on the bus are there but they do not determine that what happened to me will happen to you. 

People have changed what they believe about marriage. They have tried to change sexuality and sexual orientation and move scripture out of the driver’s seat and move experiences they have had from their family or extended family to the driver’s seat. You cannot do that because those experiences are not the authority. 

You hear it in the conversations of decisions that they have made about marriage. But sexuality, gender, sexual orientation scripture is in the driver’s seat. Experience is important but it is not the authority and driving the bus.   Reason is on the bus also. You must use it to get through things logically. Now emotion is on the bus also. People use emotion and say it sounds good, so they move it to the driver’s seat. 

Emotion for most couples is one that they have in the driver’s seat and all the other passengers on the US bus are in the back. So be careful.  

Factor #2  Decide what you believe about each other. Honor recognizes worth it does not determine it. Honor is the decision to esteem someone as highly valuable. 

Honor each other. You must honor your mate. Esteem each other and highly valuable. Honor recognizes worth it does not determine it. 

Nothing I say or do can determine your value it can’t add or take away from it. When your mate speaks words of honor and high value over you it just confirms what God has put in them by recognizing the worth that is in you by God because you are an image bearer of God. 

Honor is the decision you make and it’s not about what the other person can do or not do or has done or not done. Honor is based on they are an image bearer of God and they automatically get value. 

Factor #3 Eradicate the kid centered home. Prioritize marriage. I cannot say this enough. When the stage of life hits you with kids you will go through the stages of kid life: baby stage, toddler stage, potty trained, in school, driving, out of the house. 

You keep saying you will enjoy life in the next season or stage. But you need to enjoy it in the season or stage you are in. 

But you will have to prioritize this even with kids in the home. You will need to learn the role of husband and wife and the role of children. It is very different than most people think. 

Factor #4 Prioritize quality time. Every marriage needs daily delay, weekly withdrawal and annual abandon.  Figuring out what that looks like can be challenging for some. But you both need a daily 15-20 min eyeball face to face kid free tech free, in a room and talk to each other like a business meeting every day. When you first come home from work that is not a great time for daily delay.  

Weekly withdrawal is a date nighttime set aside to go out and date each other like you did before you got married. People say we got kids and no money. You will have to find ways to get creative for this.  But budget this so you will have this because you need to do this. 

Annual abandon is your out of town vacation leave. This needs to be a priority for you. 

Factor #5 Have the LUVE talk. The LUVE talk is: Listen, Understand, Validate, Empathize 

Learn to listen is: incline your ear give ear less of mouth and listen to your spouse distraction free time 

Understand: repeat back to them word for word to make sure you understand what they said. Then ask great questions. Follow up your listening with a question. 

Validate: this is not problem solving this is the stamp you get on a parking stub saying you were here. Validate what they said and be present. Be there. 

Empathize: this says you are hurting and that matters to me. Your pain matters to me. Listening does not mean I agree with you and to disagree doesn’t mean I hate you.

Factor #6 Recruit Great backup Singers. Every marriage is a duet in need of great backup singers. We all have that jaded friend or family member who is against marriage and not honoring of it. They speak down on marriage and maybe even yours. They have to go! They are the bad back up singer.

Find people that can advocate for your marriage and speak life into your marriage and speak life to you as a couple. Find someone that can advocate for you the couple not the spouse only. There are people you will need to turn up or turn down and some mute all together. 

Factor #7 Lighten up and laugh out loud. Learn to laugh with your spouse. Simply put. Laugh together over any and everything. 

Finally, enjoy each other for the days are short.