Be Your Partner’s Best Friend

True friends are forever. It is amazing how long we keep true friendships. From primary school age and across oceans, we take a feeling of belonging and connectedness with us and maintain friendships.

Divorcing is actually the end of a very special friendship. It is a friendship between partners and lovers. If we remember to treat our partners like we treat those special friends, it would probably make life much easier.

Friends are God’s way of taking care of us

We may have misunderstandings, disagreements and conflicts with friends, but we never forget the bond we have between us and we are always willing to work out our problems. Just like any friendship, marriage is a way for two people to complete each other.

In order for marriage to work, the couple needs to master the three functions of marriage: partnership, love and friendship. These three functions are fundamental to the success of every marriage. We talk a lot about sharing responsibilities, we talk about increasing the love, but it seems that often, the friendship is a little neglected. In fact, surveys reveal that if there is one thing that will enable a couple to weather even the toughest of times, it is friendship.

If you want to stay married for a long time, find a way to be your partner’s best friend.

The first step to success of the friendship in any marriage is to make sure you align your definitions with your partner’s. Here are some questions couples should ask themselves and then discuss with each other if they want to grow their relationship.

This post is part 14 of 34 in the series Save Your Marriage

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Global Free Hugs Day

The 19th of October (my birthday, how exciting) has been declared “Global Hugs Day”. Free huggers will be going out to streets around the world from 11am to 1pm local time, offering free hugs to all and spreading human warmth.

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The Right Age for a Sleepover

Girl in pajamas whispering to a boy in pajamas

This month, my 7-year-old daughter invited her friend to sleep over. Her mom, who had told me before she did not allow sleepovers, explained that she did not think the kids were ready for a sleepover until the age of 10. I then started to wonder whether there actually was a “right” age for a sleepover.

Many kids spend nights away from mom and dad and stay with other family members, right? If they are lucky (my kids are not), they have Grandpa and Grandma around the corner to make the sleepover a very special outing. If they are even luckier, they have cousins of the same age to spend holidays and weekends with.

But if kids have none of these, they depend on their parents’ perception of the “right” age for them to be able to sleep away from home.

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True Friends

When you decide to leave what you consider home and travel, you get to meet people, who would never have come into your life if you had not left. When people ask me about the emotional and social difficulties of moving from one place to another, I tell them that I get to meet wonderful people and that to help myself adjust to a new place, I tell myself that the new place has many true friends I have not met yet.

So how do you know your true friends?

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Two’s Company, Three’s a Crowd: See What Happens

There’s a famous saying “Two’s company, but three’s a crowd”. When you’re a parent, and you want to help your kids with their social life, it’s a good one to remember. Other odd numbers of kids are tougher than even, but three can get downright nasty.

Ronit and I grew up in small places, where life was fairly simply and people were very friendly. So whatever we did, we did with our friends. We rode our bikes with them, played sports with them, and splashed with them at the pool or in the puddles. We swung with them at the playground and very often invented new and exciting games and adventures with them.

So it’s only natural for us to want our kids to have friends too and enjoy similar warmth to what we felt as kids. We want them to develop their social skills and imagination (come on, say it with me “instead of spending all their spare time in front of the computer or the TV”).

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