Understand God’s purpose for marriage. God’s goal for your marriage isn’t your mutual happiness.  It’s much more than that: God wants to use your marriage to help you become more like Christ. An important part of that growth will happen when you and your future spouse encounter challenges, so don’t expect your marriage to be easy and free of pain.  Realize that, if your goal for marriage is just grabbing happiness, what will happen to your relationship when one or both of you isn’t happy? 

Happiness is a temporary state that comes and goes as circumstances change – and you can count on the fact that your future spouse will sometimes let you down and make you feel unhappy.  But the joy that God offers you if you invite Him to use your marriage to transform both of you will last through any circumstances. 

Go into marriage committed to learning how to love each other as Christ loves you.  Don’t waste your time and energy looking for fulfillment from any source other than God Himself – your ultimate satisfaction will always come through a love relationship with God.  If you mistakenly look to your future spouse to fulfill you, you place a burden on your future spouse that he or she can’t bear.  So go to God to have your needs met.  Take good care of yourself spiritually, emotionally, mentally, and physically, so you’ll be in good shape to love your future spouse in healthy ways. 

Evaluate your expectations.  If either you or your future spouse are harboring unrealistic expectations, your relationship can suffer from frustration, disappointment, and conflict.  So decide to claim, feel, recognize, understand, evaluate, and express your expectations clearly – before they lead to significant problems in your relationship.  Discuss each other’s expectations for at least these areas:

• sexual relationship;
• handling finances;
• social life or friends;
• matters of recreation or how to spend leisure time;
• household tasks; marital roles;
• religious matters;
• demonstration of affection;
• ways of dealing with in-laws;
• goals, philosophy of life, careers; and
• making major decisions. 

For each expectation, ask: “Is this expectation supported by objective reality? Is it objectively true that he or she should act this way?”, “Am I hurt in any way if this expectation is not fulfilled?”, “Is this expectation essential to the attainment of any specific goal I have for my marriage?”, What does this expectation do to my future spouse’s perception of me?”, and “Does this expectation help me achieve the kind of emotional responses I want for my spouse and me in marriage?”  Let go of unrealistic expectations, and approach your future spouse in respectful ways about valid expectations.