I should first start out by saying that I am not a relationship expect. Second, I am not a trained counselour or anything of the sort. What I am is a married man who has disagreements with his wife and over time I have discovered what works, and what doesn't work in our marriage. It doesn't take an expert researcher to determine that during the rough times of your relationship or marriage, you can either get mad or attempt to work out your situations. In the end, I believe that the positive outweighs the negative.

If you are worried about the future of your marriage or relationship, you have plenty of company. There's no denying that when couples argue/disagree/fight/have spats it's a frightening time. More than half of all first marriages end in divorce. And interestingly enough 60 percent of second marriages are doomed to fail. What makes the numbers even more depressing is that no can point to one single thing that causes such an epidemic.

What makes a lasting marriage is a series of things: commitment, trust, honestly, fairness, and faith in a Higher Power. Following these things can result in a couple's ability to resolve the conflicts. This isn't sometimes an easy thing to do - but it's something that has to be done if you are looking at moving forward. It takes time. Some people advise moving in together before you get married to learn more about the person you are planning on spending the rest of your life with. Others say you should write lists often of the person you are involved with. This list should have your likes and dislikes and you should go over them often.

What really separates contented couples from those in deep marital misery is a healthy balance between their positive and negative feelings and actions toward each other.

Now, if you are in the middle of a troubled marriage, it can seem that your predicament is nearly impossible to sort out. But in fact unhappy marriages do resemble each other in one overriding way: they followed the same, specific, downward spiral before coming to a sad end. Being able to predict what emotions and reactions lead a couple into trouble is crucial to improving a marriage's chances. By pinpointing how marriages destabilize, I believe couples will be able to find their way back to the happiness they felt when their marital adventure began.

There are several disastrous ways of interacting that sabotage your attempts to communicate with your partner. As these behaviors become more and more entrenched, husband and wife focus increasingly on the escalating sense of negativity and tension in their marriage. Eventually they become deaf to each other's efforts at peacemaking.

One is criticism. On the surface, there may not seem to be much difference between complaining and criticizing. But criticizing involves attacking someone's personality or character rather than a specific behavior, usually with blame. Since few couples can completely avoid criticizing each other now and then, criticism often takes up long-term residence even in relatively healthy marriages. One reason is that criticizing is just a short hop beyond complaining, which is actually one of the healthiest activities that can occur in a marriage. Expressing anger and disagreement makes the marriage stronger in the long run than suppressing the complaint.

The trouble begins when you feel that your complaints go unheeded and your spouse repeats the offending habits. Over time, it becomes more and more likely that your complaints will pick up steam. With each successive complaint you're likely to throw in your inventory of prior, unresolved grievances. Eventually you begin blaming your partner and being critical of his or her personality rather than of a specific deed.

Next is contempt. Here me out here, what separates contempt from criticism is the intention to insult and psychologically abuse your partner. With your words and body language, you're lobbing insults right into the heart of your partner's sense of self. Fueling these contemptuous actions are negative thoughts about the partner--he or she is stupid, incompetent, a fool. In direct or subtle fashion, that message gets across along with the criticism.

When this happened, they ceased being able to remember why they had fallen in love in the first place. As a consequence, they rarely complimented each other anymore or expressed mutual admiration or attraction. The focal point of their relationship became abusiveness. Defensiveness is another of these areas of problem relationships. Once contempt entered their home, defensiveness isn't far behind. The fact that defensiveness is an understandable reaction to feeling besieged is one reason it is so destructive--the "victim" doesn't see anything wrong with being defensive. But defensive phrases, and the attitude they express, tend to escalate a conflict rather than resolve anything. If you are being defensive, you are adding to your marital troubles.

The first step toward breaking out of defensiveness is to no longer see your partner's words as an attack but as information that is being strongly expressed. Try to understand and empathize with your partner. This is admittedly hard to do when you feel under siege, but it is possible and its effects are miraculous. If you are genuinely open and receptive when your partner is expecting a defensive response, he or she is less likely to criticize you or react contemptuously when disagreements arise.

Finally there is stonewalling. Stonewalling often happens while a couple is in the process of talking things out. The stonewaller just removes himself by turning into a stone wall. Usually someone who is listening reacts to what the speaker is saying, looks at the speaker, and says things like "Uh huh" or "Hmmm" to indicate he is tracking. But the stonewaller abandons these messages, replacing them with stony silence.

Stonewallers do not seem to realize that it is a very powerful act: It conveys disapproval, icy distance, and smugness. It is very upsetting to speak to a stonewalling listener. This is especially true when a man stonewalls a woman. Most men don't get physiologically aroused when their wives stonewall them, but wives' heart rates go up dramatically when their husbands stonewall them.

Remember, these things are not the end of the line. It is only after they turn a relationship sour that the ultimate danger arises: Partners seize on powerful thoughts and beliefs about their spouse that cement their negativity. Only if these inner thoughts go unchallenged are you likely to topple down the final marital cascade, one that leads to distance and isolation. However, if you learn to recognize what is happening to your once-happy marriage, you can still develop the tools you need to regain control of it.

When you're feeling like you've had enough, make a deliberate effort to calm yourself. You don't want things to grow into something more severe. Taking a break from the problem eases the need to be defensive and to stonewall. It also undercuts the physical feelings that sustain the thoughts that maintain distress.

Learning how to calm down helps prevent unproductive fighting or running away from the important discussions you may need to have.

Listen to your partner. I cannot stress this enough. LISTEN to your partner. Don't just hear what is being said - seriously try to listen. Listening or speaking without being defensive helps to counter several destructive habits. If you happen to be a nondefensive listener, chances are it will make the cycle of negativity much less likely. And a nondefensive attitude on your part also helps to defuse the need to stonewall, particularly for us bruthas. But keep in mind that defensiveness is a two-way street; if you start speaking nondefensively, you will lessen your partner's need to be defensive.

Letting your spouse know that you understand him or her is also one of the most powerful tools for healing your relationship. It is an antidote to criticism, contempt, and defensiveness. Instead of attacking or ignoring your partner's point of view, you try to see the problem from his or her perspective and show that you think his or her viewpoint may have some validity.

Fortunately, in most relationships, there are ways of fixing things.

1. Try to make comments about the communication process itself, such as "Please let me finish, " or "We're getting off the topic, " or "That hurt my feelings."

2. Comment on what's happening while it's taking place, not afterward.

3. Remind your partner that you admire and empathize with them despite the conflict.

4. Use phrases such as "Yes, I see, " "Uh huh, " or "Go on." These are little psychological strokes at which stable couples are masters.

I hope I have kept your attention and wish you much happiness.