The Marriage Hack (VIDEO)

“More and more of us
are increasingly dependent, increasingly focused on the spousal relationship at
the expense of this much broader social milieu we used to have.” – Eli Finkel

In this TEDx video, Northwestern University psychology
professor Eli Finkel explains how the nature of marriage has changed
dramatically over the last few decades. In particular, people today have fewer
close social connections outside of their marriages than ever before, which has
led us to expect more and more of our spouses in order to compensate. The end
result is that we are putting a lot of extra stress on our relationships, which leads to a seemingly inevitable decline in satisfaction over time. But is
there anything we can do to stem the tide and keep our relationships strong and
healthy?

Finkel presents some compelling evidence for an
intervention he calls “the marriage hack.” Basically, he demonstrates how
teaching couples to look at their conflicts
from an outsider’s perspective helps them to maintain higher levels of
relationship satisfaction over time. And the beauty of it is that this isn’t difficult to accomplish—indeed, Finkel argues that we may be able
to fundamentally change the trajectory of a couple’s relationship is as little
as 21 minutes per year! Check out the video below to learn more about “the
marriage hack” and what it could mean for your relationship.

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