We all look for a secret recipe for a successful marriage, as if following those steps is going to give us the result we desire. The reality is that there is no such universal recipe for successful marriages. It depends on how you use the ingredients, the quantity and quality of them, the time and effort you invest and your personal touch. Every dish has certain key and basic ingredients and if they are missing, you cannot make it. 

In the same way, every marriage should have certain key elements which are extremely vital in order for it to be successful, joyful, nurturing, caring and expansive. This is something I have personally discovered through my five and a half years of being married and creating a joyful, fun, kind and caring relationship with my husband that has contributed to my personal growth and expansion as well as his.

So what are these key elements you wonder? Here is a simplified list. Please be aware that a relationship always begins with you. So these elements can be used to create a loving relationship with you first before you create it with your partner! It is only when you have a nurturing relationship with you personally, you can bring that element to your marriage. 

1. Be grateful. Everything begins with gratitude! Practice being genuinely grateful for your partner, for their presence and contribution to your life. Acknowledge their greatness and their gifts. Take some time out each day to be and express this gratitude. In this process, do not forget to be grateful to yourself! Acknowledge your gifts and greatness and celebrate YOU! When was the last time you said 'thank you' to yourself? Maybe now is the time for it. Only when you are truly grateful for what you already have in your life, you can attract more of it. 


2. Do not judge. Have you ever been around someone who doesn't judge you? What does it feel like? Am sure you can get the energy of the peace and joy that exists in that space. Judgment is a killer and it always create separation. Every single judgment you have of your partner is like having an invisible wall that creates a separation between both of you. Gratitude and judgment cannot co-exist. So the more you are grateful, the less you judge and the more you feel connected to each other, creating oneness and communion. If you judge yourself, you are separating from you. When you are separated from you, can you truly create a connection and loving relationship with somebody else? Time to stop judging you! 


3. Never lose yourself. Embrace your authenticity and the difference that you are. Never give up aspects of you that define you as an individual. Marriage is a communion of two individuals who acknowledge their greatness and uniqueness and not try to bend, fold and compromise or give up themselves in order to fit in to other person's requirements or needs. If you have cut off parts of yourself in order to be in a relationship and you are not present fully, who will your partner connect to? Being your real self, is a great asset to a marriage


4. Give up the need to be right. Many marriages break because of people's need to be right and hold on to or prove the rightness of their points of view. There is nothing wrong about you and your partner having different points of view of about something. That's not a reflection of your compatibility. When your partner doesn't agree to your point of view, it doesn't make you wrong or him/her right. My husband and I always agree to disagree and we never have the need to impel or impose our points of view on each other. It is our way of honoring each other and it eliminates conflict, trauma and drama. Conflicts usually occur and continue because of one person's need to prove the rightness. If you are willing to be wrong in the other person's eyes, without judging yourself as wrong, there can be no conflicts and you can look at what else is possible that you have never considered.

Pratima Nagaraj is an author, speaker, hypnotherapist, transformational coach and an internationally known facilitator with the dynamic body of energy transformational work called Access Consciousness®. She travels the world facilitating workshops and sessions that empower people to shift and transform any area of their life that's not working for them, so they may create a life they truly desire. For more information, visit www.pratimanagaraj.com. Permission granted for use on DrLaura.com.