Goal Setting For Couples

Setting goals as a couple may help you revitalize and increase your relationship satisfaction. Standing water stagnates, moving water remains fresh. The difference between standing water and running water is motion. Setting and working towards goals helps you add motion to your relationship as you consciously work toward and create the life you want for yourselves.

Goal setting for couples:

When setting your couple goals, you may want to consider these areas: mental, emotional, physical, family, social and spiritual. You can have goals for personal and couple growth, finances, vacations, and a myriad of other things. Your couple goals need to align with both of your values and they should be something that you can both get excited about working together to accomplish.

Having a sense of purpose in life tends to increase your happiness. Making and working toward goals can increase that sense of purpose. Make goals that are attainable, but not too easy. You want to aim for something that will make you stretch. Remember to celebrate the little successes along the way and celebrate achieving your goal.

10 Steps To Achieving Your Couple Goals:

1. Brainstorm ideas—at this point there is no judgment or poo pooing allowed. Write down every suggestion.

2. Talk about your ideas—look at this as a way to get to know your partner better. Spend an evening talking, replace the inclination to judge or discourage with curiosity.

3. Each of you choose your top three goals. If you happen to have overlapping goals, great, you have a place to start. If you don't have overlapping goals then each of you choose one goal from your partner's list of top three goals to work on as a couple.

4. Record either the overlapping goals or the two choices from the other's list of three goals. Remember to review your goals frequently. You may want to post them somewhere you will see them often.

5. Decide on the first step that will move you toward reaching your goal and proceed to work on it. Remember couple goals means working together.

6. Choose a time to sit down together to evaluate your progress.

7. Decide on the next step to take toward reaching your goal and do it.

8. Repeat steps 6 and 7 until your have accomplished your goal.

9. Celebrate! Don't forget to enjoy the process.

10. Choose new goals and repeat the process from step 1 (you could use your original brainstorming list or you could create a new list).

Achieving goals is great, but remember the process of working together is equally or more important than the results. The process of setting and working together to achieve common goals will strengthen your bond to each other and make your relationship a more vibrant and satisfying place to be.

Division of Responsibility

Division of Responsibility

A frequent bone of contention for couples is the perceived unfairness of the division of responsibility. The following is a simple self-monitoring form to help you keep track of the time you spend on household responsibilities and to estimate the amount of time your partner spends on these responsibilities. When you each do this and compare results you can end up with some interesting insights.

The goal is not to start a fight. The goal is to gather information, be open minded and look for ways to either make the division of responsibilities more fair, or to see it more accurately.

Self Monitoring Chart

Responsibility	Your Time Spent/Week	Estimate of Partner's Time/Week
Working outside the home
Commuting
Preparing Food
Doing Laundry
Cleaning House
Shopping for Food & Necessities
Budgeting & Paying Bills
Caring for Children
Helping Children with Homework
Taking Children to Activities
Household Repairs
Home Improvements
Repairing the Car
Financial/Legal Matters
Caring for Parents or In-Laws
Schooling
Organizing Vacations
Shopping for Gifts
Feel free to add your own

Financial Stability Preparing for Hard Times

Financial Stability Preparing for Hard Times

Financial difficulties and hard times can put a lot of stress on your relationship. Decide now that you will work together to prepare and to handle any difficulties that may come your way. The following are three tips to get you started:

1. Be Prepared: Hoard a Little

You may have to do this over time, but try to get to the point where you have a two month supply of the necessities. Enough food that you could feed your family for two months without having to go to the store if need be. Don’t forget toilet paper. Every time you shop for food and necessities, take home a couple of extra things and start your own personal stock pile. The strain on your family will be far less when you are prepared.

2. Start Saving

Putting some money away, will help you to be prepared if the worst should happen and you find yourself unemployed for a period of time. If you haven’t already, start putting at least 10% of your income away for a rainy day. Chances are the rainy day could come sooner than you think. Build up your savings until you have at least enough to pay your bills and survive for several months. Having some cash on hand hidden in a safe place is also a good idea, especially in the event of bank failures. Again if you are prepared for the worst then you will be less stressed. This is not something to get frantic or fanatical about, just start saving what you can.

3. Spend Less Than You Earn

If you spend less than you earn you will have financial stability and the peace of mind that comes with financial stability.

If your income is reduced for some reason, reduce your spending accordingly. Downsize to a home that you can afford the payments on immediately. This may be less convenient, but the peace of mind will be worth it. And when your income increases it will be far easier to upgrade when your credit rating is still intact.

Consider the things that you regularly spend money on and be creative in finding ways to reduce the cost of each. There may be some that you can eliminate altogether and others that you can buy less of or find a less expensive way to do the same thing.

Avoid debt wherever possible. Credit card debt is particularly deadly. Avoid putting anything on a credit card that you do not have the money to pay. The outrageous interest rates add up quickly and you can end up drowning in an unpayable debt. If you already have credit card debt, pay it down as quickly as you can. If possible get a line of credit or some other lower interest loan to pay off your credit card, then destroy them if you cannot control them. Pay off all debts as quickly as you can. When hard times hit, it will be far easier if you are not carrying a heavy debt load.