MarriageThe Marriage Meeting
A free guide to running a marriage meeting every other week.
It’s the agenda Melissa and I use: a simple framework to help you check in regularly, handle the logistics, and keep small issues from becoming bigger ones. Eleven pages, free.
Is this you?
You run a tight meeting at work and find out about Thursday’s plans on Thursday.
Money only comes up when something’s wrong.
Something’s been bugging you for three weeks and there’s never a good time.
Nothing’s wrong. You’re just a little further apart than last year.
Nobody did anything wrong. You just don’t have a set time to talk.
Six of the questions in the guide, to try tonight.
We run them in this order. Ask them out loud, one at a time, and let the other person finish.
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Emotional Check-In
What was a high for you over the past two weeks?
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Marriage Pulse
Where are you feeling tension, distance, or frustration?
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Express Needs & Support
Is there something I can do to help you feel more loved, supported, or understood?
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Work & Calendar
What’s coming up at work that could affect our family life?
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Household
Is anything feeling unfair, unclear, or out of balance?
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Budget
How are we doing with recent spending?
Three sections aren’t here: Center, which is a prayer to start; Compliment & Gratitude, one specific thing each; and the Close. They’re in the guide, with a page on how to have this conversation well.
Get the whole guide free.
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How to run the meeting
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Pick the night.
Every other week, same slot, on the calendar like an appointment you don’t casually cancel.
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Run it in order.
Nine sections, top to bottom. Something good gets said before anything hard does, and the hard stuff lands softer for it.
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Book the next one before you get up.
Slip one and the next is easier to slip.
Every other week, forty-five minutes to an hour. A hug, a kiss, a prayer at the end if that’s you.
Why Melissa and I started doing this
Melissa and I started this after realizing that most tension in marriage doesn’t come from big, dramatic blowups. It comes from small things stacking up. Miscommunications. Assumptions. Unspoken stress. Calendar surprises. Budget tension. Household stuff.
So we did the thing we’d do at work. We put a meeting on the calendar. Every other week we sit down and run the same agenda: how we’re each doing, how we’re doing, what’s coming up, where the money went. It’s not romantic. It’s practical. And it works.
And when we skip it, we drift. Not dramatically. Just slowly.
We started this because we needed it.
What we hear from couples
We’re fine. We just never actually talk.
Every big conversation happens at eleven at night, when we’re both done.
I found out about the trip from the group text.
We had a great date night and spent it on the calendar.
What changes when you meet every other week
The small stuff gets said while it’s still small.
You talk about money before it’s a problem.
Nobody’s calendar is a surprise.
You know how the other one is doing, not just what they’re doing.
Couples rarely drift apart all at once. It happens slowly, and slowly is hard to notice until you feel it.