Express your positive feelings about your spouse. Often.

Compliments, appreciation, awe, approval, encouragement, pride, acknowledgments. Share those often.

Why you would want to share your positive feelings.

1. Your spouse will want to spend time with you (not from a place of neediness). A person naturally seeks the company of those who think well of them. – The more someone senses appreciation from another, the closer they feel.

2. Your spouse will be more willing to listen to your ideas and perspectives. – When someone feels comfortable in the relationship, they are looking less to assert themselves, and more to working as a team.

3. Your spouse will make an effort for you. – When someone feels valued for who they are, they will make an effort not to spoil that image and will try to prove that image by acting accordingly.

4. Verbalizing the compliments and appreciation make them even more real. – You have to come up with the right words to say, so you are thinking more about those positive aspects.

5. When you compliment others, you view yourself as a generous and big-hearted person. – So, you increase your own self-esteem.

6. Your spouse will criticize you less. It’s harder to criticize someone who thinks so highly of you. – When someone feels appreciated, they feel less of a need to put the other down.