Master Your Marriage

Has your spouse ever come to you hurt, and instead of hearing them out, you corrected how they said it? We're Robert and Sharla, married for over three decades and coaching couples through the same struggles we've lived ourselves. Once you start learning relationship tools, you start noticing every time your spouse isn't using them. And then it's so tempting to point it out. "That's a complaint, n...

Do you know exactly what bugs you about your spouse, but freeze up when it comes to saying what you actually want instead? We're Robert and Sharla, married for over three decades and coaching couples through the same struggles we've lived ourselves. Last week we talked about why so many of us don't ask for what we want. This week is the how. Most of us were taught to wait for our spouse to figure...

Do you wait for your spouse to figure out what you need, and then feel hurt when they don't? Or do you tell yourself it's not worth asking anyway? We're Robert and Sharla, married for over three decades and coaching couples through the same struggles we've lived ourselves. This week we start a new thread we're calling Loving Power: how to be strong and loving at the same time. Last week was about...

Do you get defensive the second your spouse says they're upset with you? Most of us do. We start correcting the facts, or we go straight to "poor me," and five minutes later nobody's talking about the original problem anymore. We're Robert and Sharla, married for over three decades and coaching couples through the same struggles we've lived ourselves. In this episode we talk about what Terry Real...

How Lifelong Lovers Cherish Each Other Differently - It is easy to look at someone else’s business, family, house, or marriage and decide ours is not enough. The longer we stay in that comparison, the blinder we get to the good that is already ours. In this episode we talk about cherishing as the practice that brings us back. We look at what cherishing actually means, why it is harder to name seve...

How Lifelong Lovers Keep Wanting Each Other Last week we kept talking about the work of stopping damage. That work matters. If contempt, unbridled expression, or defensiveness are running the house, you do not need a new date-night idea first. You need to stop the bleeding. This episode is about what comes after that. Couples can get better at conflict. They can learn to repair. They can stop doin...

Get the workbook that accompanies this series Last week we talked about borrowing a self. How many of us build a pseudo-self out of attention and approval — reassurance from a partner, praise from a boss, a degree, a title. Those boosters attach our worth to things we do not control. When the attention is stripped away, we don’t really know who we are. That is a recipe for more anxiety and more re...

Last week we talked about anxiety as a response to a real or imagined threat. How we make our partner the threat. How reactivity is the anxiety. This week is the question underneath that: why does their disagreement knock the floor out from under you? A lot of us don’t actually know who we are unless someone is reflecting it back. Praise. A title. Being busy. A spouse who validates us. A room that...

If you don’t think you have anxiety, this episode is probably for you. A lot of us hear “anxiety” and picture someone who worries all day and imagines every disaster. That is not how it usually shows up in marriage. In close relationships, anxiety often looks like defensiveness, shutting down, fixing, blaming, or making your partner the problem. In this episode, we reframe anxiety as a response to...

One of the smallest words in English can quietly change the emotional climate of a marriage. In this episode, we talk about the difference between “but” and “and.” “But” often cancels whatever came before it. “And” lets two truths stand side by side. This is not a dramatic new technique. It is a simple linguistic shift that helps couples stay on the same side of the problem — in hard conversations...

We just spent two episodes looking at contempt—the number one predictor of divorce. One of the clearest takeaways is this: empathy and contempt cannot live in the same room. When contempt is operating, we elevate ourselves. Disgust and superiority crowd out our capacity to stay present with the person we claim to love the most. And when we lose that presence, we start wounding each other without f...

Last week we named the problem: contempt is addictive, corrosive, and the #1 predictor of divorce. This week we take up the harder question—how do we actually walk away from it? We open with an honest look at whether it’s possible to keep a largely contempt-free marriage while still participating in a culture that runs on contempt. The short answer: not in any deep or sustainable way. Contempt is...

In this episode, we unpack one of the most destructive forces in modern relationships: contempt. Drawing from Arthur Brooks’ book Love Your Enemies , we explore why contempt is not just a communication problem—but an addictive pattern that is quietly eroding marriages, families, and our sense of belonging. We look at the difference between anger and contempt, the brain chemistry that makes contemp...

We’ve all heard (or said) those loaded words: “We need to talk.” For most of us, they immediately trigger defensiveness and dread. But what happens when conversations stop altogether? In this replay episode, we explore the difference between healthy silence and the damaging silent treatment , why it’s so harmful to your marriage, and practical ways to break the silence and start reconnecting. Whet...

Most of us get defensive without even realizing it — and it’s one of the fastest ways connection breaks down in marriage. In this episode, we explore why defensiveness is actually a self-esteem issue at its core. We break down how defensiveness shows up differently depending on whether you’re coming from shame (one-down) or grandiosity (one-up) , and why neither position allows for real repair or...

In this quick mid-week bonus episode, Sharla answers two listener questions from our current series on Real Self Esteem and the distortions of shame and grandiosity. We explore: Why you can feel confident and know your worth, yet still hear harsh critical voices from your parents How to pursue excellence and high performance without falling into grandiosity or one-up-ness The different “parts” of...

This is part two of our shame series. Be sure to listen to last week's episode for an introduction into shame and how it relates to self-esteem. In this episode, we go deeper into the real reason shame and grandiosity show up in our relationships. We explore how early childhood experiences shape a part of our psyche called the Adaptive Child — the part that learned to survive through fight, flight...

Most of us are walking around with a relationship to ourselves that is pretty dysfunctional — and we don’t even realize it. We bounce back and forth between shame and grandiosity, sometimes minute by minute, and this constant internal cycle quietly damages our marriages. In this first episode of our new series, we unpack what real self-esteem actually is, how shame and grandiosity act as two sides...

Many people do deep, sincere work in therapy and gain real insight into their patterns — yet they still find themselves repeating the same painful cycles in their relationships. In this episode, we explore why insight alone often fails to create lasting change and what actually helps us respond differently when we’re triggered. Drawing from the work of Terry Real and Relational Life Therapy, we un...

What if the secret to a thriving marriage isn’t avoiding conflict… but learning to lean into it? In this episode, Sharla and Robert explore NBA superstar Stephen Curry’s powerful marriage advice from his recent interview with Michelle Obama: “We don’t run away from the tension on the daily.” They unpack why this simple idea is backed by decades of research from John and Julie Gottman, Terry Real,...

BONUS EPISODE - FORGIVENESS MEDITATION TOOL! This guided Ho’oponopono meditation is a powerful companion to Episode 162: “When Is It Okay Not to Forgive? (And When It’s Not)” — and is especially helpful for married couples and partners working to strengthen their relationship. We strongly recommend listening to Episode 162 first. It provides essential context on what forgiveness really means in ma...

In this powerful episode of Master Your Marriage , Sharla and Robert Snow explore one of the most misunderstood topics in relationships: forgiveness . They revisit the subject with fresh insights, addressing common misconceptions, the crucial difference between forgiveness and reconciliation, and when it might actually be wise to move slowly on reconciliation — while still choosing internal peace....

In the final episode of our 3-part series on relationship repair, we’re focusing on one of the most practical and powerful tools for any relationship: quick, in-the-moment repairs . Even the happiest couples argue and experience moments of disconnection. What makes the difference isn’t avoiding conflict — it’s how quickly and effectively you repair those inevitable ruptures. In this episode, we ex...

Every conflict in your marriage gives you a choice: will you use it to deepen your connection and grow closer, or will you let it drive you further into resentment and disconnection? In this episode, we explore why genuine apologies are one of the most important repair tools in marriage. You’ll learn the science behind why apologies work, what happens when we refuse them or give fake ones, the neg...

Conflict isn’t the problem in relationships — it’s the hurt we cause and the lack of repair that slowly breaks them. In this first episode of our 3-part Repair Mini-Series, we’re breaking down why repair is the most important skill every couple needs. You’ll learn: Why avoiding conflict actually makes relationships more fragile How healthy couples actually have more conflict (and why that’s a good...