So you just had the biggest day of your life and now you’ll live happily ever after, right?

Wrong.

It takes some time to get to the marriage point for some people. For some people, it doesn’t. But for everyone, it’s work after marriage. I haven’t met a couple that doesn’t require work to keep their marriage happy and successful.

The hardest part I think is learning to let go of your ego. The end goal is to be happy with the person and really progress together through life. Fights aren’t always worth being right. It’s really about choosing your battles.

We grow up in life learning to protect ourselves from the world. We learn to be tough and invincible so no one can hurt us.  No one warns us that that isn’t what works in marriage though. Part of being married is being vulnerable. It’s letting your guard down and accepting that you may not always be right. It’s accepting that sometimes even if you are right, you may have to let it go to move forward.

It’s hard not to fight and not to let things get under our skin. But what’s more important: being right all of the time or having a marriage that makes us happy?

This doesn’t mean to not address the problems. But believing that your significant other doesn’t have your best interest at heart is a problem. If you start with trust, it’ll be easier to get past the issues that come up. And trust me, a lot of issues always come up. Life happens. Finances, families, life curves. And if you have a strong partnership, it makes it so much easier to get through the tough times.

Marriage is hard work. That’s undeniable.

In the end, you just have to figure out how to work with the person that you have chosen to be your life partner. And that’s the start of a happy marriage.