Gratitude’s transformative power is no secret – studies consistently show that practicing gratitude leads to increased happiness, better health, and higher life satisfaction. But within the context of marriage, the act of expressing appreciation goes far beyond simply good manners or even just saying “thank you.”
Scientific research reveals that couples who make a habit of consistently expressing gratitude and appreciating one another have higher levels of marital satisfaction, greater resilience to stress, better conflict resolution skills, and an overall higher sense of well-being in their relationship.
Expressing sincere appreciation for your spouse isn’t just a nice thing to do; it’s a crucial ingredient for fostering a deeper emotional connection, intimacy, and joy in your marriage. In our world of constant busyness and distractions, taking the time to slow down and intentionally appreciate your partner can be revolutionary.
This gratitude practice isn’t about keeping score or obligating reciprocation – it’s about cultivating a positive mindset that nurtures the love between you.
In this blog post, we will explore practical ways to make the sharing of daily appreciations a habit, including what to appreciate, how to express it meaningfully, navigating difficulties, and leveraging gratitude to spark greater intimacy. This guide isn’t just about better manners; it’s a roadmap for unlocking a profoundly positive shift in the way you experience your marriage.
The “What” of Appreciation
1. Not Just Actions, But Qualities
When expressing appreciation to your spouse, go beyond simply acknowledging the things they do for you or your household. While it’s certainly important to appreciate concrete actions like making dinner, doing the laundry, or taking care of the kids, also make an effort to appreciate the inherent qualities and characteristics that make your partner who they are.
Phrases like “I love your sense of humor and how you can make me laugh no matter my mood” or “I so admire your determination and work ethic” validate the core of your spouse’s identity. This deeper level of appreciation fosters a sense of being truly seen, understood, and cherished as a whole person.
2. The Specificity Matters
There’s nothing wrong with an occasional heart-felt “I love you,” but those generic phrases lack the punch and thoughtfulness of a specific, detailed appreciation. Statements like “I loved how you comforted me and gave me a shoulder to lean on when I was really upset about the situation at work” or “Thank you for always making my favorite meal when you know I’ve had a tough day” make your partner feel recognized in a much more profound way.
They understand that you’ve paid attention, that those little actions did not go unnoticed, and that you care enough to articulate why those things mattered to you. This level of specificity reinforces that your partner is deeply known, valued, and understood by you.
3. “Micro-Appreciations”
To build a steady habit of appreciation, train your eyes and mind to actively seek out and notice all the small, positive things your spouse does throughout each day.
Instead of unconsciously dwelling on the things they didn’t do or the areas where they fell short of your expectations, make a conscious effort to observe even seemingly minor acts of care, kindness, and helpfulness.
Notice the way they make your coffee each morning just how you like it, the silly jokes they tell to make the kids laugh, the patience and understanding they show a stressed coworker, holding the door open for a stranger with their arms full.
Verbalizing these “micro-appreciations” might seem insignificant, but they create a steady stream of positive emotional deposits into your relationship’s bank account. By actively looking for the good, you rewire your brain to focus on appreciation rather than criticism.
The “How” of Sharing Appreciation
1. Methods to Match Your Style
There is no single prescribed “right way” to go about expressing appreciation to your spouse. Different methods and modes of delivery will resonate more strongly based on your unique personalities, love languages, and communication styles as a couple.
The most important factor is that the appreciation is delivered with authenticity and sincerity – your partner should genuinely feel and believe that you thoughtfully meant what you said or did. Here are some possibilities to spark ideas:
- Verbal appreciations: The most straightforward and simple, stating your appreciations out loud directly to your partner can be incredibly powerful, especially when eye contact is involved. However, the effectiveness of verbal appreciations hinges on your tone, timing, and context clues demonstrating true thoughtfulness behind the words.
- Handwritten notes: Sometimes the spoken word just doesn’t quite convey the full depth of your feelings. A handwritten note or card hidden in a lunchbox, left on the bathroom mirror, or placed on their pillow carries extra resonance and allows your spouse to revisit and internalize your kind words multiple times.
- Small, thoughtful gifts: While expensive grand gestures make an impression, oftentimes the tiniest, most personal gifts are what speak to the heart. Leaving them their favorite snack bar with a loving note or picking up that book they mentioned months ago shows you were truly listening.
- Acts of service: Taking care of chores, errands, or tasks that your partner usually handles or dislikes doing can be a powerful demonstration of love in action. Even something as simple as drawing them a bath after a long day or giving them a foot massage communicates appreciation through intentional care and service.
2. Make It a Tiny Habit
Here’s one of the most crucial tips – aim to share at least one heartfelt appreciation with your spouse each and every day, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant. Set a phone alert or calendar reminder if needed.
As this becomes a consistent habit, you’ll find yourself more naturally attuned to opportunities to verbalize appreciation throughout each day without prompting. Over time, that steady trickle of expressed gratitude becomes a powerful river nourishing the love between you.
3. The Appreciation Jar (Optional)
A fun way to make appreciation more tangible is to designate a special jar, bowl, or box as your “Appreciation Container.” Whenever one of you thinks of something you appreciate about the other, no matter how big or small, jot it down on a slip of paper and deposit it into the jar.
Then, periodically take time as a couple to open up the jar together and read through all the reasons you each feel genuinely appreciated. This simple ritual serves as a beautiful bonding experience and visible reminder of all the love between you.
When Appreciation Feels Difficult
While developing a habit of daily appreciation sounds straightforward, it’s important to note that there will inevitably be days and seasons when this practice feels monumentally difficult.
Life gets messy – periods of high stress, unresolved resentments, crippling self-doubt, or simply feeling emotionally depleted can temporarily cloud your ability to shift into a mindset of gratitude. Maybe you’re harboring frustration towards your spouse over a recent conflict.
Or perhaps circumstances have left you depressed and struggling just to get through each day. Whatever the reason, sometimes even the mere thought of mustering up feelings of appreciation for your partner seems impossible.
1. It’s OK to Not Feel Instantly Grateful
When you find yourself grappling with these periods of difficulty, self-compassion is key. It’s normal and natural for your flow of appreciation to ebb and wane based on the challenges of life you’re navigating at any given moment. One of the biggest pitfalls is to guilt or shame yourself when you recognize your current lack of gratefulness.
That negative self-talk only breeds more toxicity and resentment. Instead, remind yourself that this is just a temporary season – that your capacity for appreciation will return with time and conscious effort.
2. Start with Yourself
On days when you just can’t seem to conjure up appreciations for your spouse no matter how hard you try, see if you can find things to gently appreciate about yourself first.
That might sound strange, but when you take a moment to appreciate your own inherent strengths, the effort you’re putting forth, and the circumstances you’ve persevered through, it primes your mind to start viewing the world through a more positive filter. This makes it at least a bit easier to then extend that perspective of appreciation outward towards your spouse.
3. Focus on the Effort, Not the Outcome
Did your spouse accidentally burn dinner tonight while trying an overly-ambitious new recipe? Was the house left a mess after their best efforts to tidy up before your parents arrived? In moments like these, make the conscious choice to shift your focus away from the unsatisfactory outcome, and instead appreciate the positive intention behind their actions.
Reframing the situation this way reminds you that your partner tried to do something caring or helpful for you, even if the results weren’t exactly what you’d hoped for. This perspective preserves space for gratitude and strengthens your resilience as a couple.
Turning Appreciation into Intimacy
While making a habit of daily appreciation provides innumerable benefits for the overall health and positivity of your marriage, it also serves as a gateway for nurturing deeper intimacy – both emotional and physical.
When you practice voicing appreciations through a lens of vulnerability and attentiveness, it strengthens the heart-to-heart connection between you and your spouse in powerful ways.
1. The “Appreciation Conversation”
As a couple, make a ritual of scheduling periodic one-on-one “Appreciation Conversations,” where the sole purpose is to take turns sharing the appreciations you each hold for one another. Treat this as sacred time by eliminating distractions like TV, phones, or other diversions.
Make direct eye contact with one another, hold hands, and go beyond simply reciting the routine niceties you might normally exchange. Use this intimate space to voice appreciations that normally go unspoken – the ways your partner inspires you, the character strengths you most admire, the specific moments when their care for you made you feel so cherished.
Let your vulnerability flow and do not shy away from expressing the full depth of what you appreciate in your spouse’s heart and soul. This extraordinary level of attunement and presence elevates the conversation into a transcendent experience of bonding on a profound level.
2. Responding to Appreciation
When your spouse expresses heartfelt appreciations towards you during these special conversations, resist the impulse to deflect or downplay their kind words with self-deprecation or flippancy.
That invalidates and cheapens the gift they’re offering you. Instead, simply receive each appreciation with open grace, eye contact, and a response like, “Thank you for sharing that, it means so much to me to hear that about myself.” Or you could say, “I’m deeply touched that you took the time to put those feelings into words.”
Affirming your gratitude for their perspectives reminds them that you truly value how they experience you as a person. It circulates the energy of appreciation back towards your spouse and helps cultivate a self-reinforcing cycle of positivity.
2. Appreciation as Foreplay
Sharing daily appreciations doesn’t have to be limited solely to emotional and intellectual substance. Another beautiful element of this practice is that it can organically prime you and your partner for greater physical intimacy and connection as well.
When we’re intentionally tuning in to appreciate qualities like our spouse’s attractiveness, humor, intelligence, strength, playfulness, and so on, it shifts our state of consciousness away from the routines and distractions of daily life and into a mindset of cherishing who our partner is at their core.
This adjustment in focus and energy helps set the stage for deeper marital intimacy by stoking the flames of desire, romance, laughter, and playful affection between you. What begins as a heartfelt outpouring of appreciation has the power to transition into something much more sensual and physically intimate.
Conclusion:
Developing the transformative habit of consistently expressing sincere, heartfelt appreciations to your spouse is indeed a journey, not a destination with a finite arrival point.
There will be seasons when verbalizing gratitude feels relatively effortless and natural, and other periods when it requires your deep reserves of love, patience, and perseverance. It’s important to extend yourself compassion throughout this continual process of building the appreciative muscle.
On the more challenging days, the objective is progress over perfection. The rewards of this daily appreciation practice are profound, but they are also cultivated over time through your steady commitment to adopting a mindset of intentional gratitude.
Ripple Effects
As your marriage becomes increasingly enriched by the steady stream of appreciation flowing between you and your spouse, you’ll likely notice a beautiful ripple effect impacting all other areas and relationships in your life. The more your practice gratitude in your primary partnership, the more your eyes will instinctively be trained to seek out the positive around you elsewhere. You’ll start noticing opportunities to appreciate the little kindnesses from your children, family members, coworkers, even strangers.
That outward-radiating energy of appreciation has the power to inspire others to reciprocate in kind, creating an uplifting domino effect of goodwill. By seeding the soil of your marriage with appreciation, you harvest joy that permeates every corner of your life.
