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Positive and negative sentiment override is a fascinating concept. After studying this topic developed by Gottman, I began to sift through the relationships of couples in my life that I am close to. I feel like most of the couples I know have positive sentiment override due to their good relationship friendships. My sister Carley and her husband Nathan have seemed to have mastered positive sentiment override. They have been married for 7 years. They have a beautiful relationship based on a friendship that began before they got married and has only gotten better over time. They have two children, but they still make one another a priority. They do this by going on dates, doing things for one another, and spending time together once their kids have gone to bed. I am in a happy marriage myself, but I find inspiration from the example set by my sister and her husband.
              I have learned that friendship is the keystone in a marriage. In MY marriage. I got married at a young age to someone I had only known for a few months. Today, we have a beautiful marriage and two amazing kids. However, I feel very lucky that we were able to establish an amazing friendship over time because it seems now that we hardly knew each other when we got married. We were very excited about the idea of marriage and we were in love. But the friendship came after the marriage. If we did not have the close friendship that we do, our marriage would have been over a long time ago. It can be hard to cohabitate with someone when you are both used to doing things a certain way your entire lives. A marriage depends on a friendship to keep it positive and uplifting. It relies on the friendship to help get one another through the hard discussions and the challenges that life brings.
              Mosiah 3:19 talks about how one overcomes “the natural man”. It explains that one must become like a child- submissive, meek, and full of love. My first thought was that we must not be prideful. It’s hard to not be prideful when we are wrong in our marriage. It’s hard to admit that we’ve made a mistake. But if we are able to become humble, meet, submissive, full of love, and let go of our pride, we will be able to let go of the natural man inside of us and be able to connect to our spouse.

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