I encourage you to begin your first lesson immediately after you receive the two Marriage Builders^® Home Study Courses in the mail. Don't wait until you have a break in your schedule, because if you're like most couples, you'll find there are no breaks. So when the courses arrive, drop whatever you're both currently doing, and complete the first step together.

Step 1. Plan time to complete the assignments of the first lesson

Take about fifteen minutes to look at both of your schedules for the coming week, and decide when you can complete the first lesson together. It will take between two to three hours to finish each lesson, so schedule three hours just in case you'll need the maximum amount of time.

The three hours do not have to be scheduled in one block. You can break them up into three one-hour sessions, or even six half-hour sessions. Or, you can schedule varying amounts of time during to week to accommodate other responsibilities.

Most people do not have an extra three hours in their week, so you may need to eliminate something you are currently planning to do. But whatever you've planned to do, this first lesson will turn out to be far more important to you.

Step 2. Complete the first lesson

Each of the two courses contains a lesson assignment book that will guide you through each lesson. So your next step is to read the assignments of the first lesson (for either course), and follow those assignments.

The first lesson introduces you to an essential requirement for the course: You must schedule 15 hours a week to be together, giving each other your undivided attention. That time must be spent trying to make each other happy, and avoiding anything that would make each other unhappy. The remaining lessons will show you how to achieve that objective. But first you must schedule time to practice, because without practice, you will not be able to change any of your habits. During those 15 hours you will be practicing essential marital habits.

Your 15 hours together should eventually turn out to be the most enjoyable time of your week. At first, though, you may find it to be the worst 15 hours of your week. That's because your habits have become so destructive. But with change, new habits will replace them, and you will look forward to your time together. By then, you'll be in love. So as you can see, you must schedule this time together, or none of the lessons will help solve your problems.

Step 3. Decide where you want to go next

To help you select a sequence of lessons that make the most sense, we will provide through email our Marital Problem Analysis. It lists the six Love Busters and ten important emotional needs, and asks you to rate them according to the problem that they cause in your marriage. A rating of 1 indicates the most pressing problems and 4 indicates those that are no problem at all. After you complete this form, I suggest that you tackle the 1s first, then 2s, then 3s. And I also suggest that you take turns deciding which lesson to do after one has been completed.

If you feel that abuse is so serious that you cannot possibly address your emotional needs before you stop hurting each other, then complete the first five lessons of Love Busters, which address abuse and control in marriage. After completing the assignments of those lessons, you may then decide to address unmet emotional needs by switching to the His Needs, Her Needs course.

On the other hand, if you feel that your neglect of each other's emotional needs is more serious than problems you may have with abuse, then complete only the first six lessons of His Needs, Her Needs, which address the four intimate emotional needs of affection, sexual fulfillment, intimate conversation, and recreational companionship. These lessons will also help you understand the importance of time for undivided attention, because without that time, these needs cannot be met. When you complete the assignments from those lessons, you can then begin the Love Busters course.

As you can see, the sequence of lessons should be determined by your most pressing concerns. Abuse may not be as great a problem for you as independent behavior (living parts your life as if your spouse doesn't exist) or dishonesty. So I encourage you to tailor the courses to your advantage, completing lessons that are most relevant first. But eventually, you should complete all twenty-four lessons, taking them in any order that works best for you.

The first lessons are the most difficult to complete

Each of the twenty-four lessons you complete will make it easier to complete the remaining lessons. That's because the more needs you meet, and the less you do to hurt each other, the easier it is to meet other needs and avoid hurting each other in other ways.

So it goes without saying that the first few lessons will probably be the most difficult for you. In fact, you may find that it's only when most of your marital problems are solved that you'll actually feel like doing what it takes to solve your marital problems. Until then, you will have to force yourselves to do the right thing.

For example, it's very hard to avoid abusive habits when important emotional needs are not being met. But it's also very hard to meet important emotional needs when abusive habits persist. If you could somehow stop being abusive and start meeting each other's important emotional needs all at the same time, both would be much easier to achieve.

But these two problems (abuse and emotional needs) cannot be completely solved simultaneously, and you must start somewhere. But which should you address first? Should you eliminate abuse before you are meeting each other's emotional needs, or should you try to meet each other's emotional needs before you eliminate abuse? Either way, the first few lessons will be particularly difficult to complete.

How long will this take?

Most couples take an entire year to complete all the lessons because some problems require more than a week to adequately address. So be certain you have a good plan to overcome one problem before you tackle another.

But you should not expect to completely solve a problem in the week or two that you are completing a lesson. It should be used only to put a plan into action that will eventually solve the problem. That's because the solution to each marital problem will require a change in habits, and new habits usually take months to create. However, if you stop following the plan before the problem has been solved, you should immediately return to that lesson.

I mentioned earlier that the first few lessons may be difficult to complete, because the more problems you have, the harder it is to motivate yourselves to solve any of them. But if you commit yourselves to completing the first few lessons, and doing what I suggest, each lesson will become easier for you as you grow in your love for each other.