Microtips for Marriage #1: Password Affirmations

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3 August 2013 by thaliakr

Here’s a tiny thing I do that helps my marriage, most days of the year.

My WordPress and Facebook passwords are based on sentences that remind me of how much I love my husband and our commitment to each other.

Some long-lost clever article introduced me to a handy way of making up multiple, ‘strong’ passwords without forgetting them (though xkcd may disagree). Make up a sentence, then take the first letters of it, make one or two of them numbers, and you’re set. So, for example, ‘Having Lots of Passwords Is Stupid’ becomes the password ‘hlop1s.’

I guess you can have an adaptable version for the millions of sites that make you login, something like ‘This Is My Password For Amazon’ would be ‘t1mpfa’ and you could have ‘t1mpfbd’ for Book Depository (don’t use those ones, though!).

So using that method, I have phrases about my husband and my marriage for sites I log into often. On most days I am prompted by internet addiction to stop and think something kind and positive about him. It’s handy.

This kind of microtip is by no means the most important thing for our marriage. Without well-practised communication, conflict resolution and intentional kindness, a password won’t get you to your silver wedding. But sometimes these little things can add up, and I’m always a sucker for a life hack.

‘Marriage’ is part of my life, and it alliterates with ‘microtip,’ but I hope it goes without saying that the tips in this series could be helpful in a variety of relationship contexts.

If you’ve got a relationship microtip to add, either pop it in a comment below, or contact me to provide a short guest post in this series.

This is the first in an occasional series on little things that can make important relationships better. Check out part two here and the series list here.

PS: Have you visited the Sacraparental Facebook page recently? It’s full of extra links, thoughts, resources and conversations as well as alerts when there’s a new post here. Check it out and invite your mates if you like what you see.

PPS: I also have a ‘Marriage and Relationships’ Pinterest board you might like to follow if you’re that way inclined :)