Tip Number One:  Marry for love and not for lust.  Love is a strong emotion that binds too people together and have lasting value to both parties.  Lust involve sexual organs and is entirely physical.  The physical side of love which is sex is great but is not the tide that binds when it come to seeking a long term relationship.  Love at first sight does exist but if must be felt by both party.  The relationship is no good if you fall in love and first sight and the person you fall in love with could care less about you.  There is no way to prove that love exists in the relationship except the person in receipt of love and the person who is loving.  Love means different things to different people.  If you have found a person who you are compatible with irregardless of what society or anybody thinks, then you have a good foundation of love.  Love is the main ingredient for a long term relationship.

Tip Number Two: A couple who have found trust between each other also has laid the foundation for a long term relationship. Trustworthiness is hard to come by because the ease of which some people find to hide the truth from a partner. A liar and a cheater will soon be found out and if you discovered that during the dating stage then you should not take such a relationship into marriage. Marriage is supposed to be the epitome of trust and you must trust the person who you marry. A good indication of a person's trustworthiness is the number of major or important promises that was broken. Also a credit check is a great indicator of whether he will be trustworthy in the marriage setting. Financial problem is the number one cause of divorces so you need to make sure that who you marry have a good credit score. This topic may be debatable because of the subjectivity of love and the objectivity of paying bills but credit scores is still a test of one's credibility.

Tip Number Three: Meet the Parents. The solidarity of the parent's relationship has a lot to do if the marriage is sustainable over the years. Most children would like to have a nice and long relationship as their parents. If your betrothed has a family that has those anniversaries that are as good as gold and diamonds, then you have a good chance of being in a solid relationship. Also, watch the way your soon to be husband treats his mother. If he is always endearing to her and treats her like a queen more often than not, he will treat you the same way. There is a sensitivity level of a soon to be groom who treats his mother with kindness and love. It mean that the propensity of domestic violence which can stop a relationship on a dime, will be null and void in your relationship. Look at these tender moments closely because you are looking for a long term relationship and do not want to be a contestant on the Jerry Springer show.

Tip Number Four:  Have fun together.  There is nother worse than to see a couple settle down in a routine of work, television. computer, dinner and bed.  You have got to keep the relationship  full of excitement and you do this by picking a mate who you throughly enjoys the company of.  If the guy is just boring and you think that you can change him with your bubbling personality.  You have to be careful because more often than not he will drag you down to his level and boredom and you will end up being a boring couple.  Boring couples last if both are satified with the relationsihp.  But most marriages last because they have decided to keep the spark in the relationship by redoing the activities that brought them together in the first place.

Tip Number Five: Plan on having a family. Children is what puts the substance in a marriage. Some people may agree but there is nothing like continuing family lineage with the addition of children to the marriage. Children are little extensions of you regardless of how bad you may think those teenage year are. Families are the staying power for longevity in marriage. Plan to complete your marriages with children. However, the decision to have children must be agreeable on all counts or disagreements will arise. Imagine, the wife having a baby and the baby being resented to adulthood for the procreation of the husband and the wife. Such actions of resentment would be unfair to the child and to the mother who would love the child, unconditionally. Talk the baby rearing situation between the two of you before you get married. Children may be so important to you that you may want to end the relationship if he decides that he does not want children. You would be wasting you time if he does not want children and you are stoic on having a boy and a girl. Marriages are for the long term if the two of you can be in agreement most of the time and especially on whether or not to have children.