As any architect or construction person knows, to build anything correctly, you need a firm foundation. This often looks like a slab of concrete, but that slab is the first step of building someone’s dream of a home or a business. This is true in marriage. To have a strong marriage, two people must lay the foundation. I asked Mark once if you could give our marriage a mission statement. What would it be? The purpose of this question was to see what we, as a couple, and individually see as the most important basic foundation of our marriage. Now, don’t get me wrong, there are questions prior to marriage that are absolutes and need to be decided on. Like other marriage counselors and coaches, I believe finances, number of children, career paths, and religion are often nonnegotiable to a person. Many marriages that ultimately fail started with “I thought I could change their mind about (insert nonnegotiable). So, these decisions are the mold for the foundation and deciding together. The values of your marriage are the cement slab that  everything else is built on. If you are reading this and are already married, it’s not too late to build your foundation, and sometimes those values change over time and need to be revisited. The purpose of the foundation is to have a strong base that you and your spouse can build on together.