Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts Seven-Session Complete Resource Kit: Seven Questions to Ask Before---and After---You Marry

by Les Parrott III

You can do more than hope. Safeguard your relationship and build a love that not only goes the distance but fulfills your deepest dreams. More than a million couples have used the award-winning Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts (SYMBIS for short) to prepare for life-long love. Created by relationship experts Les and Leslie Parrott, Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts has become the gold standard for helping engaged and newlywed couples build a solid foundation for lifelong love. Tried and proven by counselors, churches, and individual couples worldwide, this complete, award-winning marriage prep program helps you acquire the knowledge and skills for spending a lifetime together. Sessions This is the group curriculum kit includes everything you need to host a small group for couples getting married or thinking about getting married. We suggest that each participating couple purchase their own copy of Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts Workbook?to get the most from the group. Kit

Genres: Marriage

195 pages, Library Binding

First published November 10, 2015

About the author

#1 New York Times best-selling authors, Les and Leslie. A husband-and-wife team who not only share the same name, but the same passion for helping others build healthy relationships. In 1991, the Parrotts founded the Center for Relationship Development on the campus of Seattle Pacific University - a groundbreaking program dedicated to teaching the basics of good relationships.

Married in 1984, the Parrotts bring real-life examples to their speaking platform. Their professional training - Leslie as a marriage and family therapist, and Les as a clinical psychologist - ensures a presentation that is grounded, insightful and cutting-edge.

The Parrotts are New York Times #1 Best Selling Authors. Their books include the award-winning Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts, Love Talk, Real Relationships, The Parent You Want to Be, The Hour That Matters Most and Crazy Good Sex.

Each year Les and Leslie speak in over 40 cities. Their audiences include a wide array of venues, from churches to Fortune 500 company board rooms. Their books have sold over two million copies in more than two dozen languages.

The Parrotts have been guests on many national TV and radio programs such as CNN, Good Morning America, CBS This Morning, The View with Barbara Walters, NBC Nightly News, and Oprah. Their work has been featured in USA Today and The New York Times.

Visit their website for lots of free resources at www.LesandLeslie.com

Reviews

[Jordan Brannan · Rating 1 out of 5]

About halfway through the book I read the line “if you are depressed, you are choosing to be depressed” and it hit me. This book is a bunch of self help bullshit masquerading as scientific literature. There is some helpful tidbits in here for sure, but it’s all framed from a single mindset of what a relationship should look like. The white, heterosexual, Christian relationship. Information ranges from unhelpful anecdotes from the Bible to downright dangerously unhealthy mindsets on how to treat your spouse.

The book also constantly berates you to buy more of their content with assessments and online courses all with the promise of everlasting love and companionship. The book is a contradiction in itself. Marriage is a muddled and difficult individualized experience that requires cultivation and dedication over decades- but they can solve all your problems if you buy their shit. Borderline Twin Flames level.

The book reads mostly like a commercial- giving enough vague information to spark an idea, but never following through with any in depth directions, solutions or examples.

Granted, I didn’t finish the damn thing. After around 75% I found myself just getting frustrated at how narrow minded of a read this was and decided to put it down for good. My first attempt at reading a self help book and likly my last.

[Cassie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this alongside a couple I was giving pastoral premarital counseling to. It had solid information and good ideas. There were practical application points and good personal examples from the authors’ own marriage and those of clients. It had easy-to-read chapters and was highly accessible. I appreciated the reflection questions at the ned of every chapter. One complaint I have is that the accompanying assessment that is said to enhance the experience of this book not only costs money but also requires finding an authorized facilitator. It felt a little like gatekeeping. There were also a few moments that I questioned whether this was written for currently married couples or those still engaged or considering marriage for the future. I felt that the focus on the gender gap between men and women and the messaging that “marriage is the best revealer of the nature of God” was a little heavy-handed. I know this is intended for people who want to be married or already are, but I think married people need a deeper understanding and appreciation for the value of singleness. I get it; not the point of this book, but there could still have been a tiny acknowledgement. Without it, this book falls a little bit into what I would consider the trap within Christianity of worshiping marriage.

The bottom line: Overall, I think this is a helpful guide and I will likely continue to use it with future couples with a few modifications.

— MY RATING CONSIDERATIONS —
(all out of 5)

Levity/Humility: 5
Information: 4
Transformation: 4
My Gut Feeling: 4
Total Stars: 4.25

[Benjamin Bartels · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read this book along with my fiancé as we are currently on the engagement season. This book was paired in our premarital counseling and I couldn’t imagine a better book to help focus our attention on personality, family, money, and more all from a Christian perspective. Thank you for the studies done and the SYMBIS assessment that went along with this! Many prayers over all those that continue to read this and save their marriage before it starts! GREAT read!

[Ashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fantastic book for couples getting ready to get married. The only reason I couldn’t give it 5 stars was because it didn’t really go in depth with anything.