I don't mean to be rude, but I think your comment illustrates the attitude prevalent in countries with 50% marriage failure rates. Your ideal is simply unsustai

I don't mean to be rude, but I think your comment illustrates the attitude prevalent in countries with 50% marriage failure rates. Your ideal is simply unsustainable and impossible. First: Are you married now (or have you been) and do you have kids? I'll assume you are married/committed but I'm not sure you are a parent, given your views. This is a tremendously important point to help frame this discussion. I fear you probably won't understand my points at all with out first hand experience. What you are saying isn't technically wrong, but it requires precise compromise in order to be successful. That's exactly what jasonlotito is saying: You can't get what you want all the time, especially with your partner, most certainly with your children. You and your partner need to understand, respect, and tolerate each other, first and foremost. Some people are simply incapable of doing this, period. Some people conflate this with making their life completely about the other person. Both of these people will be miserable regardless. For the rest of us though, simply understanding that statement means the marriage is a compromise - sometimes you get your way and your partner tolerates, sometimes you tolerate and your partner gets to do their thing, most often you are both getting your ways, as they are the same, but sometimes both of you are tolerating, for the good of the family/marriage. Of course, with children, that last point becomes a vast majority of your life. Kids are the centre of their worlds and don't really understand how to be anything else. It takes literally years to impact the knowledge that life is better when they look outwards towards others into their little heads. Until then, you and your partner will do a lot of tolerating in your lives. How well you can do this (and when not to) will pretty much define how successful a parent you will be. It's an approach governed by the exact opposite thoughts that you are presenting however: Child first, couple second, self last. Be clear than I'm not suggesting your entire life should be one of self-sacrifice, That doesn't work either. But it must be the last of your concerns 90% of the time if you are to make raising kids and marriage - especially marriage - work. Ensure the kids are alright (not necessarily that they get their way all the time), ensure your spouse is alright (happy wife, happy life after all) and ensure you are alright in that order, and you have a winning formula. Looking out for yourself first is a guaranteed path to conflict. It's very rare that you can do this and remain in sync with other people, even best friends and spouses aren't going to want to do the same things all the time. Your children will never want to do the same things as you in any consistent fashion, which is way most happy family spend time in parks during the day as opposed to bars late at night.