It's hard to believe that there was genuinely a time before Donald Trump was president. While we're all used to the President's constant stream of tweets online, it wasn't always this way. Before Trump became the most powerful man on the planet, America had Barack Obama at the helm and the world seemed like a much more peaceful and balanced place.
Of course, one of the many great things about Obama was his genuine, loving relationship with his wife, Michelle. The couple were seen as the definition of "goals" by many people around the world and seem to be going strong to this day.
While every relationship is different, we're always searching for a way to make our companionship successful. And, even though he may be good at public speaking and leading a country, it turns out Obama is also pretty good at dishing out relationship advice.
Obama's former communications director, Dan Pfeiffer, described what it was like to receive relationship advice from the then-president in his new book, Yes We (Still) Can. Pfeiffer, who now co-hosts Pod Save America, wrote that on his last day at the White House in 2015, he discussed his future plans to Obama and told him that he was planning to move in with his then-girlfriend, Howli Ledbetter.
“So are you guys moving together? This is the one, huh?” Pfeiffer recalled Obama asking. Pfeiffer replied yes, and the president reportedly said that the “advice [he] gives everyone about marriage” is to ask yourself three questions about your potential spouse.
“Is she someone you find interesting?” Obama said. “You will spend more time with this person than anyone else for the rest of your life, and there is nothing more important than always wanting to hear what she has to say about things.”
Questions two and three were also pretty weighty, but easier to elaborate on. “Does she make you laugh?”
“I don’t know if you want kids, but if you do, do you think she will be a good mom?” Pfeiffer recalled the former-president asking.
“Life is long. These are the things that really matter over the long term.” Luckily for Pfeiffer, he answered all the questions in the affirmative.
“Howli is incredibly interesting and funnier than I am, and will be a phenomenal mom,” Pfeiffer claims to have told the then-president. “Sounds like she’s the one. Lucky you,” Obama responded.
Pfeiffer went on to marry Ledbetter in October 2016 and became one of four weddings to happen that year of a couple who had met while working for Obama.
“Obama was always very proud of the hundreds of relationships that had sprung from his campaigns and his administration,” Pfeiffer writes in the book.
You'd be hard-pressed to find a better matchmaker than Barack Obama, given that he and Michelle have recently celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary.
Speaking about what she believes makes them a successful couple, Michelle Obama told Ellen in 2015:
“What I’ve come to find is, you don’t sweat the small stuff.
“The journey that we’ve taken together, the fun we’ve had, the challenges we’ve faced, the two beautiful children that we’re raising — I kind of give him a pass now when he leaves his socks on the floor or tells that story for the one hundredth time and wants us to laugh at it as if we first heard it.”
So it seems like the key to the relationship is simple: answer Obama's three simple questions and don't get too annoyed when you find dirty socks on the floor.