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This is our (my husband and I) final conversation about being easygoing, playful and fun together.
It’s a bit of insight into our relationship and we believe it’ll give you some inspiration into where your marriage can go.
I go through the final keys to making your marriage peaceful and walking through life in a state of calm, rather than rushing in a state of stress.
A couple of things you’d be interested to hear…
- how (and why) my husband responds when he’s watching a game (live) and he sees I’m upset. From him.
- why receiving an apology graciously is just as important as making one.
- when you’re more vulnerable, the spouse will be too!
- someone called me the “calmest person I’ve ever met”. I was grateful (and shocked), but this conversation may give a bit of insight into why.
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If you’d like to get my newly released on paperback Delight Your Husband: The Christian wife’s manual to passion, confidence and oral sex, go here!
If you purchase and then review on Amazon before Sept 1, 2019, you’ll receive free access to a $97 Masterclass!
transcript
0:02
Welcome to the delight your marriage podcast. This show where you hear from amazing and inspiring wives sharing their struggles, triumphs, and advice for this journey called marriage. Here’s your host belah. Rose.
0:19
All right, thank you so much for joining. This is belah. Rose. And I’m excited to bring you another episode. This is part three of How to Be easy going, how to transform your marriage. So cool. I was on a clarity call just the other day with a wife. And she was so impressed with our conversation, I felt really grateful that she was willing to share briefly her story and her feelings and where she wants to go. But one thing she said, which I was so amazed at is she said, You are extremely call, you’re probably the calmest person I’ve ever met. She said something along those lines. And I was taken aback, and also extremely grateful, because I’m not sure anyone who knows me well would say that, I don’t know. But I will also say, definitely, that could not be said of me. Years ago, I was very anxious and worried concerned. But I will say that I have grown in this area in a huge way, as a result of my marriage. And calm is the place we want to come into this world with isn’t it, we want to come from a place of being rested, refreshed, rejuvenated, don’t we, that’s when we can do our best work for God. So I encourage you to make your marriage easygoing, peaceful, so that ultimately, you can do the best for God. Before we dive into the part three of that, I want to announce something pretty exciting that in my book, delight your husband, the Christian wife’s manual to passion, confidence, and oral sex is right now on paperback, I’m holding it in my hand, people are already purchasing really exciting, it’s on Amazon, you can get it now. And if you do, go ahead and purchase and write a review on Amazon in the next, I think you’ve got three, I guess it’s four weeks from today, you’ll be having free access to a $97 value masterclass, where you can learn even more. So I encourage you to get on the train, as soon as you can to really learn and master your confidence and your passion. And really, I take you by the hand, I take a wife by the hand to really understand yourself, how you feel about intimacy walking you through that process. And then how he thinks about intimacy, what’s his mind like in this area? And ultimately, how do you apply all of that into what I call penny or oral sex for him because a lot of men, most men actually, like crave that more even than intercourse. And I encourage you, that’s actually a good thing, because it shows that you love him so, so deeply. So pick that up, delight your husband, I’ll have the link in the show notes. It is also on my website under Resources. Awesome, let’s go ahead and dive in on today’s session.
3:46
So we’re at part three of how to be easygoing in your marriage. And if you listen to part two, you’ll hear a lot of the reasons why and why my husband was so kind to share those things. And he has a lot of really good wisdom that I encourage you to go back and listen to. But here’s a few just keys I want to talk about that. I also want, if he doesn’t mind to comment on whatever He hears, and if he feels inspired, he’s welcome to We might have to do part four of this. But here are the things that I wrote that I think are really important. So one thing and you know that my husband and I have kind of been laughing throughout these conversations, because something that’s really important in our marriage is laughter and is playfulness. And you know, Joy is a fruit of the spirit but also the joy of the Lord is our strength. It’s a very important part of life. That I think a lot of times people don’t give enough credence to but don’t take yourself that seriously, you know, life There’s enough suffering and challenge in life, don’t let that be part of your marriage. Let it be fun and fluffy and, and a soft place to land. So here are some things that I think people make mistakes on when they find things that undermine playfulness and safety in their marriage, but they think it’s actually funny. So I want to just give you some guidance on what to take out of your marriage, and what to insert to make it more fun. Because you can only have fun when there’s safety in your marriage. So one thing that takes out the safety a lot of times is sarcasm. You’ve got to be very careful with sarcasm, because you can always be sarcastic. Always. But you know, sarcasm comes with a price a lot of times, you know, certainly there are times that I mean, anytime generally, when somebody is being genuine and opening up, you can sarcastically respond, does that does that invest in the safety of your marriage? No, it takes it out, it makes it so that it’s not safe to open up. So when you recognize that someone’s really revealing their heart, that is not the time to be sarcastic, it’s the time to bite your tongue and meet them in that vulnerability and be there and be present. Don’t be sarcastic and don’t tease. Because that’s very important when they have shown you their underbelly, the soft side of them. That’s not the time to be teasing or sarcastic. Because that’s going to pull you guys farther apart. So you guys can be playful, but not a mean teasing kind of playful. My husband and I play a pickup game of soccer about three times a week now, which is really fun if the weather’s nice. And I recognized we played all all winter long, actually, if you can believe it. These guys are hardcore every now and then I would miss one. But anyway. So the older gentlemen, which there may be like 35 to 60. Yeah, they’re pretty amazing. But they are just kind of, you know, kind and playful with each other. So somebody misses the ball, there’ll be like, ah, gee, gee, how did you miss the ball? You know, they’ll kind of do that. But then I noticed as the summers coming, some of the younger guys are coming. And there were some young guys that were there in the in the winter, but in the in the summer, now there are some new young guys coming. And what I noticed those younger guys doing is, is teasing each other. But in a mean way, like, what are you doing? Don’t be scared of them? Got, you know, how did you do that? Like this just like angry. It’s not, it’s not a friendly kind of way. And there’s lots of curse words. And come on idiot, like, those are the kinds of things they’re saying. And what I noticed it actually changes the whole culture of the soccer game, because instead of like just kind of light hearted
8:26
playfulness, it’s turned into this. Okay, we are really serious about this. And if you don’t get it perfect, you’re going to be trampled on with harsh words. And at least that’s what I sense though I’m especially sensitive, my husband is less sensitive. Anyway, he was kind enough to talk to those young boys. And they have since curbed quite a lot of their language. So anyway. But that’s one thing to be thinking about is, you know, is are your words investing in a positive culture in your marriage? Or is it detracting is it causing things to be less playful and less fun for either of you, because be thinking about, they might be more sensitive to you. And that doesn’t mean you need to call it out and say you need to toughen up, you know, that was no big deal. Instead, you can recognize that’s their strength. Sensitivity is a good thing. Because you’re sensitive, you’re, you’re intuitive, you’re sensitive to the energies in the room, you’re sensitive to somebody else’s feelings. Those are good things, whether you’re a man or a woman being sensitive is good. So keep that in mind. So those are some of the kind of guidelines just to be careful about to invest in the playfulness and the fun in your marriage. So be very careful about sarcasm. Be very careful about teasing and be playful, but not mean. So one of the things that we do in terms of playfulness is I mean, there’s a lot of things that we do playfully but one of the things which is he’s actually much better at it than me but is willing Do well what happened the other day, we were coming back with soccer from soccer, he had the goals in a in like a bag, and I was trying to get in the door. He had the goals in the bag in front of me. So I’m like trying to walk around the goals. And he like, kept putting the goals in front of me. And I think I tried four times, three or four times to get around the goals. But he was he was doing it on purpose. But I thought it was an accident. I was just trying to get around them. So anyway, and then, you know, I left. But those are things like those are experiences that you could get really angry about. But if you choose easy going in your marriage, like that’s actually a fun experience. Even though I’m not as good as it one time he was we were walking, and we’re talking about something and he just keeps moving closer and closer to the wall. As you’re rocking. It was like a wall outside. And yeah, eventually I realized as I like couldn’t walk anymore. Okay, anyway, alright, so then that’s playfulness. The next one is a, allow things not to be perfect in your, in your home and with everything. So in our culture, what regardless of where you live, you’ve got some kind of expectations of what perfection is. And you know, when people come to your house, or you know, when they see your kids wearing certain things, you have an expectation of what what’s perfection in your culture. And what I encourage you to do is be willing to not be perfect, recognize that you and your spouse, have your own culture in your own home. And you can establish whatever culture you want that to be. And so for my husband, he really cares about our kids not wearing perfect things. And for a while, that was really hard for me, because that was a huge value in my mom was for us to really look presentable, no matter where we were. And I think that came from a lot of like, just trying to make sure that even even though we had, you know, challenges financially, she wanted to make sure that we looked like we didn’t. So that was just something for her. So that’s kind of an insecurity for me. But as you know, over the years, I’ve allowed things to not be perfect. And I think that’s really important for you to recognize, because one thing you’re doing when you do that is you’re inspiring others to be more authentic and be more of themselves. Because if you’re pretending to be perfect, then they have the pressure to pretend to be perfect to do Do you see that? Because it it, if you’re if you’ve got all your guards up of perfection, then they feel like they have to put their guards up of perfection. But once you start putting down your guards and start to be more vulnerable, and like, Okay, this is my authentic self, this is who we are, then they feel like they can bring their guards down and they can be who they are. One thing I really like is Jane Goodall’s
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quote that she says what you do matters. Know what you do makes a difference. So what kind of difference will you make? And I think that’s important to be thinking about is that your choices for your family and your home makes a difference to others when they see you and they do see you. So how do you want to inspire them? How do you want to help them, encourage them, empower them or not. And the next thing I wanted to mention was having certain priorities in your money. So we’ve talked about money, just a little bit on the on this series. But I did want to kind of bring it up again, because how you spend your money is really how you’re spending your life. Because money represents the hours that you have invested in receiving money back, right, because those are hours of your life that you’ll never see again. So then if you think about you use that money on a new truck, then those however many hours you spent earning that money, let’s say I’ve you know, I can’t even think of what the right amount would be based on your income. But if you think about how many hours does that represent, and you received a truck in return? Is that an appropriate thing because here you are spending your life on a truck, right? Or is it better to spend those hours in something that’s more important in your life? Instead of working so that you can have truck does that make sense? So be aware that what you’re spending your your money on is actually what you’re spending your life on. It is your life force who what you do with your money is your life. And then one thing for us, that’s really key in our having being easy going, and that was really hard for me to give up, but was giving up the finances. My husband’s in charge of the finances. And I think I’ve said it before on this podcast. But in one of my jobs, I was actually responsible for a million dollar budget. And for me to give up all the spreadsheets and all the budgets and all this stuff to my husband, was very hard. But I will say, in the midst of being responsible for our own finances, I was horrible at it, I was so stressed, it was such a burden. And I didn’t want to make all those decisions and be responsible for the family. And at the same time, my husband felt powerless, he felt like he wasn’t able to, to influence the direction of our, of our family. And he didn’t feel responsible for our family. Because I was making the money decisions, even if we were, quote, kind of doing it together. Really, I was in control. And so it wasn’t until I said, You know what, honey, I can’t do this anymore. I can’t, it’s too much for me. That was when he felt empowered, to go ahead and be fully responsible. And so now, he did a financial class. And we even facilitated the Dave Ramsey, Financial Peace financial class for a while. But he took that, and also, what else and now he does it all. And he budgets and pays it all on time instead of me who didn’t pay things on time. And anyway, so he’s amazing at that. So that’s very important for us, is for him to have that that power, because that was really important. The other thing is, when I think for me as a woman, and Honey, I’ll These are probably the last four points, I haven’t, I’d love for you to, I’d love for you to comment. But for me, and I think this is both for men and women. But when there’s an argument, a brewing, when it feels like there’s some tension, and something that seems to be going on. The first thing I assume, is that it’s me.
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Does that make sense? The first thing that I assume is I am having an internal problem. It’s become a habit, which is really good. Because then when I do feel like there’s something going on, I can remove myself from the situation journal and try to get things a little bit more in perspective when I get things on on a journal and I write by hand what’s going on and how I feel then I can look at it a bit more objectively and have some space for my feelings to then see how to respond and how to respond respectfully. Because one thing that my husband says a lot which maybe he’ll share if you don’t mind when when he’s in a soccer game when he’s watching a game right that’s his passion and his love when he’ll notice that I’m upset What will he
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do you’re upset Yeah, I stopped playing like if you are watching it Yeah. Oh from watching oh okay from from watching something a soccer whatever and I see if she’s upset i i I turned it off. I turned the whatever I’m watching off and because I feel like if if I have it on makes me feel like I don’t want to deal with whatever she’s feeling upset because you know even now we all have disagreements. And you know me my wife he has some disagreements just like everyone else. And yeah, that’s what I do I turn it off. And you know, it’s funny that we have some friends that they say like they you know, nobody interrupt me because I’m watching this just came live. So as like so what are you doing? You’re watching a game and I was like watching a game. But if my wife needs me or whatever, turn that off. I can watch the replay. later on, because I can the good things I can watch later on, because I, I’m not married to that stuff. So I can watch it later on. I don’t, there’s no problem with me. And I can feel I can see the that if he felt uncomfortable that he didn’t know what he didn’t want to hear that, you know? And I said, like, why Oh, my wife is my family. Why would I do such a thing, like, keep it on and just ignore it. Like, basically, I’m let her know that whatever I’m watching is more important than her. Right? Is whatever important. It’s what I’m watching more than her. And if bue husband or wife, you feel this, you know if, if that happens, I’m sure you feel the same way. Because he has something how you’re feeling you want to speak, you want it to be heard. And if that happens, you don’t feel like that and you feel more angry. And in that you can ignore it, you can keep going, we all laugh about, you know, forget about, but that stays there. And the when happens again, the builds up, builds up, you add another thing, another negative stuff about your spouse, right? It keeps life going on again, and it keeps going, you add more stuff. And then there’ll be a time, there will be a time because there will be a time the older thing will come out all that all those words that you wanted to say you will set out loud. And you will not want to sit on currently and respectful Wait, you want to say on the on the opposite way. Because you felt like you haven’t been hurt. And he or she pay attention more to this more than you. And when you’re angry, you will feel this that tension and then you will say those things.
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Yeah, and I love that you said that, because it’s similar to another point to make is that in order to have a peaceful marriage, is you have to forgive each other over and over and over again. I mean, it doesn’t matter how good you are in your marriage, there’s going to be things that your spouse has to forgive you have. And just like you have to forgive your spouse of things. So that’s going to be really, really important. Over and over and over again. You know, what does Jesus say? When Peter said, How many times should we forgive others? Seven times? And Jesus says no, 70 times seven. You know, if Jesus forgives us, what does that mean? How much more are we supposed to give? Forgive others? If we don’t forgive others? How do we expect Jesus to forgive us? And my husband can tell you I’m, I have trouble with that there are times that I still struggle with forgiveness of others, and he has to just remind me, you know, I thought you forgave that person. And I’m like, I thought I did too. And then it’s just a, it’s a, you know, consistent kind of thing to be thinking about, and to be giving over to Jesus. So now that I’m saying that, I’m thinking about the situation again, and I’m thinking about how I need to forgive anyway, so that I’m making a note of so I will come back to that and spend time with Jesus forgiving them and in journaling about that. But the other thing I wanted to mention is also a really key part of your marriage is asking for forgiveness, saying you’re sorry. And receiving the other person’s request for forgiveness. Because if you don’t accept their apology, then you’re again, adding to that culture of of that it’s not safe. It’s not even safe to say you’re sorry. You know, if the person responds with an eye roll or you know, like a huff, you want it to be safe to say you’re sorry. Because then that’s going to make them want to say they’re sorry, over and over again. Because we we have to say we’re sorry, over and over again. That’s constant. You should be thinking about, Oh my gosh, that probably hurt her. Oh my gosh, I probably hurt him. Let me say I’m sorry. So I think that’s really important. So not only saying you’re sorry, but also receiving the other person Since, sorry, so if my husband says, I’m sorry for something I can be like, Of course, honey, I forgive you, I know that you, you know, had a hard day or whatever, whatever. And that makes it easier for him to apologize in the future. I’m so yeah, so that’s really important. So I think another one that I wanted to bring up is the humility. And of course, the apologizing to him is humbling, right, because you’re acknowledging that you did something wrong, it wasn’t perfect what you did. And so you’re apologizing for it. And that takes humility, it takes humbling yourself and saying, I’m sorry, I did something wrong, I hurt you. I’m sorry, I didn’t want to make you feel like that. Even if you feel like the other person should be mature enough not to get hurt by that or shouldn’t be as sensitive. Like, again, you’re dealing with the person that you were, have the privilege and the responsibility to respect and love and honor and cherish and support. That is, if you if you hurt them, if they feel hurts, then it’s up to you to say I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I hurt you. I didn’t mean to do that. You know, I was talking to someone recently. And she was saying that, you know, she has apologized for these things in the past. But she didn’t understand the breadth of what was going on with her husband. Until now she does. And now she’s like, Okay, I actually do have to apologize again. Because now I actually understand. And that’s a different level, when you actually understand the hurt that you gave your spouse. Now it’s different. So you need to apologize in that way for that thing.
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Another one that I think is important to talk about is having doubt that your way is the best way. A lot of people don’t have that doubt. And they just assume that they are the best and they cannot, you know they’re infallible. And so what they do is they, you know, require their spouse to be what they think is right. And the thing is, we need to walk with humility. And sometimes that means walking with some doubt that our way is the best way. I think a lot of people feel like it’s a lack of faith to have an ounce of doubt, in the way we see things or in the way we view things. The thing is that what I truly believe is if it’s true, it’s God’s truth. So if something outside of our faith is happening, and it doesn’t make sense within the worldview of our faith as Christians, then there’s something that we don’t understand. But it’s still something that God made. You know, if, if it’s happening, then somehow there’s a explanation within what God created. So I say all that because what I think people do is they get so scared, that something’s outside of Christianity, that they almost like put blinders on and pretend it’s not even happening, or get angry that it’s happening or get angry that it’s, like I’m thinking about some, some spiritual things that happen, that are not Christian things, right? So mediums that talk to the dead or energy things or whatever, like I don’t, I don’t understand what’s going on. But I do know that God made everything, and he’s aware of everything. So I don’t know the reasons that’s happening. I know, there’s a lot of Christians that kind of interpret that in certain ways, but I just recognize that I am not qualified enough to understand those things. So if you have differences of opinions with your own spouse, whatever it is, whether it’s about things like that, or whether it’s about things like understanding the nature of what trust means, or what you know, what theology Things are who’s right about what, just recognize, have some doubt you might be wrong. And your your spouse might be right, being open to to reason and I love the scripture that says, the wisdom from above is first of all, pure, and then peace, peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere. And that’s James 317. So I’d encourage you to meditate on that verse. If you guys are having trouble with strife and anger towards each other. Think about is your wisdom pure, and then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere, especially if this is like, what’s wisdom and what’s not, and you have a better opinion than the other person. Like, okay, fine. Are you open to reason? Are you being gentle, are you peaceable, because of that’s not what’s happening in the way you are being quote wise, then that’s not true wisdom. It says, but the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere. And then it says, In a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace. So value value peace.
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Okay, so I think I have exhausted what I wanted to tell you about being peaceful and easygoing in your marriage, and how vital that is, let me just go over all the things that I mentioned really quickly, number one, be playful. Number two, extend the timeline. Number three, rely on each other strengths, number four, compliment and encourage each other. Number five, gratitude. Number six, be very careful about sarcasm, and be very careful about teasing. And your playfulness shouldn’t be mean. And then number seven, allow things not to be perfect. Number nine, think about and make sure that you’re inspiring others to be more authentic, so you become more vulnerable, and they become more vulnerable. Make your priorities and money more aligned with the culture of your family and what you want it to be, according to God’s will not what you guys have just grown up with number 10, forgive each other, over and over and over again. Say sorry, over and over and over again. And then also receive sorry, in a really wonderful way. One thing I tell I’ve told clients is, you know, when, when Jesus told us, the parable of the father, who had two sons, and one of the sons was extremely hurtful, and asked the father to give him his inheritance early. So before the Father was even dead, he asked him to give give the son the inheritance as though he were dead. So it was really, really hurtful. And then the Father gave the the money and all the inheritance and then the son went out and did horrible things. debauchery, I think is the word they say in the Bible. So that’s like, gambling and prostitution, and just horrible things with the money, lost it all. And then he’s like, I don’t, you know, I’ve got to do something. So he went to work, feeding pigs, and he was so hungry that he started eating the, the food for the pigs. And then he was like, You know what, even the servants in my father’s house, eat better than I do and live better than I do. So I’m going to go back to my father’s house and beg for forgiveness and ask if I can just be a servant in his house. And their son was coming home. And when the father saw him a long way off, he got up and he ran to his son, and embraced him in his arms. And he said, Son, I’m so glad you’re home, you know, and he’s gonna make us feast. He made this giant feast for his son that my son was lost. And now he’s found. Like, just think about that’s the way the father embraces us when we have just gone completely astray. And I encourage you and invite you to embrace your spouse when they have asked for forgiveness, even if it’s this one. weak, you know, awful like, I’m sorry, and then rolled their eyes like just embrace what they, their their tiny hint of that because that’s going to grow the next time that’s an investment in the next time that they ask for forgiveness. So receive and gratefully receive the forgiveness that someone in your marriage spouse asks for. The next one is assume it’s an internal problem first and foremost. So when emotions are raging within you assume that is your problem, because it is your problem. I mean, you’re not even sure what’s going on yet. You’re just like, I’m angry, or I’m upset, like, Okay, what is going on? For you get a piece of paper out, what am I feeling? What’s going on? What does this mean about me? What do I value? Like? Those are questions you need to be sorting out before you ever come to your spouse and approach it in a respectful way. Another thing just for women is to track your cycles. You know, my husband mentioned on the last podcast about how important it is for women. You know, as they think about their, you know, just the way God made us, physically, and hormones, and all these things like, there are reasons that we’ll have responses to things that are different than the way we normally would. So if you track your cycles, it’s much easier for you to
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then this happened to me not too long ago. But when I recognize like, oh, that’s why then I was able to give my husband a lot more grace. And it turns out the house was a mess. But it was not as big of a deal as I felt it was and I got the whole place clean. If he and this, the kids just left and it was good that they did because then I was able to clean the whole house. And not be disrespectful. So. So anyway, so that’s one thing, I would encourage. And then yeah, removing yourself from the situation. Like I said, avoid that. avoid that. The next next piece that I meant went over a little bit is is walk with humility in your marriage be humble. That’s a lot to do with the asking for forgiveness, apologizing a lot. And then the last one is having doubt. Be okay with the doubt in your heart and your mind. Because that’s going to be something that’s actually going to support your marriage in being wise. And the last thing is, check to make sure the quote, wisdom that you feel is wisdom and your self righteousness and all that kind of stuff. Make sure it’s in line with God’s word, which is the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy, and good fruits, impartial and sincere. Awesome, thank you again, so much for listening. And I hope that’s been helpful and just kind of allowed you to be thinking through what you can do practically in your marriage to make it a bit more peaceful, a bit more playful, a bit more fun to be in. And yeah, that’s why my prayers for you Father, in Jesus name, I asked God that you would encourage and empower the listener on the other end husband or wife, God to be more easygoing in their marriage, Lord and be willing to love the other person better physically, spiritually, emotionally, God, and I thank you for that listener and I look forward to more conversations together.
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Thanks for listening. If you’ve been blessed by this, why not share it? Until next time, live with love, wisdom and passion