Daly Focus Blog
Driving is a great illustration for life.
First, what makes driving safe? That line painted down the middle of the road. It’s a boundary that tells you what lane is yours and what lane is mine.
Second, in driving and in life, we encounter people and circumstances wherever we go that force us to respond quickly and make good decisions that protect our family and ourselves.
And third, to get to where we want to go, we have to be in the correct lane.
Today, I’ve got a simple idea to help you build a great marriage. It’s fun, too.
Laugh together.
Proverbs says, “A joyful heart is good medicine” (Proverbs 17:22). Jean and I have great memories of laughing together in the car or around the dinner table. A few times we’ve laughed so hard for so long that we started laughing at each other laughing.
Laughter is often more about connection than it is humor. Studies show that couples who laugh are healthier, happier and more connected.
Integrity is a paradox. It’s subtle enough that you don’t often think about it. Yet, it’s profound enough that trouble ensues when it’s missing.
Take, for example, the chess match between 33-year-old Magnus Carlsen, a grandmaster from Norway, and the 2,500th ranked player in the world from Kazakhstan. Carlsen was expected to defeat his lower-ranked opponent with ease. Instead, Carlsen was blown out in just 31 moves. How?
Carlsen says his problems started early in the match when he noticed his opponent was wearing a watch.
Guy and Amber Lia were convinced that they’d made a mistake as soon as they got married. Neither had communication skills to work through differences. Both reacted to each other instead of responding. Only a short time after their wedding, their relationship spiraled, and they considered throwing in the towel.
Every dating couple imagines marriage as a string of mountaintop experiences. We can’t fathom romance fading. We can’t foresee our conversations not stretching into the wee hours of the night.
It’s time for your checkup! Not a checkup for your body, your teeth, or your car, but for your marriage.
According to research, only 19% of couples take part in pre-marital counseling. Of those who get married, only a third seek counseling before getting divorced. And of those couples, many limp into a pastor or a counselor’s office for help only after ignoring their problems for years. Counseling is their last resort, a last ditch effort to rescue a marriage that, by that point, could be beyond saving.
Successful marriages don’t thrive because of so-called “chemistry,” good luck, or wishful thinking. They thrive because the couple sacrifice their own interests for the sake of each other.
On our Focus on the Family Broadcast “Embracing Your Role as a Spouse,” our guest, author Kevin Thompson, describes three roles of a spouse:
As friends, spouses play and laugh together.
As partners, spouses handle conflict and communicate well.
As lovers, spouses put sizzle into their relationship.
Why did you get married?
To work a job?
To do laundry?
To pay bills?
Of course not. Yet, many couples wind up with marriages in exactly that kind of “ho-hum” condition.
After the euphoria of the wedding ceremony fades, life settles into a daily routine of often-mundane activity. Careers are chased, children are born, and ever-larger homes are purchased requiring greater amounts of time and money to maintain. Before long, a relationship once nourished by hours on the phone together becomes two people who only talk when they’re discussing something practical, like finances or the kids’ schedules.
In order to stand at a wedding altar and say, “I do” with confidence, couples must first understand who they are as individuals. Only a person with a healthy sense of “I” can give to the marriage as much as he or she receives.
A thriving marriage doesn’t erase individuality. It celebrates it. It puts one’s individuality to work in service of the relationship, molding two people into one while encouraging each person’s individual flames to burn bright.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average hit a record on Monday, closing above 38,000 for the first time ever. Not to be outdone, the S&P 500 also set a new high. How long it lasts is a question and matter left to financial gurus, many of whom disagree.
Tracking the stock market’s performance provides us with an indication of where the economy is, and maybe even where it’s going. Numbers can’t tell us everything, but they can tell us a lot.
How big is your marriage’s “joy gap”?
Dr. Marcus Warner and Chris Coursey, authors of the book The 4 Habits of Joy-Filled Marriages, describe a “joy gap” as the length of time between moments of joy. If you apply that unit of measurement to your marriage, how long has it been? Days? Weeks? Months?
Your joy gap can be especially lengthy if you’re waiting for your circumstances to change on their own, for your spouse to make you joyful, or for God to zap you with joy.
Jim Daly is a husband, father and President of Focus on the Family and host of its National Radio Hall of Fame broadcast. His blog, Daly Focus, is full of timely commentary and wisdom designed to help you navigate and understand today’s culture. His latest book is Marriage Done Right.
