SML #192 - going up

LESSONS LEARNED

The biggest argument we ever had was 40 years ago this summer.

I won’t go into details.

It wasn’t physical. But it was loud, intense, and stressful.

The kids were 12 and 8. They heard a lot of it, and I knew they heard it.

It defeated me.

I was 35 years old, married 14 years, and was still failing at the same things.

Can this go on all your life?

Yes it can. You can be a bitter, unhappy old person.

And your marriage can be a routine of the same arguments and negative interactions. We’ve all seen it.

I think my hatred of that, and my disgust with myself, helped me to be open to change.

I think it was the same for Brenda.

Feeling like you don’t have the understanding or power to do better can be defeating.

It can also help you be willing to see and try things differently.

It was defeating for me. It made me give up hope in myself.

I was worn out trying to “get my life together,” and having expectations of my wife and myself that were never met.

It also made me willing to go a different way.

Over a 3 year period after that lowest point, our direction changed.

I quit drinking. I can’t explain how. I had been drinking 3 quarts of beer (minimum) for 14 years.

Then I became friends with Jesus. He’s real.

I started seeing that we’re all created to work a certain way in relationships with ourselves and others and God.

Specific changes took time, but the big change was we were going in a good direction.

If you want more details on that, you can find it HERE and HERE.

At a dinner date the other day we ate hibachi chicken and shrimp and talked some about the bad old days.

We’re not hard on ourselves or each other about those days.

We know now that we just didn’t realize some things. We didn’t know anything other than our own way.

We thought you could force things to be a certain way. We each thought we knew best and that the other didn’t.

And we were totally depending on our own selves to make life and love work.

After all these years, we realize now that all our arguments were never about the thing we were arguing about.

They were all about being heard, seen, understood, and respected.

Saying that out loud together was a real moment for me.

I wish we could go back and remake all that negativity and wasted time.

She says, “No, we’re here now, that’s what matters.”

And all that negativity was part of the road to get where we are now.

"God gives us the vision, then He takes us down to the valley to batter us into the shape of the vision, and it is in the valley that so many of us faint and give way.

Ever since we had the vision God has been at work, getting us into the shape of the ideal, and over and over again we escape from His hand and try to batter ourselves into our own shape.

The vision is not a castle in the air, but a vision of what God wants you to be. Let Him put you on His wheel and whirl you as He likes, and as sure as God is God and you are you, you will turn out exactly in accordance with the vision. Don’t lose heart in the process."

- Oswald Chambers

WORTH REPEATING

“We fell in love again! And we did it not by dealing with our problems (as serious as they were), but by establishing new relationship habits that brought positive energy to our marriage." - Mort Fertel

WORTH TRYING

Three simple, doable habits that will soften and connect you.

As my wife and I grew in these, our long-term love deepened.

1. Say what you appreciate and admire. It’s there. Be grateful outloud.

2. Focus on what’s right. Majoring on their true positives is not denying the reality of their true negatives. It’s love.

3. Be kind. Being kind when it’s hard is powerful, but being kind when it’s easy can happen more often and it adds up.

As you do these things, you are becoming the kind of person who is appreciative, who focuses on the true good, who is kind.

Do you like being that kind of person?

Thank you for reading!

"This I know, that God is for me." - King David

You matter 

To ask a question or share what's challenging you, just hit reply.

Gary

JUST IN CASE . . .

The Simpler Marriage Instagram is a bite-size on-the-go version of the kinds of things you get in this letter. Not the exact same content, but the same approach. If you’re on IG, you can see and follow HERE.​
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If you find the tone or attitude in these letters helpful, I wrote A Family Shaped by Grace from the same posture you get here. Everything in it applies to marriage, but it shows how it also applies to kids, grown kids, in-laws, etc. Here it is.