Mike Erre gives us a special glimpse into what the parable of the prodigal son truly meant to a 1st century audience. It was an incredible picture of God’s outrageous love for us.
Category Archives: marriage
The Secret of Happy Couples
New research points out that happy couples do a few things well:
- They spend a lot of time focusing on positive moments
- They spend a lot of time focusing on keeping passion alive
- They spend a lot of time focusing on keeping a positive attitude
These are ancient principles. The research points out that it is not about the negative or bad times, and it is not even about how we deal with those negative or bad times. It is ALL about looking at the good, being grateful, counting blessings, quality time, communication, and celebrating life’s positives every chance we get.
“Numerous studies show that intimate relationships, such as marriages, are the single most important source of life satisfaction. Although most couples enter these relationships with the best of intentions, many break up or stay together but languish. Yet some do stay happily married and thrive. What is their secret?
“A few clues emerge from the latest research in the nascent field of positive psychology. Founded in 1998 by psychologist Martin E. P. Seligman of the University of Pennsylvania, this discipline includes research into positive emotions, human strengths and what is meaningful in life. In the past few years positive psychology researchers have discovered that thriving couples accentuate the positive in life more than those who stay together unhappily or split do. They not only cope well during hardship but also celebrate the happy moments and work to build more bright points into their lives.
“It turns out that how couples handle good news may matter even more to their relationship than their ability to support each other under difficult circumstances. Happy pairs also individually experience a higher ratio of upbeat emotions to negative ones than people in unsuccessful liasions do. Certain tactics can boost this ratio and thus help to strengthen connections with others. Another ingredient for relationship success: cultivating passion. Learning to become devoted to your significant other in a healthy way can lead to a more satisfying union.
“Until recently, studies largely centered on how romantic partners respond to each other’s misfortunes and on how couples manage negative emotions such as jealousy and anger – an approach in line with psychology’s traditional focus on alleviating deficits. One key to successful bonds, the studies indicated, is believing that your partner will be there for you when things go wrong. Then, in 2004, psychologist Shelly L. Gable, currently at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and her colleagues found that romantic couples share positive events with each other surprisingly often, leading the scientists to surmise that a partner’s behavior also matters when things are going well.
“In a study published in 2006 Gable and her coworkers videotaped dating men and women in the laboratory while the subjects took turns discussing a positive and negative event. After each conversation, members of each pair rated how ‘responded to’ – how understood, validated and cared for – they felt by their partner. Meanwhile observers rated the responses on how active-constructive (engaged and supportive ) they were – as indicated by intense listening, positive comments and questions, and the like. Low ratings reflected a more passive, generic response such as ‘That’s nice, honey.’ Separately, the couples evaluated their commitment to and satisfaction with the relationship.
“The researchers found that when a partner proffered a supportive response to cheerful statements, the ‘responded to’ ratings were higher than they were after a sympathetic response to negative news, suggesting that how partners reply to good news may be a stronger determinant of relationship health than their reaction to unfortunate incidents. The reason for this finding, Gable surmises, may be that fixing a problem or dealing with a disappointment – though important for a relationship – may not make a couple feel joy, the currency of a happy pairing.”
Suzann Pileggi, “The Happy Couple,” Scientific American Mind, Jan/Feb 2010, pp. 34-36.
Happy Valentine’s Day: Marriage Help
It was an honor and a privilege to teach at church with my wife and 2 other couples. With over 60 years of combined GREAT marriage time, we shared our hearts and our learnings with the church.
What if…we have it all wrong? What if there is…
What if….we have it all wrong? What if there is a God that loves and adores YOU? What if there are angels? What if there is a heaven? What if there is a celebration filled with dancing, rejoicing, singing in heaven? What if there is a celebration right NOW over YOU?
Sally Beth Roe, a character in Piercing the Darkness by Frank Peretti, becomes a Christian, but Peretti provides us with a glimpse of what is occurring in heaven during the very moment that Sally Roe becomes a Christian. It is a remarkable moment of angels celebrating and the lamb of God embracing her. We have NO idea.
“Above, as if another sun had just risen, the darkness opened, and pure, white rays broke through the treetops, flooding Sally Beth Roe with a heavenly light, shining through to her heart, her innermost spirit, obscuring her form with a blinding fire of holiness. Slowly, without sensation, without sound, she settled forward, her face to the ground, her spirit awash with the presence of God…All around her, like spokes of a wondrous wheel, like beams of light emanating from a sun, angelic blades lay flat upon the ground, their tips turned toward her, their handles extending outward, held in the strong fists of hundreds of noble warriors who knelt in perfect, concentric circles of glory, light, and worship, their heads to the ground, their wings stretching skyward like a flourishing, animated garden of flames. They were silent, their hearts filled with holy dread…As in countless times past, in countless places, with marvelous, inscrutable wonder, the Lamb of God stood among them, the Word of God, and more: the final Word, the end of all discussion and challenge, the Creator and the Truth that holds all creation together–most wondrous of all, and most inscrutable of all, the Savior, a title the angels would always behold and marvel about, but which only mankind could know and understand. He had come to be the Savior of this woman. He knew her by name; and speaking her name, He touched her. And her sins were gone…”-pg 321, Piercing the Darkness by Peretti
Edwin Abbot in his book Flatland shares with us, through parable, mathematics, and physics, the very real possibility of dimensions and realities so very close to us, but we remain unaware of them. What if string theory is true? What if there are dimensions just beyond our reach? What if God and the heavenly realm is all around us, surrounding us, embracing us?
What would it be like to get a glimpse into heaven uninhibited, over joyed, overwhelmed in celebration? Here is a brief video of a wedding that brought laughter and joy to my heart as I imagined….dancing and rejoicing in heaven over US!
Part #1: Burdens, Rest, and Meekness: Matthew 5 and Chapter 9 of The Pursuit of God by A.W. Tozer
Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth. Matt.5:5a
I started the New Year resolved to read through the Bible (again). As I read Matthew chapter 5, I was struck (again and again) by its beauty and transforming power. On the same day, I just happen to pick up A.W. Tozer’s book: The Pursuit of God that I have been reading for months and turn to chapter 9 which starts with a discussion of the beginning of Matthew chapter 5–‘coincidence’? Unlikely.
Tozer points out that most of what constitutes evil, pain, and suffering in our world comes from you know who….you and me!
“In the world of men we find nothing approaching the virtues of which Jesus spoke in the opening words of the famous Sermon on the Mount. Instead of poverty of spirit we find the rankest kind of pride; instead of mourners we find pleasure seekers; instead of meekness, arrogance; instead of hunger after righteousness we hear men saying, `I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing’; instead of mercy we find cruelty; instead of purity of heart, corrupt imaginings; instead of peacemakers we find men quarrelsome and resentful; instead of rejoicing in mistreatment we find them fighting back with every weapon at their command…these are the evils which make life the bitter struggle it is for all of us. All our heartaches and a great many of our physical ills spring directly out of our sins. Pride, arrogance, resentfulness, evil imaginings, malice, greed: these are the sources of more human pain than all the diseases that ever afflicted mortal flesh.”
His words are oxygen to a patient gasping for air. Christ alone knows how to ease our suffering, our pain, our burdens…
“Into a world like this the sound of Jesus’ words comes wonderful and strange, a visitation from above. It is well that He spoke, for no one else could have done it as well; and it is good that we listen. His words are the essence of truth. He is not offering an opinion; Jesus never uttered opinions. He never guessed; He knew, and He knows.”
“`Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.’ (Mat 11:28-30) Here we have two things standing in contrast to each other, a burden and a rest. The burden is not a local one, peculiar to those first hearers, but one which is borne by the whole human race. It consists not of political oppression or poverty or hard work. It is far deeper than that. It is felt by the rich as well as the poor for it is something from which wealth and idleness can never deliver us. The burden borne by mankind is a heavy and a crushing thing. The word Jesus used means a load carried or toil borne to the point of exhaustion. Rest is simply release from that burden. It is not something we do, it is what comes to us when we cease to do. His own meekness, that is the rest.”
In coming posts we will examine our burdens…
Covetousness, Jealousy, Gratitude
Jeff Pries does a beautiful job teaching us in this sermon on covetousness.
- The 10 commandments are for our benefit. God wants us to know as Christians the path that will benefit us.
- Coveting leads to jealousy which is a painful dead end
- Life is unfair sometimes
- Be grateful for what you have
- YOU are enough!
Don’t Worry #1
My kids are worry warts. They are sometimes paralyzed by what if’s and worry about future school assignments etc. How can we educate and comfort our kids AND ourselves? This is the 1st of (I hope) many posts on the topic of worry.
Chapter 11 of Ruthless Trust by Brennan Manning is a life changing concept and chapter. The chapter is titled: The Geography of Nowhere. The concept is simple. If we are NOT NOW HERE then we are NO WHERE! So lesson #1 is to live in the NOW. Don’t worry about the future or the past. Live in the Now Here.
“The music of what is happening,” said great Fionn, “that is the finest music in the world.” …The music of what is happening can be heard only in the present moment, right now, right here. Now/here spells now-here. To be fully present to whoever or whatever is immediately before us is to pitch a tent in the wilderness of Now-here. It is an act of radical trust-trust that God can be encountered at no other time and in no other place in the present moment. Being fully present in the now is perhaps the premier skill of the spiritual life.”-Chapter 11, Ruthless Trust by Manning
The Power of Forgiveness: Matthew 18
I know that I am getting a nudge to post when I am reading a chapter about forgiveness and I also happen to start listening to a podcast on forgiveness. These notes are a summary of a chapter on forgiveness in “You Were Born for This” by Bruce Wilkinson (Chapter 12: The Forgiveness Key), and the podcast is a sermon done by Mike Erre. As always, share your thoughts with us.
Forgiveness is VERY important to God and for us to embrace.
There is only ONE thing that we are called to do in the entire Lord’s Prayer: “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors…”-Matthew 6:12
God, as represented by the King in Matthew 18, gets angry with those He has forgiven of an payable debt refuse to forgive others of a very small debt:
“…so My heavenly Father also will do to you if each of you, from his heart, does not forgive his brother his trepasses…”-Matthew 18:35 (see also Matthew 6:14-15)
What will God do to us if we don’t forgive? He will ‘hand us over to the torturers’ (Matt 18:34). What?! What does this mean?! It means that God turns His people who refuse to forgive others over to the painful consequences of their own unforgiveness until the person, from their heart, forgives others their trespasses (debts). We will torment OURSELVES until we open our hearts and forgive.
3 key points to remember:
- Jesus: “Jesus forgave you. You can choose to forgive others.”
- Justice: “Vengeance belongs to God, not to you or me.”
- Jailer: “You are your own jailer. Your torment won’t end until you forgive. Then it will end immediately. You will be free. And that is what God wants for you.”
2 gifts occur when we forgive:
- “The person who brought injury has been forgiven…”
- “and a person who offended God by not forgiving has also been forgiven…” (see this post for a powerful story about this interchange)
To Quell or not to Quell your Emotions?
In reply to the post on emotions, we got a posted comment asking: How to quell your emotions? Here are some thoughts….
To quell or not to quell?
To Quell: YES! Join the crowd of men with distant non-emotive fathers from a family of origin of quellers. This is me. I am a queller. I have been well trained in the art. I even get a small whiff of emotion and I run for cover. The problem: Quelling leads to men (and women) who don’t know what to do with their emotions. We try to stuff them down deep, hide them, pretend they don’t exist, cover them with logic and hard work, but they are there in a very powerful way. We hide them only to realize that they direct so many of our actions. Even worse, the queller is prone to incredible outbursts of emotions often acting shocked, “Where did those come from?!” Under extreme stress emotions boil over into rage and angry explosions.
The queller has been trained in the art of disconnect. We are the superhero’s that are calm powerhouses of intellect and logic within our families of origin that are unraveling by alcohol and dysfunction. Robotic, we move through life seemingly unphased. Our war cry (sorry whisper): “I don’t need people! I don’t need emotional connection!”
When in reality that is what life is ALL about: Connectedness, relationship. Only when I was dropped to my knees by catastrophic circumstances in my own life was I finally forced to lean on my wife and others. And it was extremely painful for me to reach out to others.
Not to Quell:
“…listening to your emotions ushers you into reality and reality is where you meet God”-Peter Scazzero, Emotionally Healthy Spirituality
This is the way of true life: Knowing and embracing the reality of our emotions. The key is to be aware of what I am feeling, being aware of my emotions because otherwise we let our emotions fester and smolder and control us.
How do we listen to our emotions? How do we embrace and welcome our emotions as the window to reality?
We need to learn to get into a rhythm with our emotions. A few ‘tricks’ can be used. The first is called ‘tagging’. Recognize when anger, frustration, and other emotions are starting to boil and ‘tag’ then to discuss and retrieve them at a later time. Develop a pattern or rhythm of checking in with your spouse or close friend to discuss these ‘tagged’ emotions. The other ‘trick’ is to recognize your emotions before they overtake you. Recognize the situations and times when you can start to feel your emotions bubbling over and intervene at that moment. Recognize and analyze why the situation is giving you that emotional response. In time, this approach will allow you to acknowledge your emotions and address them in healthier ways rather than waiting until they sneak up and explode on you and those around you.
Finally, what can I do when my emotions (anger, frustration, etc) start to boil over? Here is the challenge as Teresa Avila said, “…learn to sit in the weeds (of your emotions)…” What is God trying to say to me through this emotion? Why am I feeling this emotion in this situation? What is the emotion saying about me? Emotions are simply a guide. Take a ‘time out’ to listen to God’s whisper, and remember that He is ALWAYS whispering to YOU that He loves and adores and DELIGHTS in YOU!
Emotions
“Emotions are the window to reality.” Really? I have not bought into that. Why? Probably because I was raised to be out of touch with my emotions. I strive at being non-emotive. But it turns out that emotions and their physiological effects play a key part in our decision making.
Why do police departments generally do not allow their officers to participate in high speed chases? What is the cause of most medical errors? Answer: Emotions. Really? Yes.
In Malcolm Gladwell’s book Blink, Gladwell points out that there is a physiological response to stress/fear/anger/ie our emotions. One of the findings reported by a police officer who has studied police shooting incidents has found that when we are stressed and our heart rate goes about 145 beats per minute we start to lose our ability to reason, think clearly, etc. There is a sweet spot to stress when our heart rate is between 110-145 our body responds by making our ability to think clearly sharper in this heart rate range. Some police departments have banned high speed car chases for this very reason. They have found that the police in a high speed chase are so stressed that they will often respond by being overly aggressive at the time of arrest.
Dr. Groopman in How Doctors Think points out that most medical errors are related to our emotions…
“But what I and my colleagues rarely recognized, and what physicians still rarely discussed as medical students, interns, residents, and indeed throughout their professional lives, is how other emotions influence a doctor’s perceptions and judgments, his actions and reactions. I long believed that the errors we made in medicine were largely technical ones—prescribing the wrong dose of a drug, transfusing a unit of blood matched for another person, mislabeling an x-ray of an arm as “right” instead of “left.” But as a growing body of research shows, technical errors account for only a small fraction of our incorrect diagnoses and treatments. Most errors are mistakes in thinking. And part of what causes these cognitive errors is our inner feelings, feelings we do not readily admit to and often don’t even recognize.”
Life Principle #2: Give Honest, Sincere Appreciation
I have been struck by the power of affirmation and appreciation. I have also been struck by the destructive power of criticism.
Recently I tried to encourage someone to always find the good, always look for the opportunity to compliment and appreciate, and never complain or criticize. Their response was, “But if you only knew that person, if you only knew how difficult they can be, and how much criticism they deserve.”
This response misses the point completely! It was only when I dropped the contempt and criticisms did I start to see the gifts in the other person. It is only when you look for the appreciation will the critical spirit in YOU fade away.
It is NOT about the other person; it is about YOU. It is about healing YOUR image of yourself, the world around you, and others.
Our marriages and relationships would truly be transformed if we followed Carnegie’s first 2 principles always leading with this one.
“I consider my ability to arouse enthusiasm among my people…the greatest asset I possess, and the way to develop the best that is in a person is by appreciation and encouragement. There is nothing else that so kills the ambitions of a person as criticisms from superiors. I never criticize anyone. I believe in giving a person incentive to work. So I am anxious to praise but loathe to find fault. If I like anything, I am hearty in my approbation and lavish in my praise… in my wide association in life, meeting with many and great people in various parts of the world… I have yet to find a person, however great or exalted his station, who did not do better work and put forth greater effort under a spirit of approval than he would ever do under a spirit of criticism.”-Charles Schwab
“Every man I meet is my superior in some way. In that, I learned from him.”-Emerson
How to Win Friends and Influence People by Carnegie:
- “That is what Schwab did. What do average people do? The exact opposite. If they don’t like to think, they ball out their subordinates; if they do like it, they say nothing. As the old couplet says: “once I did bad and that I heard ever/twice I did good, but that I heard never.”-pg 38
- “I once succumbed to the Fad of fasting and went for six days and nights without eating… I was less hungry at the end of the sixth day than I was at the end of the second. Yet I know, as you know, people who think they had committed a crime if they let their families or employees go for six days without food; but they will let them go for six days, six weeks, and sometimes 60 years without giving them the hearty appreciation that they crave almost as much as they crave food.”-pg 40
- ” When Alfred Lunt, one of the great actors of his time, played the leading role in Reunion in Vienna, he said, “there is nothing I need so much as nourishment for my self-esteem.” We nurish the bodies of our children and friends and employees but how seldom do we nurish their self-esteem? We provide them with roast beef and potatoes to build energy, but we neglect to give them kind words of appreciation that would sing in their memories for years like the music of the morning stars.”-pg 40 one
- “When we are not engaged in thinking about some definite problem, we usually spend about 95% of our time thinking about ourselves. Now [just imagine], if we [ could] stop thinking about ourselves for awhile and begin to think of the other person’s good points…”-pg 41
- “Try leaving a friendly trail of little sparks of gratitude on your daily trips. You’ll be surprised how they will set small flames of friendship that will be rose beacons on your next visit.”-pg 42
- “Pamela Dunham of a New Fairfield, Connecticut, had among her responsibilities on her job the supervision of a janitor who was doing a very poor job. The other employees would jeer at him and litter the hallways to show him what a bad job he is doing. It was so bad, productive time was being lost in the shop. Without success, Pam tried various ways to motivate this person. She noticed that occasionally he did a particularly good piece of work. She made a point to praise him for it in front of the other people. Each day the job he did all around got better, and pretty soon he started doing all his work efficiently. Now he does an excellent job and other people give them appreciation and recognition. Honest appreciation got results where criticism and ridicule failed.”-pg 42
- “Hurting people not only does not change them, it is never called for. There is an old saying that I’ve cut out and pasted on my mirror where I cannot help but see it every day: ‘I shall pass this way but once; any good, therefore, that I can do or any kindness that I can show to any human being, let me do it now. Let me not deferring or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.'”-pg 42
- “Let’s cease thinking of our accomplishments, our wants. Let’s try to figure out the other person’s good points.”-pg 43
Men on the Path, November 4, 2009: True Success
We were in session #3 from a quiet strength a men’s Bible study by Tony Dungy and our question for today is: How is God’s definition of success different from how most people define it?
We looked at five key verses: Psalm 1:1-3; one Samuel 16:7; Micah 6: 6-8; Matthew 22:34-40; acts 1:8; Philippians 1: 21
God’s definition of success is “to live is Christ to die is gain” only when we can die to ourselves can we truly be successful. J. C. Ryle in his book titled Holiness points out what it costs to be a true Christian (to gain true success).
“For one thing, it will cost us our self righteousness. We must cast away all pride and high thoughts and conceit of our own goodness… for another thing it will cost us our sins. We must be willing to give up every habit and practice which is wrong in God’s sight. We and our sin must quarrel, if we and God are to be friends….For another thing, it will cost us our love of ease…we secretly wish we could have a vicarious Christianity, and could be good by proxy, and have everything done for us. Anything that requires exertion and labor is entirely against the grain of our hearts… in the last place, it will cost us the favor of the world… surely a Christian should be willing to give up anything which stands between him and heaven…A religion that costs nothing is worth nothing! A cheap Christianity, without a cross, will prove in the end a useless Christianity, without a crown…”-pg 82-86
“We must seek to have personal intimacy with the Lord Jesus, and to deal with him as a man deals with a loving friend. We must realize what it is to turn to him first in every need, to talk to him about every difficulty, to consult him about every step, to spread before him all our sorrows, to get him to share in our all our joys, to do all as in his site, and to go through every day leaning on and looking to him.”-pg 113
MLL: Married Life Live, Personality Traits, October 23, 2009
For those who could not attend. We had a guest speaker, Lana Bateman, who taught us about our personality traits and how to apply them to our marriages. She has written several books that go into more detail about these traits.
She discussed in detail 4 basic personality types: Sanguine, Choleric, Phlegmatic, Melancholy. This discussion was VERY interesting and helpful in understanding our spouses. Obviously we are all a mixture of all 4, but most of us are a higher/predominant part of 1 or 2 of the types. I also found a fun free personality types test.
Please share your learnings by leaving a comment below, and you can also listen to her lecture.
Finally, if you attended MLL, please fill out this survey to provide us feedback to continue to make MLL the best it can be:
Sex & Intimacy at Mariners Church
Please enjoy the handouts, audio presentation, and slides. Please share your comments, learnings and feedback with us below.
Life Principle #1: Don’t Criticize, Condemn, Complain
I continue to revisit a book and audio book that I wish that I had memorized when I was younger: How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie.
Time and time again I have found myself using (or trying to use) his principles in my marriage, parenting, and other relationships.
Recently I have had conversations about affirming and its counter–criticizing your spouse. I have seen and heard about a wife or husband who continually criticizes their spouse. I have been a master at this myself. For the most part, I have made a major effort to STOP completely this process. It is a waste of time, and it turns out to do the opposite of what you want it to. We seem to think that by giving ‘constructive criticism’ the other person will improve, but they don’t. In fact, they seem to do MORE of the actions that we want them to change!
2 things: 1. The more you affirm and not criticize; the MORE likely their behavior will change! 2. Don’t try and change your spouse; just love them the way they are!
Principle #1: Don’t Criticize, Condemn, Complain
- “If you want to gather honey, don’t kick over the beehive.”
- “Criticism is futile because it puts a person on the defensive and usually makes him strive to justify himself. Criticism is dangerous, because it wounds a person’s precious pride, hurts his sense of importance, and arouses resentment….B.F. Skinner, the world-famous psychologist, proved through his experiments that an animal rewarded for good behavior will learn much more rapidly and retain what it learns far more effectively than an animal punished for bad behavior.”
- “Lincoln…had learned by bitter experience that sharp criticisms and rebukes almost invariably end in futility.”
- “The secret of…Ben Franklin’s…success? ‘I will speak ill of no man…and speak all the good I know of everybody.”
- “Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain–and most fools do. But it takes character and self-control to be understanding and forgiving.”
- “As Dr. Johnson said: ‘God himself, sir, does not propose to judge man until the end of his days.’ Why should you and I?”
The Top 3 Things That Women Struggle With
My wife returned the other day from a Beth Moore Bible study group. They listened as Beth Moore told them of her interview results. Beth had interviewed 400 women and asked them what are the top things that they struggled with in their lives.
As told by my wife, they were:
#1. submission. Now when I said, “REALLY?!” My wife clarified that women struggle with not having control over their lives and having to give up control over certain things at work, parenting kids, and in marriage. So I said, “They struggle with the same thing that men do: PRIDE.” We ALL struggle with the fact that we LOVE control but really have very little of it, and we all LOVE ourselves and think mostly of ourselves. Call it a struggle with submission to authority, submission to others or lack of control, but it boils down to pride. We want to be large and in charge.
#2. balance. This again could or should be on the men’s list as well. We all struggle with balance. Finding the time for what is truly important (which often is at the bottom of our to do lists): Wife, Kids, & Relationships. Relationships are HARD work to maintain and to do right. It is often times much easier to just go to work or tune out checking email etc. than to do the work necessary to have a deep, abiding relationship with your wife and kids. Not to mention the struggle that most men have trying to develop truly meaningful relationships with other men.
#3. hormones. This one my wife and I had a GREAT laugh about, but the really sad truth is that men are clueless with their OWN hormones! Yes we have hormones too. They produce anger, jealousy, frustration, lust, etc. I have been told that the ‘window to reality is through our emotions’. We would be much better friends, husbands, etc. if we would embrace our emotions and learn to process them better rather than trying to stuff them down and then using a pop off valve to unleash the pressure–which often looks very ugly. AND, of course, being more in tune with our wives emotions and hormones.
An interview of 32 Southern California women in my wife’s group came up with a different list but equally important for us to consider change :
#1. High Expectations: Denmark is the happiest place on earth. When researchers went to find out why, they found that it was because they had low expectations. Our wealth and materialism has driven us to covet and always believe that the “grass is always greener” when we should be focused on watering our own lawns and counting our many blessings
#2. Beauty/body image: Again interesting and sad. Our obsession with the perfect figures has driven women mad trying to augment everything.
#3. Hormones
Men on the Path, October 21, 2009: What does Quiet Strength Look Like?
Monte did a GREAT job discussing what quiet strength looks like. Here are some points that we discussed:
- The values of our culture are the opposite of the values of one with quiet strength. Here are how the beatitudes would sound if they were written to our culture: Blessed are the popular for they will be admired. Blessed are the consumers for they will keep us in the black. Blessed are those with skeleton’s in their closets for they will remain hidden….
- quiet strength is seen when we are helpless without God, when we are NOT in control, when we share our fears and ask for help instead of isolating (just recently I had another neighbor who was in the hospital for 2 days and did not mention it to his friend/neighbor, his wife appeared shocked when I said that I would have come and visited…men live isolated, lonely lives and don’t reach out!)
- Are we afraid of success in the Kingdom of God? What are we afraid if we followed the values seen in the Kingdom of God (i.e. the Beatitudes)?
- Who is your Sam? When Frodo didn’t have the strength to make it up the mountain at the end of his quest, his quiet, strong friend Sam carried him on his back. Monte shared that he had a friend when he was going through a tough time in his life who called him and said, “I will be your Sam.” (btw-the name Samuel means God hears…hmmmm)
Sex & Intimacy Class
My bride and I are teaching the pre-married class at Mariners again on the topic that we have been teaching on for years: Sex & Intimacy in Marriage.
All couples are welcome to join us. It is very interactive and a fun topic to talk about.
When: 9:30am-11:30am, Saturday, October 31, 2009
Where: Live Development Building, Room 205, Mariners Church in Irvine
Reunion Relationships
It finally happened. They found me. I wasn’t hard to find although I have been missing since I was a little boy. They knew me when I was ‘in my prime’ or so they say. I abandoned them once as I transitioned into a different social group. I was added to their brief email banter just prior to our 20th college reunion.
I am no different than all the rest. Men don’t do relationships well. We lack the gene or we are raised within environments that continue to perpetuate the small talk training, distant/missing father figure woundedness that continues the cycle.
Although my dad and I have been through counseling together (shocking, awkward, and painful–really you should try it) and connected in deeper ways (yes, we even hug, at times!), it still amazes me how quickly we fall into small talk going on and on with the safe, meaningless discussions of the weather as if there is any weather to talk about in Southern California.
My freshman roommate had found my email and folded it into the rest of my dormmates email list to reunite just prior to the reunion. I faded from their lives while I was still in college when I joined a fraternity, and since college, I have faded from my fraternity fellows as well.
Have I learned how to relate. Not much. Do any of us? 2 of my closest friends know when my relationship receptors have maxed out. One of them will even cut our conversation short and say, “I’ll call you later.” (knowing that I have shut down and tuned out). My other friend asks, “Is the turtle’s head out of his shell today or not.” (funny and sad)
Most men really do live alone. Yes we are married with kids, co-workers, and a few buddies, but we are still alone with no one to share our fears and hopes. I can share story after story of men who have told me that they are ‘buddies’ or ‘close friends’ or ‘best friends’ and who are convinced that they know each other well. But with some deeper sharing time, I find that they don’t REALLY know each other at all. This is no fault of their own. It is in our genes and from our environment, our upbringing. We major in the minors of small talk–sports, weather, politics, etc.
If there is anything that I have learned over 20 years, it is simply that I don’t do relationships well.
About 10 years ago, I took a risk and stepped out with my wife and shared with her my final ‘skeleton’ in my closet of secrets, and our marriage has been transformed from good to truly amazing.
About 7 years ago, I took a risk and stepped out with a friend of mine and shared some of my deepest hopes and fears, and he didn’t laugh or run away, and our relationship is now one of those unique, transformational relationships: you can turn to in time of crisis, tell ALL, and share ALL.
About 5 years ago, I took a risk and slowly developed another transformational relationship with another friend.
About 3 years ago, I went to counseling during a crisis time in my life. It was awkward, stressful, but important. I learned a great deal about myself, and how I was ‘trained’ to disconnect, never to show emotions or need to be connected. But in a time of crisis, I found the importance of my wife and my friends–thank God that I had developed those deep, intimate relationships! “Emotions are a window to reality.” At least that is what my counselor told me. I am still working to understand that reality.
Do I know anything about relationships? Not really. But I am so thankful that I took risks. My relationships with my wife and my 2 ‘best friends’ continue to grow—far too slow for them–but for the turtle–they are moving at just the right speed.
Regrets? A few. Learnings? Yes. Hopes? That my friends would take risks, do the hard work, lean into their relationships–in the end–it is ALL that matters, and when the going gets tough (as I have learned it WILL), there is nothing like a friend and a wife who are by your side laughing and crying with you.
Advice. Be more vulnerable, take more sharing risks, take the time to develop your marriage (it is HARD work, and easier to go to work for many of us…but it is worth it–this I DO know.) and find a friend who you can relate to and start to do the tough, awkward work to develop a true relationship.
I am not enough!
I am NOT enough! My eyes have FINALLY been open to this reality. Most of us have this ‘wound’ but we just don’t know it. I have written a brief summary of my learnings to help us all to learn from our past so that we may grow spiritually and emotionally in the future:
“Drew, can you be 1st base coach?” How hard could that be? The player’s are only 5 years old so all I had to do was point them in the direction of 2nd base, say, “great job!”, and my job was done. Or was it? My dad came up to me afterwards and said, “You know that you could have coached them more.” How many times has your mom or dad told you that you could have done a better job at something? Well at 35 years of age, my dad’s comment went on deaf ears until I mentioned it in passing to my wife. She thought his comment was significant, and comments such as those can have a lasting impact especially when you are young. When she said this, I shared with her those times when I was young that my dad would critique one of my school projects, and he would insist that I throw it out and start all over.
More recently, I followed my father-in-law’s advice and bought a new barbeque from the exact same store and arranged the details of the delivery just as he instructed me. I proudly mentioned to him that I had left just the right amount of money on top of the old bbq so the delivery man would willingly take it away when he delivered the new bbq. When I showed off my new bbq to my father-in-law, I couldn’t get the propane tank hooked up to the bbq because my new bbq had a different attachment than my old one. My father-in-law said, “Oh, I always have the delivery man make sure and hook up the propane tank to the bbq before they leave to make sure that it works.” Finally, I recently had the pleasure of trying to pass a kidney stone. Not wanting to miss any work, I arranged to have it extracted during my vacation time. In passing, I mentioned to my retired father-in-law that I had only missed 1 day of work in 11 years. He said, “I missed 1 day of work in 30 years.” Have there been times in your life when your mom and dad have ‘zinged’ you (probably not even knowing that they had)?
Our dad’s (sometimes our mom’s) tell us over and over again as we are growing up—You are NOT enough! In so many subtle and not so subtle ways. This is the wound that so many men (and women) carry with them. It creates a fiercely critical spirit, a chip on our shoulders, and abrasive arguments when anyone tries to give us “constructive criticism”. We become our dad. It was only recently that a friend pointed this “I am not enough” wound out to me. It was life changing to begin to process what it meant, how often I responded to my wife and others because of it, and how to learn and grow from it.
There are many practical ways that knowing about this wound has transformed my life. In the past when I would write an article, I would immediately ask my wife to proof read the article for me. When she would quickly use the red marker to slash and destroy what I thought was an almost perfect article, I would respond in a fury. Now I see that I was only responding to my childhood experiences of not being enough. My wife now knowing my wound has taken it upon herself to help heal my wound. When I ask for her to proof read anything that I have written, she will affirm me, put it aside for at least 24 hours, and then she will slash away with her red marker. It is amazing how quickly I become unattached to my work, and then can handle her critiques and edits much better.
My wife and I have an amazing marriage, but we have our share of arguments. To my surprise, most of our arguments revolve around my “not enough” wound. We argue because I feel that she has told me that “I am not enough”. It can be simply because she told me that I loaded the dishwasher the wrong or that I should drive around the block again so my oldest son will be late to a birthday party because he does better when he is not the only kid there. Yes, believe it or not this can set me off because I feel she is critiquing my driving and my favorite mantra that being early is one of life’s valuable secrets.
Two things have occurred since my “wound” was discovered. Our arguments still occur, but they are much shorter and often end in laughter. A less obvious by-product of my discovery stems from my wife’s repeated comment, “Ok already, I got it. You are not enough. When will it stop being about that!” The wound is now so obvious and so prevelant that we both can laugh about it. I have been healed enough through the process to laugh and with my wife’s encouragement to even tell myself, ‘Get over it!’