State of the Marriage
As Preston and I celebrate our 4th wedding anniversary, I have spent some time reflecting. I know to some of you who have been married a lot longer than we have, 4 years seems like nothing. But in my seat, 4 years feels like a huge accomplishment and we are celebrating God’s help and faithfulness in our marriage!
{Insert Wedding Photos Because 7/16/16 is still my favorite day EVER!}
I’ve shared with a few of my friends something that Preston and I have come to call, “State of the Marriage.” The friends I have shared it with have put it into practice in their relationships and have grown from it so I felt led to share with you. Early on in our marriage, we made it a priority to keep an open line of communication. When I say “we”, I really mean Preston. I remember our first few “disagreements”. I could be found hiding in my closet, pouting. Preston would come and find me and ask me “do you want to pray about this?” Me, being the great Christian girl that I am, promptly responded, “No, I don’t want to pray.” A while later, I would come out of my closet, shoulders slumped, relinquishing my stubbornness, I would look at Preston and say, “Okay, I guess we can pray.”
One day, while we were driving to Hattiesburg to visit our families, Preston was driving, and I had my feet on the dash, head down, lost in social media world on my phone. I looked up from my phone and it was like the Lord jerked me to attention. I was convicted that we had a 2 hour drive ahead of us and we had a choice. We could either let that time pass us by or we could spend it connecting with one another. I looked at Preston and I asked, “How is our marriage?” To which he responded, “Huh?” I will never forget that car ride as we had one of the most honest and real conversations we had ever had about our marriage. Later, we commented that the conversation reminded us of the State of the Union that the President gives. He tells us what’s going great in our nation, shares his perspective of where the problem areas are and describes his plan to fix them. And just like that, “State of the Marriage” was born.
Now, we use this phrase when we have some uninterrupted time as an open door for real and honest evaluation of our relationship. The practice came out of the desire to not wait until heated moments arise to have real conversation about our relationship, but to have real and honest conversation continually and often. We learned quickly that if we waited until heated moments to have these types of conversations, it could be detrimental. As our feelings rise, they cloud our ability to think rationally and often cause us to say things we wouldn’t say otherwise. We had to learn this lesson the hard way.
Preston and I find practicing “The State of the Marriage” very freeing. As we have established a level of trust and respect to know that we can discuss the hard things in this space and can come out on the other side better for it. We don’t typically plan these conversations, we try to look for opportunities and cease them. Now, either one of us can say “State of the Marriage” and we know it is an open invitation to talk.
We use Ephesians 4:29 as a filter. It reads,
“Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.”
We ask ourselves:
Does this ultimately build up or tear down?
Will this benefit my spouse and my marriage?
We don’t avoid the hard things - we just make sure we are saying the hard things for the right reasons. Not to cut or tear down our spouse but to build them up and edify our relationship.
Want to try this out in your relationship? Here’s what you need to know:
Three questions to ask:
What is going well in our marriage?
What areas do we need to grow? What do you need from me?
What are we going to actively do to encourage that growth?
State of the Marriage Ground Rules:
Complete honesty.
Gracious respect. (use Ephesians 4:29 filter)
Active listening (no phones or distractions)
Must begin with positive things.
Can happen at any time - doesn’t have to be planned. (It’s also okay to say you don’t feel like having the conversation right then and ask if you could pick it up later.)
This is not a quick solution that will magically fix your marriage. The Lord sees our marriage and knows we certainly don’t have it figured out! This is simply a tool that we have found helpful in facilitating genuine conversations that have helped us to grow closer to each other and ultimately closer to Jesus. I pray it will do the same for you!
