Why Your Attitude is Everything Have you ever noticed that some people just take things in stride better than others? Something goes wrong and there are a myriad of ways to handle the situation - how will you handle it? Friday, I met for lunch with a pastor friend at McAlister’s Deli. I took along the promotional tumbler that we had purchased there several years ago so we can get...
Let’s start with this fundamental understanding: to be married, one needs to be an adult. I can’t imagine anyone wanting to get married to a person who is childish. This may sound like a no brainer, but some fundamentals do get missed. If a child has been under the care of a parent all their life, it is quite possible that they don’t see themselves as an adult. Being an...
Children: What to Do When Your Parents Won’t Let Go Many of my counseling sessions over the years have been the result of (1) parents not releasing their children when the children get married or (2) children not releasing their parents when the children get married. We addressed the first and second issues in another blog post and I will address the third issue here: what to do when your...
Children: The Importance of Letting Go of Your Parents When You Get Married In my experience, the frequency of young married guys and gals who can’t let go of their parents is pretty equal. It is most often the mother that they are attached to and won’t let go of. Most of the time in our culture, the mother throws herself into the children and the father throws himself into...
My Spouse is Living the Dream - How Do I Overcome Jealousy? Q & A How can a spouse go beyond feelings of jealousy and being left out when the other is “living the dream” with the ideal job in an environment they love and the other spouse doesn’t have a job in their profession and feels stuck in a place away from family and friends? Where does our jealousy...
Help! My Ex and I Don’t Get Along! I’d like to start by saying something that will probably startle you. You and your ex have a lot of passion… and the more disagreeable you are, the more passion you have. Let me explain. When you initially got together, there was a loving passion or you wouldn’t have gotten married. I have people in counseling that tell me, “I never...
It’s not if a miscommunication will happen, it is when it happens. Let's face it: miscommunications happen to us a lot more than we think they should. I had thought that the older I got the fewer miscommunications Kim and I would have, but since my hearing isn’t 20-20 anymore, it has opened up a whole new window for miscommunication. I will ask Kim, “What did you say?”...
Kim and I have a list of suggested reading for the couples we counsel toward marriage; Gary Chapman’s book The 5 Love Languages is always on that list. We believe everyone would profit from the straightforward, easy to grasp truths in the book. We also have each couple go online and take the free test at 5lovelanguages.com (I’ll link to the book and the test below). We would encourage you...
Q&A: What Does the Phrase Dying to Self Mean? Here’s a question we received from one of our readers: What does the phrase “dying to yourself” mean? There is one major obstacle to my marriage happiness… me. We mirror what we do on this blog and on our YouTube channel. I will have the YouTube link for you at the bottom of this post in the event you want to...
Q&A: Abusive Relationships: Understanding and Recovering From Them Here’s a question we received: As someone who has survived an abusive relationship prior to my marriage with the love of my life, my heart goes out to all people out there who are in relationships plagued by abuse. It is so easy to spot an abusive relationship after you have been in one yourself, but it is so difficult to...
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