Study Him

Carlie, a blogger wrote a list of 5 habits to make marriage a priority. I love number three. I think it's just worded well. It's actually very similar to what Ryan talked about here.

"Study Him(Be a Detective):

I've studied that man of mine for over 16 years now because I want to know what makes him tick. What’s his passion? What’s his love language? What are his spiritual gifts? What irks him? What makes him feel most respected and loved by me? These things haven’t been hard to learn, but they have taken my time and focus. Once I know the answers to these questions, I just try to pursue them, cultivate them, or encourage them in my husband."

It's a cute idea. Actually figure out all the good things that your husband loves and try to do those things for him and encourage him to do those things. Also, note that she mentioned "what irks him?"... don't do those things. 

Above image from mycutegraphics.com

There's (a lot) more to intimacy than kissing...

Too often, we make the mistake of thinking that physical relationships define the intimacy that comes in marriage. This misconception manifests in a lot of ways. Shallow relationships, based only on physical attraction, invariably implode unless they develop into something more in time. People think their marriage is in trouble if they're no longer "satisfied" with their partner, not realizing that the real trouble runs much deeper than a lack of exciting romance. People choose not to marry in the first place, thinking that the physical relationship is the important part anyway. Or they believe some physical relationship can replace the traditional one.

The marriage relationship is really about being intimate, in the Victorian sense of the word. It's about building an enduring friendship, acquiring a deep empathy for someone, leaving your own worries to her and taking on her burdens as your own. It's about magnifying each others' best traits and overlooking weaknesses, of making a safe place for each other. It's about sharing a lot of secrets between you and keeping very few secrets with others. A successful marriage intertwines two lives so tightly that you can't imagine being apart, and your plans always involve your other half.

And yes, the kisses are fun, too.

Lovely LipSense Lips pictured above.

Honoring My Veterans

My (Leah's) sweet grandparents were dating when Pearl Harbor was bombed in 1941. Granpy signed up for the Navy and went off to war. The only thing that kept Granpy and Granny in touch was letters. Granpy would write home coded messages about what he could share. Granny would write regularly and encourage him. In 1944 they got married on a short furlough, they were married 2 days before Granpy went back to war. Just as a side note, Granny still writes so many letters today. She always sends birthday cards to everybody on their birthday, Christmas, Granpy's birthday, and any occasion she feels like. Since Granpy died twenty plus years ago, she sends everybody a memorial letter about him each year.
I'm especially grateful for the Veteran's who fight for us, so that we don't have to fight. Freedom isn't free. Our military are paying the cost right now, our Veteran's have already paid the cost. Thank you service men and women.

More pictures of my Veteran's on my blog here.

Review: The Peacegiver

"The Peacegiver" by James L Ferrell

The couple in this book seemed just like Ryan and I. They'd been married 12 years, got married in the Los Angeles Temple a year after the man returned from his mission, etc. Then, I read on and hated how their marriage was. It wasn't really like ours at all. They had been fighting for years and spent lots of time not speaking to each other. They were both about ready to separate. All I can say is, marriage is not meant to be like the broken relationship described in this book. Marriage is meant to be a happy, rewarding union between man and woman. The book showed how it could be too. What I liked was the idea that whose fault their marital problems were, didn't matter. The Savior had already accepted their sins and the fallout from those sins upon himself. So, it was each individual's job to forgive, regardless of whether the other one forgave. In this way, the book was very uplifting.

The book mentioned how marital sins were addictive like alcoholic or drug sins. The marital sins like "not speaking to each other", "thinking oneself superior to the other", "hateful words" and such changes a person to feel like they are justified in doing these sins and makes them commit more and worse sins of that nature as if the sin itself were addictive. It's only through the Savior's atonement that we can get out of vicious cycles of destructive behavior that destroy our marriages. At times during the read, I found myself thinking, thankfully I wasn't stuck with a husband like that. But, a marriage relationship is like a living thing. It needs attention, love, time, patience, nurturing, etc, to grow well. Our marriage could have gone that way had we let it. I have a daily choice in my relationship how to treat my spouse. I don't have the choice how he treats me, but I can do a lot to shape how he wants to treat me. I certainly am in complete control of how I treat him. The book showed how we each have our own responsibility to make our marriage the best it possibly can be. The Savior will help us with that. If we rely on Him, I believe we can have what marriage is meant to be: a happy, rewarding union between man and woman.

Investing in the One You've Got

It takes work to stay married. But, doesn't it take even more work to divorce and remarry?

After a divorce, I often see both spouses eventually try to remarry. The effort they put into remarrying translates to: lots of money, time, hope and attention spent on lots of dates. They'll spend tons of time, money and attention into their appearance - working out, getting new clothes, haircuts, etc to look like a good catch. In fact they're willing to become their best self, so that somebody will fall in love with them. Anybody who has dated knows that lots of these dates are going to be awful. That's just how it goes sometimes, especially while you are working on improving yourself. Often the dates can be so awful that the individual may begin to wonder if they should continue the process, after all it's really taking up a lot of their resources. Then, often after soooo much work, they find a match that works. They put a lot more time, money, hope and attention into this person, while continuing to work on themselves and hopefully end up marrying to them.

This pattern shows up so frequently, and I always wonder what would have happened if both of them had put all that money, time, hope and attention into each other when things started looking bad. And what if they invested all that time, money and attention into their current spouse? This would be a good point to work on their appearance as well - working out, getting new clothes, new haircuts, etc, to look their best for their spouse, as an offering to their spouse when the relationship is rocky. Not just working on their appearance, but also trying to make themselves a person worth loving. Sure, they might get some awful "dates" out of their spouse at first. But, if they continue they might realize that they are investing in the individual that made them fall in love and get married in the first place. They also might become the individual their spouse fell in love with in the first place. If they continue investing so much time, hope, money and attention into their spouse, they might just fall in love again. After all, they already went through the process of falling in love with this individual once, filtering that spouse out from the rest of the human race as one being a great match.

Please, try putting a lot of work into your relationship, before divorcing and putting a lot of work into other relationships.