Apologratitude

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I'm sorry that we have been unheard, misunderstood, criticized, disrespected, blamed, shamed, disowned, de-friended, and demonized. I'm sorry we don't always know how to hold our own perspective and each others with an open mind, and sorry we don't always know how to understand each others deeper concerns and values and goals. I'm sorry we don't always see and treat each other the way our highest selves or our higher powers would. I'm sorry for all the opportunities for compassion and kindness and forgiveness that we overlook or reject. I'm sorry curiosity and cooperation and compromise can be too far a stretch for us sometimes, and condescension and condemnation and separation too easy. I'm sorry for the hurt and outrage we've witnessed, and sorry for the wounds we've received and inflicted. I'm sorry we've torn each other down, and in doing so dragged ourselves down too.

I'm thankful too, for our shared concerns over integrity and morality and leadership. I'm thankful for the things we see differently, and thankful for the things we see the same. I'm thankful for the respect we've shown, the patience we've demonstrated, the truth we've sought, the standing up we've done, and the voices we didn't keep quiet. I'm thankful for the effort we've made to engage during an extremely challenging time. I'm thankful for how we've changed, and how we've remained steadfast. I'm thankful we can keep seeking to understand and learn from each other, and help each other heal and grow.

From my friend Bojan...

"Today I practiced my rights, as a brand new citizen of the United States of America, to vote in the presidential election. Tomorrow, the result of this process will, unfortunately, divide the country. If your candidate wins, do not gloat and rub it into the other side's face. Listen to their point of contention and respect the reasoning behind their vote. If your candidate doesn't win, respect the will of the majority and accept the newly appointed president. Then, use your constitutional right to question the process, challenge the political decisions, and engage your local officials to help you with your issues. Whichever side you're on, be respectful. Respect opinions that don't align with yours, respect your fellow human beings, and be willing to compromise. The country I was born in was violently split because of the geographical, political, and religious intolerance, and I would hate to see my home country go through the same thing. We're all on the same team, and now, more then ever, we need each other."

Self-talk

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From To Sell is Human by Daniel Pink.

We human beings talk to ourselves all the time—so much, in fact, that it’s possible to categorize our self-talk. Some of it is positive, as in “I’m strong,” “I’ve got this,” or “I will be the world’s greatest salesman.” Some of it—for a few of us, much of it—is negative. “I’m too weak to finish this race” or “I’ve never been good at math” or “There’s no way I can sell these encyclopedias.” But whether the talk is chest-thumping or ego-bashing, it tends to be declarative. It states what is or what will be... But the most effective self-talk of all doesn’t merely shift emotions... It moves from making statements to asking questions.

First, the interrogative, by its very form, elicits answers—and within those answers are strategies for actually carrying out the task. Imagine, for instance, that you’re readying yourself for an important meeting in which you must pitch an idea and marshal support for it. You could tell yourself, “I’m the best. This is going to be a breeze,” and that might give you a short-term emotional boost. But if you instead ask, “Can I make a great pitch?” the research has found that you provide yourself something that reaches deeper and lasts longer. You might respond to yourself, “Well, yes, I can make a great pitch. In fact, I’ve probably pitched ideas at meetings two dozen times in my life.” You might remind yourself of your preparation. “Sure, I can do this. I know this material inside out and I’ve got some great examples to persuade the people who might be skeptical.” You might also give yourself specific tactical advice. “At the last meeting like this, I spoke too quickly—so this time I’ll slow down. Sometimes in these situations, I get flustered by questions, so this time I’ll take a breath before responding.” Mere affirmation feels good and that helps. But it doesn’t prompt you to summon the resources and strategies to actually accomplish the task.

People who give up easily, who become helpless even in situations where they actually can do something, explain bad events as permanent, pervasive, and personal. They believe that negative conditions will endure a long time, that the causes are universal rather than specific to the circumstances, and that they’re the ones to blame. So if their boss yells at them, they interpret it as “My boss is always mean” or “All bosses are jerks” or “I’m incompetent at my job” rather than “My boss is having an awful day and I just happened to be in the line of fire when he lost it.” A pessimistic explanatory style—the habit of believing that “it’s my fault, it’s going to last forever, and it’s going to undermine everything I do”—is debilitating, Seligman found. It can diminish performance, trigger depression, and “turn setbacks into disasters.”

In other words, the salespeople with an optimistic explanatory style—who saw rejections as temporary rather than permanent, specific rather than universal, and external rather than personal—sold more insurance and survived in their jobs much longer... Optimism, it turns out, isn’t a hollow sentiment. It’s a catalyst that can stir persistence, steady us during challenges, and stoke the confidence that we can influence our surroundings.

Still, the glasses Hall wears have clear lenses—not rose-colored ones. He finds some customers annoying. He admits to taking some rejections personally. He’s had plenty of grim, unpleasant days. But negative events can clarify positive ones. They equip Hall not with weak-kneed dreaminess but with tough-minded buoyancy—the proper balance between downward and upward forces. His is not blind optimism but what Seligman calls “flexible optimism—optimism with its eyes open.”

Real Love

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From How Real People Make Shades of Real Love

Don’t buy what anybody else is selling: Everyone always marr[ies] wrong.

Because what’s wrong in the world is always us.

None of us ever know whom we marry. And falling in love never made anyone angels… it’s only made it clear how far we’ve fallen.

And you have been smacked by my flaws, slack-jawed by my flaws, and it ain’t been Hallmark pretty. It’s been holy. You’d think after a lifetime of Sunday sermons I would have known that this is what real love always does—- goes to hell and back for each other. Thank you.

Thank you for never mentioning the burnt soup, the piles of unmatched socks, the ring around the bathtub — thank you for keeping the covenant of the eyes and the vow that rings round us. The real romantics know that stretchmarks are beauty marks, and that different shaped women fit into the different shapes of men souls, and that real romance is really sacrifice.

Real Love truthfully sees the flaws — and still really loves fully.

Love isn’t blind — Love is the only way of really seeing. You have loved me real.

The success of loving is in how we change because we kept on loving –regardless of any thing else changing.

You have lived and bore the weight of it —- I am far worse than I ever dreamed. And yet you have loved me beyond what I could ever dream.

Difficult Conversations

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Favorite quotes from Difficult Conversations by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, and Sheila Heen.

...we make an attribution about another person’s intentions based on the impact of their actions on us. We feel hurt; therefore they intended to hurt us. We feel slighted; therefore they intended to slight us. Our thinking is so automatic that we aren’t even aware that our conclusion is only an assumption. We are so taken in by our story about what they intended that we can’t imagine how they could have intended anything else... The conclusions we draw about intentions based on the impact of others’ actions on us are rarely charitable.

What’s ironic — and all too human — about our tendency to attribute bad intentions to others is how differently we treat ourselves. When your husband forgets to pick up the dry cleaning, he’s irresponsible. When you forget to book the airline tickets, it’s because you’re overworked and stressed out. When a coworker criticizes your work in front of department colleagues, she is trying to put you down. When you offer suggestions to others in the same meeting, you are trying to be helpful. When we’re the ones acting, we know that much of the time we don’t intend to annoy, offend, or upstage others. We’re wrapped up in our own worries, and are often unaware that we’re having any negative impact on others. When we’re the ones acted upon, however, our story too easily slides into one about bad intentions and bad character.

Interestingly, when people take on the job of thinking hard about their own intentions, it sends a profoundly positive message to the other person about the importance of the relationship. After all, you’d only do that kind of hard work for somebody who matters to you.

Separating impact from intentions requires us to be aware of the automatic leap from “I was hurt” to “You intended to hurt me.” You can make this distinction by asking yourself three questions: 1. Actions: “What did the other person actually say or do?” 2. Impact: “What was the impact of this on me?” 3. Assumption: “Based on this impact, what assumption am I making about what the other person intended?”

Focusing on blame is a bad idea because it inhibits our ability to learn what’s really causing the problem and to do anything meaningful to correct it. And because blame is often irrelevant and unfair. The urge to blame is based, quite literally, on a misunderstanding of what has given rise to the issues between you and the other person, and on the fear of being blamed. Too often, blaming also serves as a bad proxy for talking directly about hurt feelings.

At heart, blame is about judging and contribution is about understanding.

“How did we each contribute to bringing about the current situation?” Or put another way: “What did we each do or not do to get ourselves into this mess?” The second question is “Having identified the contribution system, how can we change it? What can we do about it as we go forward?” In short, contribution is useful when our goal is to understand what actually happened so that we can improve how we work together in the future.

Recognizing that everyone involved in a situation has contributed to the problem doesn’t mean that everyone has contributed equally. You can be 5 percent responsible or 95 percent responsible — there is still joint contribution. Of course, quantifying contribution is not easy, and in most cases not very helpful. Understanding is the goal, not assigning percentages.

Love is...

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I started listening to an audio book today named tiny beautiful things: Advice on love and life from Dear Sugar by Cheryl Strayed. Dear Sugar is a column Strayed authored for The Rumpus, and the very first letter she included in the tiny beautiful things collection was full of thought-provoking statements about relationships and those three little words. For many years I felt that saying "I love you" to a significant other required the kind of earth shattering connection that indicated a life long romance. So I missed out on saying it when it was real, and as life so often goes, eventually clumsily shared it when I thought I should, rather than when I fully felt it in the way I wanted to. The excerpt below is Strayed's response to a Dear Sugar letter written by Johnny, who was holding back on telling his current love how he felt.

http://therumpus.net/2010/06/dear-sugar-the-rumpus-advice-column-41-like-an-iron-bell/

"Love is the feeling we have for those we care deeply about and hold in high regard. It can be light as the hug we give a friend or heavy as the sacrifices we make for our children. It can be romantic, platonic, familial, fleeting, everlasting, conditional, unconditional, imbued with sorrow, stoked by sex, sullied by abuse, amplified by kindness, twisted by betrayal, deepened by time, darkened by difficulty, leavened by generosity, nourished by humor and “loaded with promises and commitments” that we may or may not want or keep...

You aren’t afraid of love, sweet pea. You’re afraid of all the junk you’ve yoked to love. And you’ve convinced yourself that withholding one tiny word from the woman you think you love will shield you from that junk. But it won’t. We are obligated to the people we care about and who we allow to care about us, whether we say we love them or not. Our main obligation is to be forthright—to elucidate the nature of our affection when such elucidation would be meaningful or clarifying.

And in your case, it will be. You asked me when is the right time to tell your lover that you love her and the answer is when you think you love her. That’s also the right time to tell her what your love for her means to you. If you continue using avoidance as the main tactic in your romantic relationships with women, you’re going to stunt not only your happiness, but your life...

The point is, Johnny: you get to say. You get to define the terms of your life. You get to negotiate and articulate the complexities and contradictions of your feelings for this woman. You get to describe the particular kind of oh-shit-I-didn’t-mean-to-fall-in-love-but-I-sorta-did love you appear to have for her. Together, the two of you get to come to grips with what it means to have an exclusive, nicely clicking, non-committed commitment in the midst of her bitter divorce and in the not-too-distant wake of your decades-long marriage.

Do it. Doing so will free your relationship from the tense tangle that withholding weaves. Do you realize that your refusal to utter the word love to your lover has created a force field all its own? Withholding distorts reality. It makes the people who do the withholding ugly and small-hearted. It makes the people from whom things are withheld crazy and desperate and incapable of knowing what they actually feel.

So release yourself from that. Don’t be strategic or coy. Strategic and coy are for jackasses. Be brave. Be authentic. Practice saying the word love to the people you love so when it matters the most to say it, you will."

Does God Love Introverts?

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"'Sometimes I feel like I'm going through the motions. The outward enthusiasm and passion that seems to be part and parcel of Saddleback's culture doesn't feel natural. Not that introverts can't be eager and enthusiastic, but we're not as overtly expressive as extroverts. At a place like Saddleback, you can start questioning your own experience of God. Is it really as strong as that of other people who look the part of the devout believer?'

Evangelicalism has taken the Extrovert Ideal to its logical extreme, McHugh is telling us. If you don't love Jesus out loud, then it must not be real love. It's not enough to forge your own spiritual connection to the divine; it must be displayed publicly...

It's brave of McHugh, whose spiritual and professional calling depends on his connection to God, to confess his self-doubt. He does so because he wants to spare others the inner conflict he has struggled with, and because he loves evangelicalism and wants it to grow by learning from the introverts in its midst.

But he knows that meaningful change will come slowly to a religious culture that sees extroversion not only as a personality trait but also as an indicator of virtue. Righteous behavior is not so much the good we do behind closed doors when no one is there to praise us; it is what we 'put out into the world.'"

This excerpt from a short section of Susan Cain's book Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can't Stop Talking detailed in gratifying clarity my own experience and struggle in evangelical settings. This book offers a load of validation and enlightenment regardless of where you fall on the intro/extroversion and (non)religious spectrum, highly recommended!

The Art of Selling

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My blog was previously titled Generous Wives to Be, but I've updated it to Snippets for Life since my own perspective, goals, and literary pursuits have expanded.

I have a backlog of inspiring reads I could share but I’ll have to settle for a snippet that struck me recently, having often vented about my aversion for networking and selling myself (and anything, for that matter).

Marc and Angel Hack Life recently shared a post titled 6 Easy-to-Steal Rituals of Extremely Successful People and tip number six happened to be: “Study, rehearse, and get super comfortable with the art of selling.” Their explanation below definitely shifted my perspective on the subject, and made me want to explore the idea further.

Keep in mind “selling” in its truest sense isn’t an act of manipulating, pressuring, or being deceitful. Selling is explaining the logic and benefits of a decision or point of view. Selling is convincing other people to work directly with YOU. Selling is overcoming concerns and roadblocks, and calming other people’s unwarranted fears. Selling is one of the principal foundations of both business and personal success. It’s about knowing how to negotiate, how to deal with a “no” when you receive one, how to maintain confidence and self-esteem in the face of rejection, and how to communicate openly, honestly, and effectively with a wide range of people so that you can build long-term relationships that garner long-term trust.

When you truly believe in your idea, or your business, or yourself, then you don’t need to have an enormous ego or an overly extroverted personality. You don’t need to “sell” in the traditional sense. You just need to communicate your point of view clearly, cordially, and confidently.

That last sentence makes it sound so simple, yet being clear, cordial, and confident in every relationship situation is a challenging endeavor.

It turns out there’s a treasure trove of enlightenment to be found in the study of introversion vs. extroversion, but I’ll stick to sharing an excerpt from Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking by Susan Cain (quoting Jon Berghoff below):

“A lot of people believe that selling requires being a fast talker, or knowing how to use charisma to persuade. Those things do require an extroverted way of communicating. But in sales there’s a truism that ‘we have two ears and one mouth and we should use them proportionately.’ I believe that’s what makes someone really good at selling or consulting - the number-one thing is they’ve got to really listen well. When I look at the top salespeople in my organization, none of those extroverted qualities are the key to their success.”

It was encouraging to realize that selling anything breaks down to a lot of behaviors and skills that we (hopefully) do all the time without much thought. Like listening, being open and honest, sorting out what people really need, coming up with ways to work through or around roadblocks together… and you don’t have to be an extrovert to be a pro at it =)

Boundaries

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One of this week's hellomynameisblog.com blog posts reinforced a chapter I had been reading in Coach Yourself to Success by Talane Miedaner.

If you don’t set boundaries for yourself – other people will set them for you.

And then they will violate them.
And then they will tell all their little friends to violate them.
And it will be your fault because you never decided where to draw the line.

- Scott Ginsberg (the Nametag Guy), from What My Stalker Taught Me

While I'd be careful not to relieve boundary crossers of all responsibility for their actions, an ounce of prevention is often worth a pound of cure. Especially if you can avoid a restraining order. Talane gives some good advice on the subject:

Boundaries work equally well at home. A client's boyfriend had a hot temper and he would get angry and yell at her on occasion. She thought this was normal and something that had to be tolerated. I asked her to expand her boundary. It was not okay for him to yell at her for any reason. She explained to him that she loved him and would never intentionally hurt him in any way. The only reason he should be angry with her is she intentionally tried to hurt him. So if she was ten minutes late for a date, he could let her know it bothered him without yelling. At first he was still used to his old ways and so of course he started to yell when he was upset with her. She calmly informed him that he was yelling at her and asked him how much longer he needed to be angry. Five minutes? Thirty minutes? She'd be back when he calmed down. He realized how silly it was and started to laugh.

Boundaries are simply the things people can't do to you, lines that will protect you and allow you to be your best. Here is how to stop this behavior in a graceful and effective manner.

1) Inform. "Do you realize you are yelling?" or "Do you realize that comment hurt me?" If they continue with the unwanted behavior, go to step 2, but only after trying step 1.

2) Request. Ask them to stop. "I ask that you stop yelling at me now," or, "I ask that you only give me constructive feedback." If they still don't get it, try step 3.

3) Demand or insist. "I insist that you stop yelling at me now." No luck? Move on to step 4.

4) Leave (without any snappy comebacks or remarks). "I can't continue this conversation while you are yelling at me. I am going to leave the room."

The key to success with these four steps is to say them in a neutral tone of voice. Remember, you're informing the other person. Think of going through the four steps in the same way you'd say, "The sky is blue."

We assume that enforcing a boundary will make people dislike us or think we are pushy or aggressive or perhaps demanding. However, it is the exact opposite. When you have strong boundaries in place, people will stop treating you like a doormat and start respecting you. You'll be the kind of person people naturally respect and treat courteously.

It's tough to put up boundaries, when you're scared it will only separate you from what (or who) you want to stay close to. But having your dignity, intelligence, or sanity assaulted by someone who isn't interested in or capable of handling you with care will diminish you to a breaking point. It's a worthwhile risk to set and enforce boundaries that might actually help you grow and stay together instead. Of course women aren't the only ones who need to set boundaries, just ask Scott Ginsberg!

The people who really love you will respect your boundaries.

vulnerable is good for you

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I'm thinking I need to catch up on TedTalks...

A summary of some of the good stuff from this talk by Dr. Brene Brown - http://anonymous8.com/women-talk/why-being-vulnerable-is-good-for-you/

The only difference between those who have a strong sense of love and belonging and those who don’t is this: those who have a strong sense of love and belonging BELIEVE they are WORTHY of love and belonging.

1. Have the courage to be imperfect.

2. Have the compassion to be kind to yourself so you can be kind to others.

3. Be authentic, let go of who you think you should be to be who you are. You can't have connection without authenticity.

4. Embrace vulnerability. What makes you vulnerable makes you beautiful. Vulnerability isn't necessarily comfortable or excruciating, it's simply necessary. It's the willingness to say I love you first, to act without guarantees, to invest in a relationship that may or may not work out.

And what do the whole-hearted say? Instead of saying, “I am not thin enough, or I am not tall enough, or I am not pretty enough, or I am not interesting enough, or I am not rich enough,” they say, “I am enough.”

Vulnerability is captivating and reverence-inducing for me, in a way. It's like an instant "Handle with Care" label that signifies something extremely valuable might be in that box, and I can't help wanting to follow the label's instructions, and see what rare or beautiful thing is inside...

four phrases

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Four phrases blogger Tara Pringle Jefferson suggests incorporating into your relationship, from blackandmarriedwithkids.com


“Can I help you with anything?” I would love, love, love to hear this phrase at least once a day. Is it unrealistic? I have no clue. But there’s something about your spouse offering their help without you having to ask for it. Of course, this works best when it’s a two-way street, so if I want my husband to leap to my assistance, I better not disappear when he’s knee-deep in yardwork.

“You really look beautiful/handsome/sexy/hot today.” Sometimes we get so caught up in the day-to-day minutiae that the chance to just look at our partner and marvel at how sexy they still are after all these years (or months). Especially if you don’t have much time together during the day and your evenings are spent wrestling kids into the bed and passing out promptly afterward. Give your partner an unexpected compliment every other day and I bet you things will only get better.

“What would I do without you?” I usually ask my husband this question at least once a week, after he’s swooped in and fixed whatever problem I was trying to solve. He might not jump for joy every time I say it, but by continually expressing how much I value his place in my life, we strengthen our bond.

“What can I do to make this better?” My husband asked me this after an argument we had a while ago. Not only did it make it easier to accept his apology (and really, it wasn’t a big deal to begin with), but we both had a sense of how we were going to move forward, which is crucial when dealing with matters of the heart.

I like you because...

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I think we could all use more conversations like these... from Stephen Covey's Living the 7 Habits:


My oldest daughter, Tina, who was about nine at the time, and I were driving to see her grandmother. I remember thinking that with Tina, building an Emotional Bank Account was a key. So I thought, "What can I do in the thirty minutes we have together to make deposits in her bank account?" You know, this took a bit of courage. By the age of nine, a child pretty much has a good idea of the kind of behavior to expect from each parent. I'm not much of a chatterer when we travel. I might comment on the scenery every now and again, but mostly I drive in silence. So I was a bit nervous suggesting the game I came up with.

As we backed out of the driveway, I said, "Honey, why don't we play a game. What we want to do is say 'I feel good about you because...' or 'I liked what you did because...' The 'because' is important because then we know why the other person likes us. Okay? I'll start."

So I started off. I said something about her. Then she paused and said something about me. After about three or four things, I really had to start thinking. This was quite shocking to me. I love my child so much, but I was having difficulty thinking of specific actions that I loved about her. I was really searching for things to say. Tina found it easier. After about five or six, she started to break through the normal responses. I could tell she was looking at my life, and seeing me and what I did. She was grateful for the work I did, the walks to the park, the basketball in the driveway, the way I woke her up in the mornings. She could see all of me.

I was still struggling. Then, as I looked at this little girl's life, really looked at her and what she did every day in our family, I started to see. I saw her hugs, her little words, her thank-yous. I saw how well she was doing at school and how polite she was. I told her I loved it when she came home from school and gave me a big hug. When we started digging and looking, we couldn't stop. This was only a thirty-minute trip. We got to twenty-two, twenty-three items and then I had to call it off. I couldn't think of anything else.

Frankly, I was stunned by the game. I felt good on one hand but discouraged on the other. Good that Tina could see so much (she wanted to carry on), discouraged that I couldn't find more. More importantly, the rest of the trip we spent chattering to each other. I think the game started a dialogue that I hadn't had with her before.

When we arrived, Tina jumped out of the car and raced into the house, and that's when my heart almost broke. "Grandma, Grandma," she shouted. "My daddy knows so many good things about me. I didn't know he knew so many good things about me."

The word "respect" comes from the Latin root specto, which means to see -- to see another (Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood). The more we are self-absorbed, the less we see others as precious individuals with many layers of individuality, and with many facets to each layer. When we get out of ourselves, and truly listen to another, a marvelous journey of discovery begins.

Be Positive

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More from You Say More Than You Think by Janine Driver:

It doesn't matter if you are speaking with a barricaded person, and interviewee, or a date, remember that the person in front of you has pride. Rather than being negative and saying, "Don't lie to me," suggest the quality you want to see. As my friend James Cavanaugh, ATF Special Agent in Charge always says, "Credit people with the quality you want them to produce and normally they'll accept it, even feel bound to it."

Who are you more likely to be receptive to - someone who recognizes your positive characteristics or belittles you by detailing each flaw?

For instance, this morning my son was playing with an elaborate pop-up book while I was on the phone with one of my sisters. At first I said, “Angus, please put the book back, I’ll read it to you when I get off the phone.” He ignored me and continued to play with the book. Then I tried QWQ [Question, Wait, Question]: “Angus, you’re a good listener, right?”

He smiled and said, “Yes.”

“Do you think you’re the best listener in the whole world?” I asked.
He laughed and responded, “YES!”

Then I added, “I know you’re the best listener in the whole world; that’s one of the things I many things I love about you. When I ask you to do something, you do it faster than any other kid I know.” He smiled. Then I said, “Angus, please put your book back and I’ll play with you when I’m done.” And he put the book back and began playing with a toy dinosaur instead.

the right side

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From You Say More Than You Think by Janine Driver:

Every person has an on/off switch for rapport, a "right" or more open side of her body. Knowing which side of a person's body is more comfortable for her, and which side makes her uneasy, can make for really effective body language... Once you know a person’s right [positive/good] side, you can use it in many powerful ways.

Less than a month later, one of the mothers from the event sent me an e-mail. Her relationship with her husband (physically and emotionally) had gone downhill since their early courtship, so after the class, she had decided to try out my rule with him. She changed the sheets and had them sleep on opposite sides of the bed. He was intrigued. (And by “intrigued,” I’ll refer you to the previous chapter, “Work Your Naughty Bits.”)
This change may not sound revolutionary. But consider that she discovered that she prefers people on her right side, and her husband had been sleeping on her left side for years. Literally overnight, they reconnected with each other, got a major boost in the bedroom, and had an improved relationship with the rest of their family, too.

fight with your fists...

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From an article in Real Simple magazine titled 10 Things My Father Was Right About by Jancee Dunn:


1. Hold hands while you hash it out. My folks have been married for 47 years. One of my father’s rules for a happy marriage is that if a nasty argument erupts, hold hands as you fight. You’ll feel goofy doing this, but here’s the thing: It works. Recently my husband, Tom, forgot to pay a few bills that were buried under a pile of clutter. I was incandescent with rage. So we interlaced our fingers while we talked it out, and I felt my blood pressure plummet and my endorphins flow in spite of myself. It’s impossible to scream at someone who is giving your hand a gentle squeeze. It just is.


And a few others I liked =)


2. Pay attention to anyone who wears a tool belt... My father is practical, thrifty (or, put more accurately, cheap), and savvy about home improvements. He calls a repairman only as a last resort—and when he does, he hovers around the guy and asks tons of questions. “Carefully observe anyone with a skill that you don’t have,” my father often said, “and then you can take care of the fill-in-the-blank yourself.” He was right: After shadowing a handyman for an hour, I later fixed my own dishwasher, to the perpetual amazement of friends who call their super to change a lightbulb.

3. ...Or a uniform. It has always annoyed my dad that a waiter gets a 20 percent tip for serving a crème brûlée, while a hotel maid who disposes of used dental floss often winds up with bubkes. My father routinely told our sanitation men and the crew who cleaned his office that they were doing a good job and made sure to compensate them at holidays. As a child, I used to writhe with embarrassment when he did this. Now I do the same for the sanitation workers in my neighborhood. One guy once told me, with a catch in his voice, that in 10 years, it was the first time he had ever been thanked.

9. No one’s smarter than you. Long ago, if I was in a group and the conversation strayed to an unfamiliar topic, I’d keep silent. Dad urged me to say, “I don’t understand. Can you explain what you’re talking about?” Asking questions makes you sound smart, he said, and confident to boot. At a recent gathering, somebody mentioned the Mauritius Continental Shelf. Silence. Then I asked, “What’s that?” And all the former Ivy Leaguers around me exhaled and admitted they didn’t know what the hell it was, either.


View the entire article at
http://www.realsimple.com/magazine-more/inside-magazine/life-lessons/things-my-father-was-right-about-00000000035158/index.html

a pearl of choice

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From Love & Respect by Emerson Eggerichs:

Think of a speck of sand. If the sand gets in the human eye, it causes irritation, then infection, and if not cared for, eventually loss of vision. But put that same speck of sand in an oyster. It causes irritation, then secretion, and eventually the oyster forms a pearl. Was the sand the primary cause of the results in the eye? Was the sand the primary cause of the results in the oyster? No. If it were, the results would be the same. The sand was an agent that revealed the inner properties of the eye and of the oyster. In a real sense, when life with your spouse causes irritation, you can let it develop into an infection or you can allow it to become a pearl...

Your spouse can affect you, but your spouse does not control you. You can experience disappointment, but it is your choice to disrespect or be unloving...

I CAN EXPERIENCE HURT, but it is my choice to hate.

-----------------------------------------------
And from Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas:

If we view the marriage relationship as an opportunity to excel in love, it doesn't matter how difficult the person is who we are called to love; it doesn't matter even whether than love is ever returned. We can still excel at love. We can still say, "like it or not, I'm going to love you like nobody ever has."

the respect test

---

From Love and Respect by Emerson Eggerichs:

I asked a group of wives to spend a bit of time thinking of some things they respected about their husbands. It took some of them quite awhile, but they all finally did it. Then I told them to go home, wait until their husbands weren't busy or distracted, and say: "I was thinking about you today and several things about you that I respect, and I just want you to know that I respect you."

After saying this, they were to not wait for any response- just mention something they needed to do and quietly start to leave the room. Then they were to see what would happen. One woman reported back to me that after telling her husband she respected him, she turned to leave but she never even made it to the door. He practically screamed, "Wait! Come back. What things?"

Fortunately (and this is very important), she was ready to tell him what she respected about him and she proceeded to do so. After she was finished, he said, "Wow! Hey, can I take the family out to dinner?"

The wife was aghast. Her husband had seldom if ever taken the family out to dinner. What was going on here? I explained to her that a man's first and fundamental impulse is to serve, especially in response to being honored. She had honored him, and he wanted to do something about it. The wife had to ask for a rain check because the kids had committments that evening, and he agreed. About fifteen minutes later, however, she heard pots and pans banging in the kitchen. She went to look and found her husband fixing dinner. Her husband had never fixed dinner. Never - this was a first! Again, he was serving.

A few days later, this wife wrote to us again and said."You won't believe it. He's in the laundry room! Do you have any other 'respect tests'? I think I might get a cruise out of this."

Could a wife use the Respect Test to manipulate her husband to take her on a cruise? That's possible, but this wife was not guilty of manipulation. She sincerely tried expressing respect for her husband, and it worked far beyond her expectations. To repeat what I said earlier, a husband who has basic goodwill will serve his wife when she respects him for who he is.


"As women, we have the power to build up or tear down our husbands every day, merely by the respect we give and the amount of faith we let him know we have in him. Respect and admiration are two of the most powerful tools a woman has to influence her husband." - http://devotions.proverbs31.org/2010/02/love-respect-and-admiration.html

=)

lights out

---

Great analogy from Love and Respect by Emerson Eggerichs:

Think of this difference as two types of electrical circuits. On one circuit there are three thousand lights, and the circuit is so designed that if one light gets smashed the whole string goes out. On the other circuit there are three thousand lights, and it is designed so that if you smash two thousand of these lights, the other thousand will still work.

At the level of intimacy, the wife is like the first circuit. If a serious marital conflict exists, this affects her whole being. All of her "lights" go out, and she shuts down totally. This is because she is an integrated personality. Her mind, body, and soul are connected and her entire system reacts to feelings of hurt. Let her husband make one small, unkind remark that feels unloving to her and she is totally upset with him until things are repaired... When she believes there is a problem, when she feels hurt, lonely, or neglected, she definitely has no interest in responding to you sexually. When her spirit is crushed, her body is unavailable.

The wife may complain that her husband seems to be able to operate as if there is no problem between them when she clearly is still upset and feeling crushed. He goes to work, and when he returns home, he cannot believe she is fully charged to talk about and earlier tension. Usually he has to be reminded of what exactly happened because he has forgotten. For her, the whole day has been interwoven with the spat that they had at breakfast. She has replayed and rehearsed the episode a dozen times... Why is he not upset the way she is upset? Remember the two electrical circuits? Her husband is the one where you can smash two thousand of his lights and the other thousand will still work. That is what is meant by "compartmentalizing" his problems.


There's clearly some generalizations here, but I know that first circuit is one I've definitely operated under. Many girls and guys replay their significant other's words and actions over and over when they were first dating, it's just that a lot more positive things tend to be purposely said and done during those rose-colored days. Finding ways to constructively address the less rosy bits is the tough part.


Remember too, that wives love to talk to release their emotions. Because a woman is an integrated personality, she is like a teakettle - she collects all the things that have happened to her over the day, and there is a buildup. She needs to release some of those feelings... Women also need to talk to realize their feelings. As they begin to talk about what happened through the day, they can work back to the problem that they can't seem to put their finger on. As she talks to you, it clarifies things for her; then she feels better and she feels understood.

inspiration

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As seen on Facebook:

just when you think its a typical freezing monday morning, someone wonderful shows up at the door, with breakfast, and makes your coffee, and brushes off your car, and starts it....lets out your puppy.... and totally makes your monday morning wonderful... :)


Just thought I'd share some inspiration for anyone looking to make their significant other's day =)

more gift ideas

---

for my original list check out my first gift ideas blog post =)

some free online gift ideas -
http://www.ehow.com/how_4723720_give-free-online-gifts.html

from lovingyou.com


A Coloring Book For Your Love
For an anniversary present, I made my boyfriend a coloring and activity book. I made up a story and drew all the pictures (plain computer paper is fine) and outlined them with pen. I bound it all together with a cover and gave him some crayons to go with it. He loves it so much he refuses to color in it for fear of messing it up.
--submitted by Kitty

A Fairy Tale Story
My boyfriend and I are always telling each other stories, just to pass the time. This year for Christmas I decided to write out the story of how we met in a fairy-tale format, complete with cute pictures of the Kim Anderson children to illustrate it. All my girlfriends loved the idea, and hopefully he likes it as much, too!
--submitted by Anonymous

A Happy Book
I decided that I wanted to do something really special--and cost effective--to get his spirits up and still celebrate us, so I made him a "happy book." I went to a bookstore and got a really nice leather-bound, unlined journal and a felt tip pen. I then sat at my computer and researched hundreds of motivational, inspirational, and loving quotes that made me think of him. I picked my favorite 60 (1 for each month we had been together) and wrote them down on a separate page in the book. On the next page I inserted a picture and wrote a story about how or why that quote made me think of him. I want him to know that he's accomplished so much in his life, and he just needs to keep going...
--submitted by Dani

A Keepsake of Our Song
As Valentine’s Day got closer I still wanted to surprise him so I got six balloons and placed a note in each one. Each note told him where to go to pop the next balloon. By the time he got to the bedroom I was standing there with the song that we danced to at our wedding playing, and a bottle in my hand. In the bottle were the lyrics to our song printed on old-looking paper. He loved it!
--submitted by Michele

A Message In A Bottle
I got a clear plastic soda bottle, and took all the wrapping off it. I typed up a note to her and printed it on some paper that looked like a scroll. I rolled it up nice and tight and tied it in a bow. I put the note in the bottle, and screwed the top on. I taped her address to the outside of the bottle, and it only cost me .55 cents in the US mail! She absolutely loved it! Trust me, it will be one of the best inexpensive surprises ever!
--submitted by John

A Picture Is Worth 1000 Words
My girlfriend and I were at different colleges, so I didn't get to see her except on holidays. So, for our anniversary, I wrote her a note. At the top I put, "Some people say a picture is worth a thousand words. I can't take a picture with you... so guess what?" Under that, I wrote out how much I loved her and missed her using exactly a thousand words. I put the note in a picture frame and sent it to her in the mail. She loved it!
--submitted by Untouchable

A loving book
I will go shopping at a book store in the children's section. I will pick out a book with a loving title, like one time I bought him, "I love you this much" When he reads through it he knows how much I love him. It's a great gift to keep for a long time too.
--submitted by Pam

Build Your Own Lamp
She loves the movie Monsters Inc..So I bought a talking stuffed figure of the character from the movie and a do-it-yourself lamp kit. I cut a little hole in the back of the stuffed animal, slid a metal stand rod and wires under its back, with the light and lampshade just above his head. I pulled it low and glued his hand to it, so it looked like he was looking out from underneath the lamp shade, like a scene from the movie. I left it at her work, with him holding balloons and a card I made. Next to it was a box of her favorite cookies that she can never find at any of our stores (I called some stores in nearby cities and found them). She was so surprised that she started crying, and to this day the girls at her work still remember me as the guy who made the cutest lamp for his girlfriend.
--submitted by Kenny

Choose Your Own Adventure
This would be a great gift idea for those 20-something year olds that grew up with the books Choose Your Own Adventure and want to make a creative love journal. Basically, the books gave you choices and depending on your choices you would flip to different pages. They were especially fun to read because you could reread the books and change your fate every time depending on what you chose to do.
--submitted by Anonoymous

100 Reasons Why I Love You
We chat on the phone a lot, but that gets expensive for a broke, college girl, so we also chat on the computer. One day, he asked me if I was sure that I loved him and I told him of course. He asked me why, and I told him there were at least 100 reasons. When he asked me to name 5, I told him to give me a minute, I had to do something. In the buddy info of my chat program, I listed 10 reasons why I love him, for him and everyone else I know to see. I told him to check, and he called me up as soon as he read it gushing about how much he loved me. A week later, I put up 10 more, and the same thing the week after that. Once he caught on that there was a new set of 10 every week, he started doing the same thing. It lasted for 10 weeks. We had so much fun doing it, we just kept it up. It's a great little reminder to have sometimes, just to let you know that you're thought of.
--submitted by Melissa

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

---

RESPECT. Unconditional respect. Whether the person is loving or not, whether they are the first to admit wrong or not.

It's one of the most powerful tools a woman can own.

From Love & Respect: The Love She Most Desires, The Respect He Desperately Needs by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs:

I have been in counseling sessions with couples, and with her mate sitting there listening the wife will readily say, "I love my husband but don't feel any respect for him." But when I turn this around and ask the wives how they would feel if they would hear their husbands say, "I respect you but don't love you," they are horrified. They exclaim, "I would be devastated!"

I asked one wife, "How long would it take you to get over that?" She quickly answered, "Forever."

The typical wife would be up in arms if she heard, "I respect you but don't love you." That is taboo! She would view her husband as a very unloving human being. Yet this same wife feels she can readily say to him, "I love you but don't respect you." What she doesn't understand is that her husband is equally devastated by her comment and it also takes him "forever" to "get over it." The bottom line is that husbands and wives have needs that are truly equal. She needs unconditional love, and he needs unconditional respect.


Stay tuned for more pearls of wisdom from Love & Respect =)

nice nite in june

---

I can't seem to find the original source for this poem titled Nice Nite in June, but it was an amusing and sad-but-true snapshot of modern relationships.


Nice nite in June,
Stars shine, big moon.
In park, on bench,
With gal, in clinch.
Me say me love,
She coo like dove.
Me smart, me fast,
Never let chance pass.
"Get hitched," me say.
She say, "Okay."
Wedding bells, ring, ring,
Honeymoon, everything.
Happy man, happy wife,
Best time in life!
'Nother nite in June,
Stars shine, big moon.
Ain't happy no more,
Carry baby, walk floor.
Wife fuss and scream,
Me yell, get mean.
Wife sad, me mad,
Everything go bad.
Nagging wife, bawling brat,
Life one big spat.
Me realize at last,
Me just too fast!


Dr. John Van Epp read the poem in a video I saw of one of his seminars on How to Avoid Marrying a Jerk (or Jerkette) - check out excerpts from his book at http://nojerks.com/index.php?page=Excerpts.

"Don't spend months preparing for a wedding that will last an hour, and neglect to prepare for a marriage that is to last a lifetime."

the one

---

from Laugh Your Way to a Better Marriage: Unlocking the Secrets to Life, Love, and Marriage by Mark Gungor:

The idea that there is just one special person for me - my soul mate - comes from an alleged altercation between the human race and the Greek god Zeus. It was thought that our undying pursuit of perfect love is the result of Zeus's scheme to keep us busy - far away from meddling in the domain of the gods. Those of us in Evangelical circles have even taken this to a whole new level by encouraging parents to start praying for that "one special person" that God has chosen for our child while he or she is still young. Rather than praying that our children embrace righteousness, justice, wisdom, sacrifice, goodness, et cetera - all things that would make them wonderful mates to whomever they chose to commit their lives to - we are praying for that "special one" that God has already chosen for our child. Zeus be praised, I guess.

The Bible never tells us to find the one God has chosen. It teaches us how to live well with the person we have chosen. And there is a distance of infinitude between those two thoughts. The first assumes that life, love, romance, and marriage are part of God's divine plan and, therefore, depend more on God than on us. The second, and more biblical, line of thought tells us that successful life, love, romance, and marriage are the result of a couple living by God's principles - principles that never fail. But this version, which places true love and marriage on the footing of human choice and responsibility, just isn't nearly as romantic or seductive. The truth is, a successful marriage is not the result of marrying the "right" person, feeling the "right" emotions, thinking the "right" thoughts, or even praying the "right" prayers. It's about doing the "right" things - period.

I generally agreed with Grugor, although there's a verse in Proverbs that might make one question the extremity of his opinion -

House and wealth are an inheritance from fathers, But a prudent wife is from the Lord. Prov 19:14

While I don't think it proves that God of the Bible intends one special woman for one certain man, it does indicate that a prudent wife is a gift that He purposefully blesses a man with. Is the verse saying a prudent wife is an inheritance from the Lord? Or does the "but" indicate a completely opposite idea of inheritance? How exactly God or fate or the universe orchestrates the giving of that gift is beyond me, and I whole-heartedly support that it's focusing on building one's own character that will most likely attract the amazing person we hope to be gifted with.

beautiful

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From an article series in the August 2009 issue of Real Simple magazine titled: What Makes Me Feel Beautiful:

Anne Roiphe: My Late Husband’s Words

It was mid-December of 2005. I don’t know why he said it. I don’t know if a shadow had fallen across him, something appalling he saw out of the corner of his eye. I don’t know if it was just coincidence or intuition that prompted him, but about a week before my seemingly healthy 82-year-old husband suddenly died, he emerged from the kitchen ready to go to his office, his face clean-shaven, his eyes shining, smiling shyly, holding the copy of the Anthony Trollope book he was rereading, and said to me, "You have made me very happy. You know that you have made me a happy man." There I stood in my work outfit, blue jeans and a T-shirt. There I stood with my white hair and my wrinkles and the face I was born with, although now much creased by time, and I felt beautiful.

"What?" I said. I wanted him to repeat the words. "You heard me," he said and put on his coat and drew his earmuffs out of his pocket. "Say it again," I said. He said it again. "You’ve made me happy." We had been married 39 years. We had held hands waiting in hospital corridors while a desperately ill child struggled to breathe and thankfully recovered. We had made financial mistakes together. We had spent hours out in fishing boats. We had raised the children and then second-guessed our choices. We had stood shoulder to shoulder at graduations and weddings and we were well-worn, but still I had made him happy, and I was proud and flushed with the warmth of his words.

I know I looked beautiful that morning. Perhaps not to the young man holding his toddler in his arms who rode the elevator with me; perhaps not to the friend I met for lunch, a true believer in Botox; perhaps not to passersby on the street; but I knew it for a certainty. I was beautiful.

I don’t believe that inner beauty is sufficient in this cruel world. That’s the pap one tells a child. I don’t believe that positive thinking improves your skin tone or that loving or being loved changes the shape of your nose or restores the thickness and color of hair, but I do know that there is a way of being beautiful, even as age takes its toll, that has something to do with the spirit filling with joy, something to do with the union with another human being, with the sense of having done well at something enormously important, like making happy a man who has made you happy often enough.

Ten days after that morning conversation, my husband and I returned from a concert and dinner with friends and walked down our windy block toward our apartment house when suddenly he stumbled and fell and died within minutes. As I waited for the ambulance, I remembered his words, a beauty potion I would take with me into the rest of my life.

excel in love

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Significance is found in giving your life away, not in selfishly trying to find personal happiness.

When you're with an amazing person there's simply never enough hours in the day. While being single can sometimes feel like you're just trying to fill the time, this quote from Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas reminded me to switch that perspective around and look at my time and life as something to give away. I'm all for personal happiness as well, but if love is a great beautifier, giving and doing for others is a great happifier =)

My other favorite quote from the book was:

If we view the marriage relationship as an opportunity to excel in love, it doesn't matter how difficult the person is who we are called to love; it doesn't matter even whether than love is ever returned. We can still excel at love. We can still say, "like it or not, I'm going to love you like nobody ever has."

sacred marriage

---

- For Lisa -

I smiled in surprise as I turned past the cover pages to these words of dedication, written by Gary Thomas in his book Sacred Marriage. I just happen to share his wife's name =) While perhaps not a masterpiece of literary eloquence or charm (or even intended to be I would guess), the book is still full of thought-provoking passages and challenging ideas.

Reading Sacred Marriage confirmed for me all over again how different infatuation is from truly loving someone; infatuation is something like adoration, without a deeper conscious desire and effort to continually honor and show respect to the object of your affection. I have completely and happily adored in the past, but loving with that kind of unwavering commitment to Respect is a much harder action to take hold of and carry out. So often we think of love as something we find, or that comes to us, rather than something we actively do and work at. This passive idea of love can be debilitating when we discover ourselves or our significant other to have suddenly "fallen" out of it. We then can only think it was meant to be, that there is nothing we can do about the loss of that feeling. Infatuation is a very irresistable state and feeling to fall into, and then perhaps out of, but love can really be thought of as a choice and an effort. Thomas declared:

Romantic love has no elasticity to it. It can never be stretched; it simply shatters.

Because we get the choice and then find it difficult to carry out the love in practice, what grounds do we have to ever stop loving? Yes, this spouse might be difficult to love at times, but that's what marriage is for - to teach us how to love.

Isn't that last bit a remarkable statement? That marriage isn't just a state of being where two people are to feel mutually loved, but a tool to teach us how to love. Amazing to sit on for a minute.

Gary naturally writes as a husband relating to his wife but here's some more of his points to ponder, with some of the 'wife' references switched to 'husband' to encourage all my generous wives to be out there =)

The thought that God wants me to serve him by concentrating on making my [husband] happy was extraordinary.

I quit defending myself when I was judged too harshly - for the important thing was not to be right (or to be well thought of) but to love.

My family once went through the National Gallery of Art, looking at some original Rembrandts, and one of my very tactile children reached out to touch the painting. My wife let loose with a harsh whisper and grabbed our child's hand before it could even reach the canvas. "This is a Rembrandt!" she hissed under the guards glare. "You can't touch these!" My [husband] was created by God himself! How dare I dishonor [him]? In fact, shouldn't it give me pause before I reach out to touch [him]? [He] is the Creator's [son], after all!

Honor not expressed is not honor. The difficulty with honoring our spouse is that it calls us to adopt attitudes and actions that go far beyond merely saying that we won't dishonor him or her. Honor isn't passive, it's active. We honor our [husbands] by demonstrating our esteem and respect, complimenting them in public, affirming their gifts, abilities, and accomplishments, and declaring our appreciation for all they do.

The glib statement "Oh that's just [men] for you" betrays a serious spiritual disease. "Just [men]" are made in the image of God.

All of a sudden, a question startled me: "Does Lisa feel like she's married to Jesus?" I almost laughed out loud, until I was shaken by another thought. I am told over and over in Scripture that my duty as a Christian is to become more like Jesus Christ. Over time, my wife should start to feel like there's at least a family resemblance.

Instead of focusing your energy on resentment over how sparsely your spouse understands you, expand your efforts to understand him or her. Take time to do an inventory of your spouse's difficulties rather than your spouses shortcomings.

I never eat at somebody's house without thanking them for providing a meal; why should I not give my wife that same thanks I'd give someone else?

Have contempt for contempt... Contempt is conceived with expectations. Respect is conceived with expressions of gratitude.

The times that I am happiest and most fulfilled in my marriage are the times when I am intent on drawing meaning and fulfillment from becoming a better [wife] rather than from demanding a "better" [husband].

olive branch

---

"I thought I was just tired," says the guy newly in touch with his feelings, "but I'm really sad, lonely, ambivalent, distant, mournful, neglected, burdened, unappreciated, mistreated, taken advantage of, etc. I have a lot of needs that are not getting met in this relationship!"

Of course his partner would respond with exasperation.

"But you wanted him to express his feelings," we would say.

"Not those feelings!" she'd exclaim in disgust. "I want to hear how much he loves me and how important I am to him and how empty and sad his life would be without me."

Here is a tough question that women need to ask themselves: Do you really want to know about his feelings or do you merely want him to validate yours and comply with your idea of connection?

Again we remind women, be careful what you ask for, because if you refuse the connection when he extends the olive branch, you will make it difficult - if not impossible - for him to give you what you're asking for. If you expect a man to be forthcoming with his feelings, you must cease all the distraction, impatience, criticism, and other forms of stomping on his heart that taught him in the past that it is not safe to go there.


Just some more words of wisdom from How to Improve Your Marriage without Talking About It by Patricia Love and Steven Stosny.

I found this helpful as well:

Every time you violate your core values - even if you're just reacting to your partner - you feel guilty. If you take a deep breath and try to improve, appreciate, connect, or protect, you will find yourself back to what is most important to you. You will no longer want to attack, devalue, or defend.

The capacity to stay true to your deepest values - and thereby transform most of your fear and shame - lies entirely within you. And in the end, you will judge yourself by your own efforts and behavior, not by your partner's. On your deathbed, you won't regret what he/she did or didn't do; you'll think about your fidelity to the most important things around you. When you are upset, angry, or resentful, try to focus less on what your partner is doing and ask yourself... Am I acting like the person I most want to be? Am I being the partner I want to be?
Remaining true to your core values, regardless of what your partner does, is the necessary first step in relationship improvement.

good measure, pressed down, and shaken together

---

"Therefore be merciful, just as your Father also is merciful. Judge not, and you shall not be judged. Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give, and it will be given to you: good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over will be put into your bosom. For with the same measure that you use, it will be measured back to you.”
Luke 6:36-38

Some people are definitely toxic, and require distance or other boundaries to preserve your own sanity. And putting your sanity first is key to being able to be merciful and forgiving and giving, but I've never gone wrong when I've insisted on treating people well because of who I am, not because of how they're treating me or how I want to be treated. Just a slightly different twist on the Golden Rule. Maybe I feel like I have more direct influence on how I'm remembered than how I'm treated, so it's a better use of energy to focus on the former? I've seen this principle resolve or even improve enough negative situations to be a firm believer in it. It's also not just about how you're remembered; it's about the ripple effect you want to have. Cruelty and sarcasm can only breed more of the same, and it's not really fair or beneficial when Kevin Bacon's cousin ends up the unwitting victim of your judgement or stinginess. You might actually restore someone's faith in humanity, and inspire them to do the same for others =)

I know it's tough to be generous when you're hurting, but these verses offer an amazing reward for turning our own knee-jerk critical and demeaning reactions around. With the exception of toxic/abusive relationships, it sounds like the hardest part is believing that being the first, and sometimes only partner to be merciful and understanding and affirming and giving can be in YOUR best interest. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over best interest.

A big pile of goodness, pressed down to make room for even more well-mixed goodness, with an extra bottle of goodness poured on top and spilling over... can I get double shot of that? =)

for shame

---

From How to Improve Your Marriage without Talking About It by Patricia Love and Steven Stosny:

"Some women have no clue how critical and demeaning they are to men. When confronted with their critical behavior, the most common reaction is disbelief. Reflecting on this fact, Pat thought it might be interesting to list 101 ways to shame a man without trying. Off the top of her head, she came up with well over 50 ways she had done so, inadvertantly or otherwise, in her own relationships..."

For an eye opener, choose true or false for the following statements (choose "true" if it applies to you at least sometimes).

1. I exclude him from important decisions.


2. I don't always give him a chance to help.


3. I correct things he says.


4. I question his judgment.


5. I give him unsolicited advice.


6. I suggest how he should feel.


7. I ignore his advice.


8. I imply that he's inadequate in certain areas.


9. I'm often stressed or in a bad mood.


10. I think that he should at least match my use of time and energy.


11. When he says I overreact, I think that he just doesn't understand.


12. I ignore his needs that I don't think are important.


13. I focus on what I don't have instead of what I have.


14. I withhold praise because I think he doesn't really deserve it or because I don't want him to get the big head.


15. I use a harsh tone to get through to him.


16. I pay more attention to other people's needs than his.


17. I undermine his wishes.


18. I am condescending to him.


19. I lack respect for his work.


20. I show little interests in his interests.


21. I criticize his family.


22. I interpret the "real meaning" of what he says and does.


23. I compare him to other men or, worse, to my girlfriends.


24. I don't take his point of view seriously.


25. I believe that he just can't see my unhappiness.


26. I think he fails to make me happy


27. If I'm unhappy, I tell him he must be unhappy, too.


28. I roll my eyes when I think of some of the things he says and does.


29. He says I give him "the look"


30. I am sometimes sarcastic to make my point or express my dissatisfaction with his behavior.


31. I use ridicule to get through to him.


32. I usually have a "better way" of doing things.


33. Sometimes I think he's a jerk.


34. I have to tell him what he's doing wrong.


35. I tell him that he never helps me enough.


36. He can't handle my feelings.


37. I believe that if his childhood or previous relationships were different we wouldn't have these problems.


38. I think that I understand relationships better than he does.


39. I think I do more than he does.


40. My friends treat me better than he does.


41. He disappoints me.

Guilty ={

"Where there is a withdrawn or silent man, there is usually a critical woman."

the love list

---

"Maybe I'm not the right man for you," he said, half making a statement, half asking a question.

"Maybe you're not!" I crossed my arms, feeling defiant, but in the next second I regretted the whole ridiculous discussion. What were we talking about? I thought I had met the man of my dreams, and we were about to throw the whole thing out the window over an absurd argument. Closing my eyes, I suddenly saw a mental picture of "the list." It had been in the back of my closet for five years. What would Aubrey think of the list?

"I have an idea," I said. I left the kitchen, and several minutes later I came back with the list in my hand. I held the small sheaf of papers out to him. "Read this, and you decide if you are the right man for me." I turned on my heel and marched down the hallway to my room, as if following stage directions.

.........

"I want to know if—" I began, but I couldn't finish the sentence. Finally, I blurted out: "I want to know if I am supposed to have a true and lasting love in my life. It's okay if I'm not. It's really okay. I have so much in my life. My family. My friends. My artists. My galleries. I just want to know. I want to stop worrying about it—thinking about it all the time."

"Here is what you must do. You must go home and write down 100 qualities you would like this person with whom you will share your life to have."

I felt almost giddy. "A hundred? Wouldn't I be lucky if I got 10?"

"Oh no, my dear," she said. "You must describe the person down to the color of the socks!"

I wanted to laugh. Color of the socks?

"You will make your list, and then you will put the list away for safekeeping. What you are doing is making clear for yourself exactly the person who will be right for you, and then you will be directing the request into the universe to send that person to you. Do you understand?"

I nodded. But I didn't understand at all. The idea that somewhere in the universe was a person just right for me—someone who would respond to all the things that were important to me and with whom I could share my life—seemed impossible. Yet in spite of the painful experiences of the past, I had always lived my life as if all things were possible. Why wouldn't I try making the list?

At home I climbed into my four-poster bed with a yellow legal pad. I was amazed by how easy it was to write the list. I began with the definitive idea that he must be "at peace with himself." Then I listed everything, from good family relationships to intelligence and a sense of humor, to sex, religion, money, music, books, gardening, sailing, dancing, fishing, and on and on—down to dark gray socks.

Satisfied that I had done my part, I put the list in the back of my closet.

After about 15 minutes of waiting for Aubrey's answer, he walked into my room with the list in his hand. He had tears in his soft blue eyes. We looked at each other for several seconds before he spoke.

"I missed two," he said, holding up the list. Then, smiling, he added, "There are many things you have on this list that are true about me that you could not possibly know."

I wanted to laugh out loud. Instead I jumped up and threw my arms around him. I felt jubilant. Whatever doubts I harbored that he might have missed many more than two, I knew that the point was that he thought he missed only two. I had given my list to the universe and the universe had sent me Aubrey.

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Read the full article here - http://www.oprah.com/article/omagazine/omag_200802_gorman

I heard about this love list a year or so ago, and while I didn't actually believe it would come true, I thought it was a really fun idea. What's important is being strong and holding out for the characteristics that will still be important and meaningful to you after 20 or 30 years of marriage, and not settling because you're too old or too invested or too worried about not being able to find anyone better, or just anyone else.

http://www.oprah.com/slideshow/oprahshow/slideshow1_ss_ss_20080206/5

"While Martha's article about Alice touched many readers, Erin says it nearly knocked her out of her chair. "In December 2006, I made a detailed list of what I wanted in a life partner. I included everything from hairstyle and hobbies to spirituality, health and raising children," she says. "Less than two months later, I met my wonderful now-boyfriend of one year. He is absolutely everything above and beyond what I had listed."

Heather says she made her own love list in 2002 and put it away in a drawer. "Later that year, I met my future husband, Greg. In 2006, he proposed, and a few months later I came across my list," she says. "And there were the qualities of my husband. Every time I read my list, I smile knowing I ordered my husband from the universe."

Melissa's love list dates back all the way to 2000. "Did I get what I wanted right away? Uh, no," she says. "But I kept learning, not settling, and growing as a person." Melissa—pictured above on her wedding day—recently found the list buried among old receipts. "I realized that Will, my husband, was all of the things I had asked for. Do I believe in the power of a list? A little. But I also believe in the power of me, and I worked hard to find healthy love," she says. "That's living my best life."

honeymooners

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21 blissful days and counting... she's the kind of girl you love more and more every day

A friend posted this comment about his wife on fb today, love it =)