I know that the pain of not having the sweet connection with your husband you always dreamed of is very raw and very real, because I’ve been there. Your life was not supposed to turn out like this. You had, and still have, a very clear idea of the godly husband you wanted, the sweet moments you would experience together, the force for good you would be, and the close-knit, loving family you would create. Only now, the dream is behind a thick pane of impenetrable glass- you can barely see it, you can’t get to it, and all you know now is that the God you love and gave your heart to, doesn’t seem to want you to be happy. That’s what it comes down to. If He did, things would be different. Or maybe you just blew your chance, and He just expects you to spend the rest of your life being punished for making the wrong choice. And now you have nothing left to look forward to except the next episode of Sweet Magnolias and the occasional slice of cheesecake.

But I want you to know, right here and right now, that that kind of thinking is as misplaced and ill-fitting as the 90s prom dress you got at Wet Seal that for some reason is still in your closet.

I want you to think deeply about the gratitude you have to God for loving and understanding you even when you keep making the same goofy mistakes. He gets you. He knows how hard you’re trying, and He doesn’t want you to wait until you’ve become Mother Teresa to come to Him and ask for His help. If Mother Teresa had not turned to God for guidance and connection every day she would never have become Mother Teresa! Think about His mercy and His tolerance for you, how many chances He’s given you, and extend that same mercy to your husband when he’s being a moron.

The answer to your marriage problems are “go to God.” You say (and I know cause I used to say this myself) “that makes it worse cause he hates when I go to God. The only thing that’s keeping me here, which is my sense of commitment and the duty I feel to God, is the thing my husband is most annoyed by, and that’s the awful irony.” And doesn’t it feel hopeless and crazy when you put it like that? But that’s only because you haven’t yet fully experienced how God feels about your husband and how much God is counting on you to show him how sweet the love of God really feels. And it is sweet, when anyone feels seen and embraced in all their cluelessness, just as God sees and embraces you. And when it feels safe and ok to be clueless, that’s when your husband is most likely to get a clue. Even when you don’t say anything about it, the way you feel about your husband is always hanging out there in the air and no matter how bad his spelling and grammar is, he can sense it, and if it’s stinky, he’s going to pull away.

God’s plan isn’t to eventually provide you with a comfortable apartment in the sky as a reward for enduring a life of misery chained in matrimony to a man you like no better than a junkyard dog. He wants you to love every possible minute of your life together! He wants you to wink at each other and send suggestive texts and gross the kids out with all your displays of affection! He loves love, He loves you and He loves your stumbling husband. Yes life knocks you down and the hurt can be unbearable, but I promise you that God bears it with you and that all the pain is just deepening your receptacle for your coming joy!

When God said “have faith,” He didn’t just mean believe that He exists, He also meant believe that He wants to make life a joyful adventure for you, and that as you walk with Him, He absolutely will!

Note: I wrote the following during a spiritual high. It came rushing in as one of those “download-from-heaven” moments. This tells me that someone needs to hear it. I also recognize that spiritual ecstasy, like other emotions, ebb and flow, and that without the benefit of that “soul-lubricant,” the reasoning can seem overly simplistic, abrasive or even absurd. I also know it’s true. As Christians, we rejoice in the highs and exercise faith during the lows. I pray this will touch your heart by any of those means.

The thing I was too busy feeling sorry for myself way back when to realize was that I had been given a gift in my diffcult marriage- an amazing opportunity to walk with Jesus and show Him just how much I love Him. You think nuns love Him? Sure, they get to be married to Him. But try showing Him your love while being married to this guy! It’s even more impressive and therefore an even better opportunity. And speaking of nuns- no disrespect- all my reverence and honor. Call the Midwife is my favorite show of all time.

And here’s what I was getting to- one of Mother Teresa’s helpers once shrank in disgust from a maggot-infested wound she was supposed to be tending to. Have you ever shrank in disgust from your husband? Do you know what Mother Teresa’s response was? “This is Jesus,” and she proceeded to tend to him herself with the utmost love and care.

That’s your job. That’s what you’ve been put here to do. Tend to your husband with the utmost love and care, however maggot-infested you think his soul is. And do you know what? Jesus will walk with you and turn it into a joy. I promise you with my whole heart He will. Stop worrying about what you’re missing out on. Stop it! I wasted years of my life doing that. “Poor me. I don’t have the love I deserve”. And I was right! I didn’t have the love in my heart that I deserve! I wasn’t exercising it. Loving feels at least as good as feeling loved! It’s the best! Do it! Pray for strength! He will help you! I promise you you can be happy with this man! Now if he’s hurting you or your children that’s a different matter and you need to get out of there but if it’s just your unhappiness- you and your Lord and Savior can take care of that and you will be happier than ever! Love Jesus, love your husband and love yourself. Do all the things to make yourself happy that your husband’s not doing.

Also- you don’t have to defend yourself to him! He can think you’re wrong! It’s fine! Let him think that! Don’t try to argue with him! Just sit with your feelings. Sit with ‘em. Watch them. Let them simmer, boil, fume, whatever, walk it out if you need to. Write it down. If you don’t have my emotional first aid kit yet. Get that at pages.bethechangeinyourmarriage.com/flexreset . That’s your first order of business. Fill it out on the Google Docs app on your phone and it can help you set a lot of internal stuff straight. After you simmer and pray of course. You don’t need him to know everything that’s going through your head. You don’t need him to be Ryan Gosling, you just need to walk with the Lord.

And here’s what’s going to happen. As you make that effort to understand your man, you’re going to see some amazing changes happen until you just might think you have someone better than Ryan Gosling in your house! I mean don’t count on it- I’m joking, but only kind of. You don’t have to count on any outcomes because you know you can count on God. If you’re walking with Him, every outcome is going to be amazing! I am dead serious! You will pass through some crap, but it will all turn into fertilizer for the flowers He’s planting in your magnificent life! Your life is GOING TO CHANGE. That’s the business Jesus Christ is in. No one who walks with Him ever comes out the other side the same person. And when your husband sees that he’s living with a different person. He is either going to become a different person himself, or he’s gonna get his derrière out of dodge! Know what I’m sayin?

But seriously- I know its ridiculously hard, but your Savior knows that too and He’s with you. He wants to help you get rid of all the garbage in your mind and heart that’s making you unhappy, and learning to love a difficult person is one of the best possible ways to make that happen. I wrack my brain and I can’t even imagine a better one. I thank God all the time for the pain I slogged through and what He made out of it in me. My life is an absolute dream because I trusted Him enough to let go of the reins and let myself be stretched beyond what I thought I could bear and yours will be too. The Lord gets it. And He will be with you every step of the way.

The perfect marriage, perfect house, perfect hair you were hoping for- all that stuff can make a nice gold frame around your happiness but we both know it’s not the Source of it. It’s not the juice. Not where the real, true juicy joy is that makes your heart sing as though it’s been tuned like a harp. All you need for that is Jesus. And the more you look for Him, the more you find Him. And the more you dig in, the more those other bonus, decorative, icing on the cake parts of your life fall into place with very little effort.

I’m telling you, things are going to happen. Your husband will say something he’s said a hundred times, but this time you’ll hear it in a new way and you’ll think it’s cute and playfully touch his arm afterwards. Or you will start dusting your bookshelf and a book on God or relationships or sex you’d forgotten about will suddenly start glowing and begging for you to pick it up and read, only to encounter a line that changes everything. Or a conversation will start and you’ll be sharing things you’ve never shared before and find yourself holding hands and shedding tears of relief.

Emily Dickinson wrote “Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul — and sings the tune without the words — and never stops at all.” and it’s the same with faith. We know our God is a God of miracles who never stops blessing us, so why would we ever give up our faith or our hope?

Please let me know how it goes. You deserve all the love and happiness you can hold. And love digs deep.

“We love because He first loved us.”
— 1 John 4:19

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James “Fish” Gill, Heart Coach, and self-proclaimed “conflict nerd” noticed this. He is fascinated by human connection: how it is generated, and how it erodes over time with unskillful interactions. The day I stumbled across his Instagram account james_fish_gill, was a fortuitous day indeed, and if you’re not following him already, do it with a quickness, because he will infuse your feed with sweet, full-bodied, heart broadening wisdom.

In the wonderful episode of The Shared Road Podcast I listened to, hosted by Carly McDowell, called James “Fish” Gill on Boundaries Through the Lens of Compassion, “Fish” explains that he has asked his audience how they feel when they’re on the receiving end of a boundary, and the response was unanimously negative. How do you feel when someone you love has called you out on an “unacceptable” behavior and informed you that you’re expected to change in order to maintain the relationship or stay in that person’s good graces? Shamed? Belittled? Blamed? Rejected? Unseen? Misunderstood? Angry? Defensive?

That’s most often how a boundary is received, because it places the receiver in the wrong- in a place of disapproval like a child who’s “in trouble”.

But let’s rewind. Whåt is a boundary anyway? I consulted the blog post Requests Vs. Boundaries Vs. Ultimatums: The Ultimate Guide, by Hailey Magee of the Gottman Institute.

https://www.gottman.com/blog/requests-vs-boundaries-vs-ultimatums-the-ultimate-guide/

She writes “Requests ask someone else to change their behavior⁠—and they may or may not do so. Meanwhile, when we set boundaries, we are making clear what we will or won’t tolerate.”

We are making a statement about ourselves, indicating that we are not ok with some action of another. It’s a dangerous game, am I right? Fraught with peril, especially for introverts.

But with a bit of “heartful” reflection, it doesn’t have to be. Through the gift of this deliberate pondering, we can express a boundary in a way that’s a win for both parties.

One of the most transformative shifts we can make in marriage is learning to see one another not merely through the lens of behavior, but through the lens of compassion. Christ consistently looked beneath behavior into the deeper ache of the human heart. Everyone wants to feel loved- to feel witnessed by supportive, compassionate understanding eyes, who actually give a Wet Nap® about what happens to us, and that’s the gift you can give- the win you can bestow on him during the process.

Can you think of a moment when your husband’s behavior was not ok with you?

I’m guessing that the first phrase that came to your mind at the time was NOT “I wonder what your tender heart is yearning for,”. At the time, you probably wanted to call him a scabby, fly-bitten Farquad. When we feel the hurt feelings, we tend to assume that his intent was to hurt. Logical cause and effect, right? But we almost always assume wrong. And that’s when the wrong kind of sparks start flying.

Scripture teaches us to be “quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath” because human anger so often clouds understanding. In marriage especially, it’s easy to move from hurt into assumption, and from assumption into conflict. “Fish” offers four questions to dissolve our assumption of malicious intent. These are direct quotes from James “Fish” Gill.

The first is: “I wonder what their tender heart was yearning for.” He uses that phrase very deliberately because he finds that it softens him.

And next, “What pain are they wanting to express?”

His third question is “What pain were they wanting to get out of?”

And finally, “What pain were they hoping that I could taste, such that they could feel understood in it? Amazing, right?

How are you feeling about the situation now? Perhaps you’re saying, “Ok, Summer, but I still feel this hurt, and does this mean I’m somehow bad or immature for feeling this way?”

Absolutely not, and I’m sorry for structuring things to give you that impression. Your feelings are normal, understandable, absolutely valid and need to be considered.

“Fish” emphasized repeatedly that taking the time to understand the behavior does not make their behavior ok. You are not condoning it. And he makes the point that neither party’s hurt feeling invalidates the other. The hurt feelings COEXIST, despite our tendency to choose sides.

So once you’ve considered these questions, what do you do next?

Let’s consider the example “Fish” gave of a couple he once worked with on a communication breakdown. When conversations got heated, he would raise his voice, invoking an anxious response in her. She would flee the situation, lock herself in another room and he would follow, yelling and pounding on the door, causing her to feel more unsafe, and much less likely to yield to his demands.

Just one more amazing example of how behaving in a way which flows naturally from a negative feeling results in more of what we expressly don’t want.

His behavior could easily be labeled as abusive, and she could easily consider herself a victim and feel justified in ending the relationship.

This couple, however, felt a desire to make things work.

So “Fish” invited them to get compassionately curious about what the other’s tender heart was yearning for.

He was operating unskillfully out of a sincere longing to be understood, AND she was yearning for safety. “Fish” used “AND” very deliberately. No “buts” are invited to this powwow. All the feels coexist.

Here’s the cool part. The boundary doesn’t have to be handed out as a one-sided, immovable barrier, such as “When you raise your voice, I leave the room.” The win-win comes in when he gets to feel validated. “I recognize and acknowledge that you had no intention of harming me. Your heart was longing for me to hear and understand you, and I love that about you! I absolutely love the importance you’ve given me in your life! You want me to understand you because you love me. And I love you. AND, I feel incredibly anxious when you raise your voice and pursue me and as ‘Fish’ put it, “I’m not going to continue that dynamic with you”.

How can we create the conditions for you to feel understood and me to feel safe in your presence?

I love that you want this understanding and connection with me. I’m just not ok with the way you’re going about it.

Now because this boundary was set with the validation and understanding of both parties, it is now mutually beneficial and most likely to be mutually held. He doesn’t feel that the boundary is minimizing and dismissing him, he knows it is honoring and benefiting him. As he abides by it, he gets his yearned for understanding, and you get that hoped for behavior change. And all is right in the world.

Please listen to the interview with James ‘Fish’ Gill by going to leadbyheart.com/podcasts and selecting the episode of The Shared Road called Setting Boundaries That Stick,

Interview with "Fish"

and on leadbyheart.com, check out the wonderful group coaching offerings.

I recently learned of a Stay-at-Home mom whose husband had called her a “Freeloader”.

“Thou sodden-witted lord! Thou hast no more brain than I have in mine elbows “

“Would thou wert clean enough to spit upon.”-Shakespeare

Beautiful one, if you are living with someone who is critical, controlling, narcissistic, selfish or just plain mean, you need a sharp set of tools and a tanker vessel full of patience, STAT! My husband recently suggested that I offer y’all the advice: “Just put his head in the toilet and flush.” Thanks for the tip, honey.

It can be super disheartening to live with someone who doesn’t seem to give a can of SPAM® for your feelings. But, having been through it, I can attest that, believe it or not, and though we wouldn’t pick this dish in a buffet line, there can be some ultimate advantages.

When you live with someone you can never please, you can finally discover the futility of doing so, and get off that treadmill with the fake carrot dangling 7 inches out of your reach.

Then you’ll get on with trying to become the grandest, queenliest most epic version of yourself. You can stop being what Dr. Stephen R. Covey called “spouse-centered,” and get on with being “principle-centered,” that is designing your life according to the virtues which withstand time, such as compassion, integrity, contribution and love (that is being a loving person, because that’s a desirable way to live, not because any so & so deserves it.) You can stop vainly chasing a counterfeit happiness, and choose, rather, to embody happiness.

You can decide what is enough for a loving queen like you, who is walking her chosen path, to offer to that person and chuck the guilt and shame they’re trying to pawn off on you in the nearest dustbin.

Another advantage of living with a difficult person is that it can strengthen your spirituality. Sometimes God uses painful relationships to reveal where we have built our identity on approval instead of on Him. When you can’t find happiness in your associations with him, you learn to cultivate and galvanize that inner stillness that transcends anything that happens in this material world.

It also gives you the sacred and vital opportunity to set aside your ego, and realize you don’t need to justify yourself to this person. You can then use your wisdom and discernment and your plan for your life to decide if the feedback you’re receiving has anything of value in it. Sometimes it does.

This kind of relationship also has the potential advantage of calling forth in you the strength to stand up for yourself.

Dr. John Lewis Lund has a wonderfully practical book called HOW TO HUG A PORCUPINE: DEALING WITH TOXIC AND DIFFICULT TO LOVE PERSONALITIES.

The following example comes from pages 147-149 in this book:

One of Aaron’s main complaints was about Sharon’s

housekeeping. His standard of housekeeping as stated to

the counselor was,

“I’m reasonable. I just want a clean

house.” The unstated, unrealistic expectation by Aaron

was,

“Anything less than perfection will be criticized.”

Sharon’s standard of housekeeping was “I’m reasonable.

The house is clean, but not clutter-free. I like to keep

some of my projects out where I can see them. It reminds

me of what I need and want to do with them.

She reviewed the criticism of Aaron and set her ego

aside and determined it was not reasonable to have

several projects out in the open all the time. After thinking

about it and talking it over with one of her friends, she

came up with a plan to obtain some orange boxes, label

them, and place her different projects in them. She

decided she would only keep one project out at a time.

The other undertakings would have to be stored and

rotated. This now became her personal standard of

excellence.

Aaron’s actual words when he found out about her

plans to put her projects in orange boxes and store them

were,

“That’s great. I’m really proud of you, but why

don’t you put all the projects in boxes and take out the

one you want only while you are working on it, and then

put it away also?” (Notice the “trailing barb.”

[Dr. Lund’s perfect term for a criticism tacked

on the end of a compliment- usually preceded by the word, “but”.]

[Aaron] could never just compliment Sharon.

He had to add a suggestion for improvement.)

If Sharon’s expectation was to please Aaron, she

would have been disappointed by his response. In his

mind, her solution was a step in the right direction, but

wasn’t “quite good enough.”

As a counselor I told her, “It will take time and practice

to free yourself from feeling disappointed with his

responses.

She asked me, “How am I supposed to respond to a

trailing barb?”

“Your verbal reaction to him could choose to focus

on the positive part of his statement. ‘I’m glad you were

proud of me. Frankly, I’m proud of myself and I feel

good about it.”“

“Don’t respond to the negative trailing barb. Ignore

it When you choose to comment on it, you are reinforcing

its worth. If he won’t let it go and continues to fuss and

fume over the one project you have out at a time,

acknowledge his frustration and continued criticism by

saying, I’m sorry you’re still frustrated over my one

project being out, but it’s just the price you pay for being

married to a wonderful person like me!’ Your resolve

must be firm and consistent. If you waver or give in, you

will only encourage his criticism.

Another area of expectation for Aaron concerned her

level of education. He had expressed, “I think Sharon

needs to get a Bachelor’s Degree. It will make her more

marketable if something happens to me. Also, women

who are college educated are more interesting to talk

to.”

Her response was, “I don’t want to take the time to

go back to college right now. .. …I’d rather increase

your insurance or look at some other options,”

[This is key:]

“’She reviewed Aaron’s criticism and set her ego aside

to evaluate his concern,

“Education is important and it

would make me a better self if I were to expand my

mind. I have time to do something, but I don’t have the

time or the will to be a full-time student.” Sharon

pondered her options, She visited with some friends and

family, She bounced some ideas off them to see if she

was being reasonable, Finally she explored her proposal

with Aaron, the toxic, who she knew in advance would

not find her solution “good enough,” This time it was not

his acceptance she sought, but to inform him of the

options she could support.

Sharon set her own standard, her own goal. She

decided she would like to be a trained real estate agent

and was committed to go to school to do so. This would

give her a career which she could rely upon if needed,

Also, she could work at her own pace.

Aaron’s actual statement was, “You never do what I

want you to do, Why can’t you just once do it my way?”

The answer to his question was this, “Because you

have unreasonable expectations, Even if I were to sacrifice

my total identity to what you think I should, need, and

ought to be, I would still not be enough. You would still

be dissatisfied with me and both of us would be miserable.

I can’t be responsible for your happiness nor for your

unhappiness, Aaron. I’m trying really hard to be

accountable for my own happiness. That’s why I can’t

do it your way, I can only do what I can do.”

WIN! Notice how she didn’t entirely discard his criticism or advice, but wisely and confidently found the value in it and used it to come to her own decisions.

Other ideas found in this book for dealing with criticism:

1. Instead of defending yourself, try writing it down. Get out your notes app on your phone and say, “Slow down, this sounds important. I want to write this down to make sure I have it and can think more about it later.” This has several advantages: It gives you somewhere to direct your intense feeling, which is a great alternative to spouting off and getting into a fight. You can stop and breathe, and activate a part of your brain other than Fight or Flight. It also causes the person doing the criticizing to think more carefully about what they’re saying, as you are recording it, and every time you do it, they can be reminded that they’re being critical again.

2. Try rewarding yourself every time you’re criticized. You could use an app like a Swear Jar app and drop a quarter or a dollar into a fund for something like shoes or a mani-pedi. Then you can just smile and say cha-ching to yourself every time it happens.

3. If the way you’re being spoken to is intolerable, you can say, “I need to leave the room. I am leaving the room, not the relationship.” This is to quell a fear that might cause him to pursue you or demand that you stay. If he threatens divorce you can say:

“If that is what you choose to do, I will accept it,

but I will not tolerate abuse. If you can talk to me with

respect and in a civil manner, I will listen. Otherwise

write down your concerns and I will read them, or wait

until you are in control. Until then I am leaving the

room but I am not leaving the relationship. (Lund, 175)”

At least not in the heat of that moment.

Stay close to God and cultivate your inner light, and you will know what to do. In the meantime, grasp every opportunity for growth that’s being thrown at you. Become the you that God always intended you to become.

You deserve all the love and happiness you can hold.

I was excessively diverted 🤓.   There was incredible wit and artistry in the visual details as well as the acting.  It moved me to tears from both giant belly laughs and genuine poignant emotion, which was a beautiful surprise. What I thought would be frothy and frivolous fiction turned out to be deeply moving.  Other people can talk about the balance of power in the world.  I want to talk about your own balancing act of loving yourself and your husband.

I know I questioned my role as I watched the movie and resonated with so many of the difficulties that we face as women and what a challenging job we have to, as was said in the movie, “tie ourselves in knots” for the people around us.   So I questioned as I watched, “Are my teachings truly serving women? Am I showing up in a way that’s going to benefit them or am I just adding impossibly more to their already full plate?  And here’s what finally came to me: There’s a false dichotomy presented in the movie.  The idea that you are either living out your dreams and fulfilling your purpose- becoming President or winning the Nobel Prize, or you're dressed as a maid, and handing your man a brewski, as if those are two mutually exclusive options or pathways to choose from.  But that notion is as fake as Barbie’s unattainable proportions.

Every so often (with about the frequency that someone besides you replaces the toilet paper roll), a certain turn of phrase is able to shift the dusty cumbersome furniture in your well-entrenched mind parlor, revealing something your innermost being has always known which had but awaited the illumination of your recognition, much like the opulent treasures concealed within Tutankhamun's tomb had awaited centuries to be unveiled.

Such was the case when I read the following quote by Gay Hendricks: “In all times and in every way, we are getting exactly what we’re committed to getting.”  Wait. Whaaaaaat? (In conjunction with the brilliant commentary of Nate and Kaley Klemp in their excellent book, THE 80/80 MARRIAGE…) There’s no way I’m committed to getting no understanding or warmth from my husband and no help around the house! Perhaps not. But taking responsibility is the ONLY POSITION OF POWER.  You’ll get the greatest results in love and life when you adopt the uncomfy view that you are responsible for the results you’ve gotten so far.   Look.  I don’t believe that every rotten thing that has happened to you is your fault, or that you need to spend any time beating yourself up over your mistakes.  Nor do I want you to assume responsibility to the effect that you feel paralyzed by the overwhelming size of it.  What would be the point of that?  But what if you took a curious, loving yet detached look at the aspects of your life you’re disappointed about and said, “What if somehow I am committed to those undesirable results?”   Nate and Kaley Klemp, in THE 80/80 MARRIAGE, ask you to lead with that assumption, not because it’s true, but because the thought experiment will lead you to priceless and indispensable insights.

Then the children came, and you were so excited for the shared love of your little ones to make your relationship even closer and more meaningful.

You weren’t prepared for how parenthood would change the playing field, and how the demands suddenly exceeded your capacity.  You needed him to anticipate your needs and be inquisitive as he used to be.  You tried subtle, and not-so-subtle ways to let him know that you felt like you were drowning, but instead of being responsive, he would spit out some trite advice, making it your fault, and go find something else to do. He was no longer the loving, attentive man you married, and gradually your life’s forecast became cloudy and dismal.  You had eagerly promised to live out your life with him, but you certainly weren’t making your vows to this new selfish, inconsiderate, distant version. 

Your feelings began to cool toward him.  With each unsuccessful attempt to communicate, your faith and your optimism flagged.  Every time you thought about reaching out to him, your brain said, “What’s the point?” So you tried to push those thoughts aside and focus on keeping busy and meeting your children’s needs instead.  Your life began to lose its luster.  It became more difficult to get out of bed.  Though you tried to push these realities aside and barrel ahead with your “duties”, creeping thoughts of divorce became more and more frequent, because of the tiny glimmerings of hope you felt imagining a second chance to find a better man and a truer romance.  

However you don’t feel quite right about moving ahead.  Your feelings don’t seem like a compelling enough reason to disrupt your children’s stability and dismantle a family structure which, however shaky, took years of effort to build.  So you’re in limbo.  Taking each day as it comes, and living a kind of half life in which you don’t tell your husband a fraction of what occupies your mind and heart, and try to distract yourself from the deep feelings of disappointment you have in your life.  

What happens next? We'll explore some possibilities in this episode.

Message me "INFO" to learn more ❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹

You deserve all the love and happiness you can hold.

As Cheryl McClary, author of THE COMMITMENT CHRONICLES, so delightfully tells us, (actually I won’t share her words yet, I’ll share what’s coming from me after feeling her wisdom wash over me): If you’re going around being bummed out because you don’t like your husband, you have been handed a priceless gift:

What?! Ok Summer, now you’ve boarded the bus to Mooncakeland. How can disliking my husband possibly be anything but one of life’s stinkiest dumpster fires? I mean, I’m stuck with him.

Find out all about this great gift in this episode...

Let me share how Dr. McClary summarized her complaints about her husband.  You’re going to love this.  

• He is in touch with his feelings only when he gets a headache.

• He believes his "feminine side" refers to his

maternal relatives.

• He thinks The Celestine Prophecy is a topless dancer

on Bourbon Street.

• He assumes The Road Less Traveled is the interstate under construction.

Do any of those sound familiar?  So after years of feeling disappointed with his cluelessness, She experienced a wonderful moment of awakening she described like this:

“Jim is completely happy. He just wants everything to stay the same, which means I keep doing all I can to please him and make his happiness my main goal in life. No wonder he's so damn content! I would be, too. I am going to have to be the change agent.”

“I had to take control of the situation. I was the one who was unhappy. I was the one who wanted a better relationship.”

Learn more about how she did it in this amusing episode.

Stay tuned, because this is going to be the great mission of my exciting, (and ridiculously affordable) upcoming offering: supporting each other through flipping our scripts, building our bliss, and lovingly offering our dear husbands a clue.  It is going to be more fun than a stack of novels, a trough of muddy buddies and no one else at home.  No. Now I'm overhyping.  Nothing beats that.  But it’s going to be fabulous!  We’ll leave it at that. DM me "WAITLIST" on Instagram to get all the updates ❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹.

You deserve all the love and happiness you can hold.

Source: THE COMMITMENT CHRONICLES by Cheryl McClary, Ph.D., J.D. Top Shelf Press

Stop mistreating and denying yourself in the hopes that your family will take pity on you.  Instead, treat yourself as the queen that you are and watch your family follow suit.

I want to see you have a joyful, loving Mother’s Day that’s full of gratitude and delight.  So please don’t wait around and hope that it happens.  Decide right now that it’s going to, and clear out any logistical and mental obstacles. 

If you have any questions and concerns around that, by all means, send them my way in the instagram chat!

I’ve been a little quiet on social media because I’m in building mode, and so excited for my upcoming offers.  But I’m always happy to chat and be educated about all the different circumstances you beautiful seekers are dealing with.

And will you do me a favor?  I’m sure you know another mama who could benefit from this episode, so please send her the link with some love!  I’d be so happy for this episode to reach as many mamas as possible!

The snowball is an old metaphor, but for a reason, so don’t skip over it. Live into the snowball with me for a moment. The beauty in our lives, and our sense of it, sticks to itself, packs it on, gathers momentum and becomes larger and larger. Do you feel that? It is a real universal law. And it goes BOTH WAYS. Can you picture a snowball rolling back and forth in something of a concave cradle? Imagine that the cradle is settled into the top of a mountain, and on one side is the pull of your joy, and on the other is the pull of your despair.

You are the snowball. You are rolling back and forth in this container, and one thought is ready to tip you over the top and send you careening down one side of the mountain or the other, packing on either the happiness or the despair. The negativity also gets sticky and packs more of itself on. In just the way you can use one piece of Play-Doh® to press and pick up all the other little crumbs of it your kids left on the table, one sticky negative thought puts feelers out for another, until your whole emotional windshield is splattered with squashed bugs and you can’t see a blessed thing. (Me and my mixed and also excessive metaphors. Apologies🙄)

Just last week, my little snowball started tumbling down the bad side. It happens. And we need to bring our awareness to it. I had encountered a lull in my business, and my belief in myself and my future was gradually eroding. My optimism had dialed back and my positive snowball had settled into a plateau, leaving me vulnerable. I was teetering, and began a slow negative roll.

Thoughts about just how goshdarn hard everything was, became very sticky, and piled on. Now when I looked at my husband, the little things that disappointed me were more glaring. It was as if my negatively charged ions were attracting his negatively charged characteristics. I’m just making stuff up, beauties, I know nothing about science, but I could observe what was happening inside me. (No, we don’t have a perfect marriage, but we are perfectly committed to working things through, which is better than perfect, as it’s an ideal container for growth. Anyway…) When we needed to make some logistical adjustments that left me with less effective work time, I found myself weeping. You can hear the rest of the story in this episode. Thanks for staying with me this far,

Beautiful, I am so excited about what I am building for you behind the scenes right now. I have definitely switched to positive momentum and it’s spiraling! In the next couple of months I will have something amazing to offer you, so please stay tuned for updates. If you're not on my email list, please sign up here so you don't miss a thing!

You deserve all the love and happiness you can hold. ❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹

James “Fish” Gill, Heart Coach, and self-proclaimed “conflict nerd,” has pointed this out. He is fascinated by human connection: how it is generated, and how it erodes over time with unskillful interactions.  The day I stumbled across his Instagram account , was a fortuitous day indeed, and if you’re not following him already, do it with a quickness, because he will infuse your feed with sweet, full-bodied, heart broadening wisdom.   

In the wonderful episode of The Shared Road Podcast I listened to, hosted by Carly McDowell, called Setting Boundaries that Stick, 'Fish' explains that he has asked his audience how they feel when they’re on the receiving end of a boundary, and the response was unanimously negative.  How do you feel when someone you love has called you out on an “unacceptable” behavior and informed you that you're expected to change in order to maintain the relationship or stay in that person’s good graces?  Shamed? Belittled?  Blamed?  Rejected?  Unseen?  Misunderstood? Angry?  Defensive?

That’s most often how a boundary is received, because it places the receiver in the wrong- in a place of disapproval like a child who’s “in trouble”.   

In setting a boundary, we are making a statement about ourselves, indicating that we are not ok with some action of another.  It’s a dangerous game, am I right? It feels, fraught with peril, especially for us introverts.

But with a bit of “heartful” reflection, it doesn’t have to be.  Fortunately, that is exactly the area where we introverts shine.  Through the gift of this deliberate pondering, we can express a boundary in a way that’s a win for both parties.

And this episode will help you start.

Please listen to the full interview with James 'Fish' Gill here. And check out his amazing group coaching offerings, one coming right up next month.

You are warmly invited to our free Facebook group, The Marriage Saving Society for Introverted Moms, which contains numerous trainings and resources to leverage your unique gifts in managing what can sometimes feel unmanageable. ❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹

You deserve all the love and happiness you can hold- and love digs deep ❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹.

If you liked this episode please consider leaving a review or sharing. Thank you!

What are the obvious reasons?  The obvious reasons are that it blocks out opportunities to interact and deepen your connection.  It takes the place of exchanges you might naturally fall into together.

As Dr. Matt Townsend recently mentioned on Instagram, (& no the irony there is not lost on me) “Stop distracting yourself to death. You are sitting on the couch next to the most important person in your life and you’re distracted by the phone or the game.”

A slightly less obvious reason is that it distracts you from feelings you need to dive into, process, learn from and express.  If you go for the immediate dopamine hit and numb your feelings on TikTok instead of sitting down with your journal and free writing:  “Why did I get so triggered and suddenly get sarcastic when he said he didn’t want to go to my parents’ for dinner?” You are denying yourself the vital messages for growth and self support that your feelings are straining and sweating to transmit to you, and the next time the trigger is applied, the sarcasm will shoot out again, possibly resulting in a relationship battering knock down drag out.

And an even less obvious and more pervasive reason is...

Message me here for questions and occasional advice.

Join us in the free Facebook group for weekly trainings and resources.

Quotes from Dr. Matt Townsend and Eve Dineen, Board Certified Behavior Analyst

And I don’t necessarily mean dropping a couple grand for a spa day or buying yourself Stuart Weitzman heels, though if that's your thing, go for it!  I’ve just been reading the brilliant classic book THE DANCE OF INTIMACY by Dr. Harriet Goldhor Lerner and my highlighter pen is relinquishing its life in a consecrated quest to capture the profundity.

It explains so much of what I strive to be about and to help you with, in a better way than I’ve ever been able to.

Does the following quote not speak so succinctly to the mission and movement of Be the Change in Your Marriage? (Dr. Lerner from the book:) “Pushing a partner to change is about as effective as trying to make friends with a squirrel by chasing it.”

Honestly, though, every time we reactively push for a different behavior from our husbands, we only get a more heaping dose of samesies.

When our anxiety is high around a certain issue, we tend to either overfunction, as in calling the shots, taking over, focusing on the other person in an energy of worry or anger and becoming overly responsible, or we underfunction, distancing ourselves, freezing, ignoring and avoiding.

And get this: none of it is bad or wrong!  Listen to this quote: “Overfunctioning, underfunctioning, fighting, pursuing, distancing, and child-focus or other-focus are normal, patterned ways to manage anxiety.  One way is not better or more virtuous than another.”

So how do we close the distance with a spouse who’s ignoring us?

This episode will give you some ideas.  To participate in a live group training this week on the same topic with accompanying worksheets, join us in this group.

Message me here for questions and advice.

REFERENCE: THE DANCE OF INTIMACY by Dr. Harriet Goldhor Lerner 

How could I be such an emotionally immature idiot as to jump into marriage with someone who made me so unhappy?

Other people were in romantic, nurturing, connected relationships, but not me.  I had missed my chance by saying those “cursed ‘I do’ words” when I did.

I fell into a deep depression by allowing myself to believe those thoughts.  It was difficult to get out of bed.  My disappointment in him came darn near loathing.  He could sense it, and was driven to do more of the avoidant, self-soothing behaviors that bothered me in the first place, which in turn prompted me to be more dumpy, negative and stinkfaced toward him.  I had no idea that my negative focus was actually creating more of what I didn’t want.  It does that, you know.  Like clockwork.  It’s a right foul shuzzbutt that way.  So I lurched around spending my one wild and precious life thinking I was under a curse from those “cursed ‘I do’ words”.

But gradually, when I went deep into spirituality I started to open myself to a different view.

And instead of feeling “cursed” with unhappiness, I became curious about what was growing and developing in me through the experience.

https://www.instagram.com/bethechangeinyourmarriage/?hl=en

PRINCIPLE # 1: WE NEED A PURPOSEFUL, COMPELLING FUTURE.  The quote that Dr. Hardy kept coming back to is this one by Friedrich Nietzsche: “He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.”

This was also quoted by Dr. Viktor Frankl in reference to his time in a Nazi concentration camp.

Goodness, Summer, you brought up concentration camps in your last episode.  This podcast is getting really depressing.

Fair point.  The reason I bring them up is that they really give the person quoting some street cred. When they speak of suffering you KNOW they’re not just talking about bunions or bad gas.  When someone like that tells you you can bear ANY how, as in ANY circumstances, they have some strength in their case.

Thank you so much for listening.  I am so grateful for you.  I would love to meet up and talk with you.  I always learn so much from people’s stories, whether or not you join my program, so if you haven’t met with me yet for a complimentary session, please send me a message and get on my calendar, because there is no pressure to enroll and I will help you create that purposeful, compelling future that can be your guiding light for this new year beginning today.

And you and your marriage will never be the same.

Grab a notebook and a pen or the notes app on your phone or tablet.

Some questions came from an Instagram post by MEL ROBBINS called Before you plan 2023, ask yourself these 5 questions.

I sincerely hope that 2023 will be the most beautiful year of your life so far.