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Would you like to keep your marriage fresh?

I have been talking about meeting each other’s needs in marriage. This is the third part of the second step in the series.

The first part of step two was helping discover, using the list, why you may have had conflicts in the past. Part two was explaining how thrilled your spouse will be when you value their opinions as related to the list.

When your needs are met, and when your spouse’s needs are met, what a wonderful thing it is in your marriage. Even though you’ll have ups and downs, you’ll have a thrilling and very fulfilling marriage when both of your needs are met.

Now, this doesn’t happen by accident You have to be proactive and cause these things to come about.

Taking Steps

As I said, I’m talking about some steps toward meeting each other’s needs. In previous posts, I talked about making a list and then ranking that list in the order of importance.

Two posts back (link above) talked about using that list to the best advantage in your marriage. Use it to enhance your marriage and to make it sparkle.

The post just before this one (link above) talked about recognizing the value of your spouse’s opinion.

You may find that you have a certain need way up on your list and he or she may have it way down towards the bottom on his or her list. That doesn’t mean that one is better than the other. Not at all.

When you recognize and value each other’s opinions, it gives you an opportunity to have some discussions that you may not have had previously.

Once you’ve recognized the value of each other’s opinions, work toward meeting your spouse’s greatest needs. If there have been areas and things that you have neglected, you have a new emphasis on what you want to try to do in your marriage in order to meet your spouse’s needs.

Likewise, your spouse will do the same for you.

Keeping Things Fresh

There is another way to use those lists, and that is to review them from time to time.

One way to remind yourself to review your spouse’s list is to put it in your Bible, a book that you’re reading, or somewhere else where you will see that often. Then and you will review your spouse’s interpretation of what are his or her most important needs in his or her life.

You’ll be reviewing it when you do that, but you should also review this by going through the process again at different stages in your marriage.

So you reviewed these needs again, but you also go through the process of the ranking again.

The reason for doing that is that life just changes.

Life Stages Related to Children

Let’s think about some life stages that are related to children.

If you’re in the before-children stage, that is a good time to make your list and do the rankings and trade the list. The goal is to work toward meeting each other’s needs.

It may be that you and your spouse do not have children. Well, most people your age probably will have children during that life stage. This is a good time for you to, again, redo your list to see if anything has changed. it may not change as much for those without children, as it would for those who have children.

Then there comes what might be called the empty nest stage of life. That’s another change. It is a time when life has changed so much that your ranking of how you feel about those felt needs may have changed.

Your spouse needs to know that. If you have a new number one need, your spouse needs to know that. Your spouse needs to know you’ve changed your mind about what’s important.

Another life stage will be what we might call retirement or I refer to it as the later ministry stage within our life. The circumstances have changed.

Those are four different times that would be a good time to review your lists about felt needs.

If you haven’t done your list yet, go back to the previous blog posts. I talked about making a list, ranking it, sharing it with your spouse, and how to use the information you learn.

Life Stages Related to Finances, Careers, or Jobs

There are other life changes that are not related to children, but related to finances, careers, or jobs.

It may be that one time when you filled out your list, your finances were very low, so financial security may have been very high on one or the other of your lists. However, if you are comfortable now, that may not be quite as high on the list.

You may have gotten to the point where you have financial peace. Maybe one or both of us have lost jobs. Those events would probably make a difference in that area of your ranking. I would urge you to go through those lists again at that time.

You might have a career change, or a different job within yourcareer category. When you start a different job and have different time demands, it will be very important for you to consider how you’re going to work through these time demands and how your spouse feels about it.

If it’s going to demand more of your time, how are you going to work that out where you continue to have good quality time with your husband or wife? Perhaps you will end up having a whole lot more time than you did before. In either case, your needs have likely changed.

These are good times to go through the list again.

Life Changes Related to Maturity or Renewed Focus on Spiritual Growth

Then there are life stages that are related to your own personal maturity; Your own growth or renewed focus on spiritual growth within your life.

When it comes to maturity when you’re very young, your needs or perception of needs may be quite different than it is after the two of you have gone through some storms.

Those storms may not have been caused by either of you, just by life events. But having made it through those storms together, you have grown within your lives and your priorities may end up being different than what they were when you filled out that list in the earlier stage in your life.

You have also may have had a time when you decided the two of you were really going to focus on your marriage. You had a renewed focus your marriage has just become better because of your renewed focus in that area.

After having refocused for a while, it would be a good time to go through the exercise again. Rank those needs in order of importance to you and then you and your husband or wife will trade those lists again. it will give you a means for further discussion, and a basis for how you’re going to focus your life in the next few years because you really want to please your husband or wife.

So you have maturity or you had renewed focus in your marriage.

You may have new spiritual growth. If you did not know the Lord when you first filled out the lists, and then later if you came to Christ, your priorities will probably have changed.

If you’ve had a new stage of spiritual growth and your life and both of you have a new commitment in that area, or if it’s changed for one or the other of you, it would be a good time to go through the process again. Then look at your current status of how you feel about what is important to you in your life.

Try those lists, discuss them if you need to, but then focus on focus on doing what is best for your spouse.
Review the list periodically as needed throughout your life.

Well, I hope this has been helpful to you. For more tips on marriage, and to see the other posts in this particular series, click here.

I also, have two books on marriage some books on Amazon. One is called “21 Ways the Principle of Leaving Will Benefit Your Marriage” and the other is “From Mountains to Molehills” Both of those will prove beneficual to your marriage.

Thanks for stopping by. Until next time, I wish you the best in your marriage.

Respect the value of each other’s opinions and watch your spouse beam with joy.

Welcome to part 5 of my series on meeting each other’s needs in marriage.
First I told you about the benefits of listing each other’s needs.
Next came information about the troubles you can avoid by doing the list-building exercise.
Following that was instruction on how to create, rank, and use your list.
Most recently, I revealed some reasons why you may have had conflicts in the past. These 4 complete the first step.

Now, I’m moving on to the second step, where I talk about using the information gained in step one.

Review of Step One

In the first step, you had a list of needs that was developed by marriage counselors and marriage researchers.

Next, you customized those lists by adding your own ideas if you thought there had been some that had been left out.

Then you took those lists and we ranked them in the order of importance to each of you.

After that, you traded the list with your spouse. Doing that gave you some revelations and ideas of things that you may have not considered before.

I want to encourage you to think about meeting each other’s needs.

Beginning Step Two

Now in the second step, I’m talking about using that list to gain a better understanding of one another in dealing with our husbands or wives.

Here I’m going to talk about respecting the value of each other’s opinions.

When it comes to these lists, you may be surprised to find that your number one need is way down on the list of your wife or your husband.

Out of the 1000s of couples that were surveyed this list of 10 or so needs was identified. There were many others that were also important, and that’s why you customized your own lists.

One person’s opinion is not better than the other’s, it’s just different. It’s great if you have been honest about how you feel about these needs in your particular situations.

Respecting the value of each other’s opinions: the wife was just beaming. She said, “My husband really gets me and he listens to me. Sometimes he acts on what he has to say.”

This is important for both parties because it motivates you to do things that can be beneficial to your marriage.

What happens when you respect the value of each other’s opinions?

It Builds You Up

First of all, it builds you up and makes you feel good. When you feel good, you are likely then to want to continue on with a certain project or a certain thing that you are doing. So it makes you feel good, especially when your spouse meets your needs. It also makes you feel good that your spouse, who was previously unaware of how important some things are to you now realizes it.

In this process of identifying how important these things are, they begin to meet your needs.

it also makes you feel good when you start attempting to do a better job of meeting your mate’s needs. At least you know that you’re trying and can show them that that is what you are doing.

So it shows that you’re trying and it makes us feel good.

It Gives You a Basis for Discussion

In addition, it gives you a basis for a discussion. You might not be questioning that is really how your husband or your wife feels. But after comparing lists, you might ask for clarification.

“What is it about this that really triggers you? Really motivates you? How is it that this thing really motivates your need?”

Ladies, be prepared.

Your husband may not be able to articulate some feelings very well. But they might, you never know.

But it does give you a basis for discussion. After a while, you will begin to consider “Well, what is it about this that makes me feel so good, and what is it about that motivates me?”

You get the basis for discussion.

It Gives You Joint Projects

The second thing is it gives you joint projects.

When you are working on things together, it gives you the opportunity to be together.

Some couples may say, “Well, that’s not too good. We just get in an argument when we try to do things together.”

But if you respect each other in how you approach things, how you ask questions and aren’t critical, you can avoid arguing.

I know of a family that bought some chickens. They decided to build a chicken house and the chicken run that would go with it. They didn’t know much about it and started watching videos trying to figure out how to do this project.

Fortunately, they had a friend who was pretty good at building who came over to help them get started. This friend really did a lot of things. He sped up the process quite a bit, but they had done most of the project themselves.

While doing the planning, they would come up with different ideas. The testimony has actually been good for them to be doing this together.

The wife said, “Well, I learned to be careful how I would ask a question if I thought maybe something could be done differently.”

He really listened and they considered the ideas and then came up with the idea.

Working on these lists of meeting each other’s needs is giving you a joint project. It is something that you are doing together.

It Forms the Basis for Change

It shows that you are willing to change and that goes a long way in a marriage. When you’re talking about being willing to change, it’s also about respecting the value of each other’s opinions, especially in the areas of health needs.

There’s a difference between when you want to do something and when you are forced to. If you feel like you are being forced to do something then you are not as likely to be motivated to do that particular thing.

But if it’s something that you really want to do, then you go into it without hesitation and it forms the basis for change. It helps you respect each other’s opinions and to listen, to really listen to each other’s ideas, and consider those ideas.

Beyond that, it gives you the joy of knowing that you are serving each other. It makes you feel good to know that you are serving someone else. It makes you feel good when someone’s serving you and meeting your needs.

I don’t mean that in a selfish way. I just mean that we are fulfilled and of course that makes us feel good.

Respect the value of each other’s opinion.

I hope this has been helpful to you. Be sure to look for the next blog in this series

If you would like some more marriage tips like these click here..

Also, I have two books on Amazon that are on the topic of marriage. The first is “21 Ways the Principle of Leaving Will Benefit Your Marriage.” The second one is called “From Mountains to Molehills.” These posts here are actually the basis for my fifth book on marriage. It will be out soon.

If you’re interested in writing a book yourself, my book “How to Write a Book in 28 Days or Less Without Stressing Yourself to Death” is available on Amazon as well.

Please consider subscribing to my YouTube or Rumble channel, and following me on Facebook.

I hope you are having a great day. I wish you the best in your marriage

Today I’m talking about marriage again. In the first post in this series, I spoke about the benefits of making a list of one another’s needs. The second one talked about troubles that could be avoided by making the list. This blog will be about using your list.

What you and your spouse are going to do is make a list of your most important felt needs. Both of you will get value from going through this exercise.

Why Make the List?

Why will this prove valuable?

No one wants to have hard conversations. You probably won’t come up with anything that will be really difficult when you do this list although you might. You don’t want to feel selfish when talking about what you need all the time.

So you’re going to go through the exercise of making a list of your ten most important felt needs and ranking those.

In talking about making a list of your needs and ranking them in order of importance to you, you don’t want to appear selfish. That may be a reason why you would never bring some of these things up on your own.

So the process of going through and working with this list will help you to have some conversations that you might not have otherwise.

Getting Started

I’m going to make it easy for you because I’m going to give you a pre-made list. This is a list that has been compiled from information from marriage counselors, pastors, and health professionals.

What I’m going to do is give you a list of categories that they came up with when they did their research. As you look at the categories, you may feel like something that’s not on the list ought to be. Tell your spouse that you think that category ought to be on the list and both of you add that to the bottom of your personal lists. Your mate may feel that something else is missing. Go ahead and add that to your list too.

You’ll end up with a list of 10, 11 or 12 needs that you’re going to rank.

Now when it comes to ranking, there are two ways to do it. I’m going to talk to you first about the one that is the most effective, but more time-consuming. Then I’ll give you another way to do it, which is less time-consuming, but probably not quite as effective, but will still be very good.

The Pre-Made List

_____ Conversation

_____ Affection/Romance

_____ Admiration/Respect

_____ Recreational/Companionship

_____ Attractiveness of Spouse

_____ Financial Support

_____ Sexual Fulfillment

_____ Domestic Support

_____ Family Commitment

_____ Honesty and Openness

First Way to Rank Your List

For the first one, you’re going to compare your ranking of every need that’s on the list with every other need that’s on the list.

So you’ll take a piece of paper and on the left-hand side at the top of the paper, write one, comma one, and then you’re going to come down in a column. You write one comma two, then on down one comma three, one and four, one and five one and six, one and seven, one and eight, one and nine, and one and 10.

So there you’ll have the first item on the list, compared with the second item on the list, and then you have the first item on the list compared with the third item on the list. Then you have the first item on the list compared with every other item that is on the list.

When it comes to using that, you will look at number one and number two on the list. Which one of those is most important to you? You’re going to have to rank them in order so pick one, then compare one and three; which is more important to you? Circle the one that is more important.

Then you will come down to one and four and decide if one is more important, or four is. Whichever one it is, circle it.

Once you have compared the first need listed with all the other needs, then you’re going to go through the same thing with the second need listed. However, on this column, you will jump over right beside where it says one and three.

The reason for that is you’ve already compared one and two and you don’t need to compare two and two. So you’ll jump down there and beside one and three, now you will have two and three and then move on down the column. You will have 2,4 2,5 2,6 until you get down to two and 10.

Then go through the process again. Compare each couple. There will be a couple of needs that are listed. Pick one and circle it, then go with item number three compared with all the rest of the items.

You will start with three and four.

So on your row there on the top on the left, you will just have one and two. And then you’ll have two and three and so forth coming down that left column on the next column at the very top. You won’t have anything there for one or two. But you will start with two and three coming down. So coming across you have one and three, two and three, and so forth.

Okay, so now you’re coming down so there are fewer items to put in your column because you’ve already compared them previously.

So we come down to comparing three and four. Below that is three and five, three and six, and so forth till you get down to three and 10.

Next, you will come across and you will start with the four and five until you get down to four and 10 and so forth.

You will finally end up with just nine and 10.

Once you have reached the end, you count how many times you circled an item The one that is circled most will be the most important need for you. It will be your number one ranking.

The one that got the next highest number of circles will be your second rank. You can do the third one which would be the third most items that are circled and so forth until you come down ranking from one to 10 with one being the most important because you will have circled that item the most times.

That is one way to rank it and it’s the most effective way to do it because you are making a decision on every comparison.

The Second Way to Rank Your List

Now here’s a quicker way to do it. It is a really good way to do it. It may not be quite as effective but it will probably serve your purpose.

When I do marriage seminars I use this method just because it is easier.

For this one, you’ll take the list and look from one to 10. Whatever one is most important to you, put number one out to the right of it.

Then look through your list again. If you could only choose one item, what would it be? Out to the right of that you put number two.

Just go down through the list doing the same thing until you have your list of needs in the most important order. The needs that are most important to you will be listed from one to 10

When you’re done ranking this way, you will have to look up and down on the right side to find what the number one most important need is and so forth because your numbers will be mixed up there on the side.

If you want to make it really easy, then you can rewrite them in the most important order.

Trade Lists

Having done that, we’ve come to the important part of this. Double-check to make sure that it represents your ranking and, without commenting on it, trade it with your spouse’s list.

Look at the list first without comment. Give it a minute or two until you’ve looked over the whole list. Then you can discuss the list.

Using Your List

Are there any surprises?
Would you have thought that your husband would have ranked something much higher than what he did?
Would you have thought that your wife would have rank something much higher than what she did on the list?
Are there any surprises there?
Are there any immediate ideas?

There could be some real revelations.

One of you may say, “Well, honey, I hadn’t realized that that was so important to you. I know we haven’t spent much time on that. I’m willing for us to spend more time in that area.”

Likewise, your spouse may say the same.

The two of you may decide to come up with some projects or some priorities in your mind. Because what is important is what your husband or wife thinks. It’s not what’s important as to how you think it would be. It is what they feel.

With an understanding of that, you can then meet your husband’s or wife’s needs more easily than you would have been able to otherwise.

I truly hope this is helpful to you. There will be another post in a day or two.

In the meantime, I have two books on marriage currently available on Amazon. The first is “21 Ways the Principle of Leaving Will Benefit Your Marriage” and the second one is “From Mountains to Molehills“.

In addition, the previous post in this thread, along with the future ones, can all be found right here.

Thank you for reading. I wish you the best in your life and your marriage

Benefits of listing each other’s needs.

Today I’m talking about marriage. In particular, I’m talking about the topic of meeting each other’s needs.

Here, I’m going to talk about the first of seven steps for helping you to meet each other’s needs.

Your Mate Will Feel Fulfilled

The first step is listing each other’s needs and there will be some benefit to doing that.

One of those benefits is that it will make your mate feel fulfilled.

Now, whenever your mate has a sad countenance, that often brings frustration to you and may cause you to be embarrassed and have a certain amount of shame.

Shame is especially hard on husbands. It’s hard on both husbands and wives but some researchers have said that it is especially difficult for husbands to feel ashamed.

The other problem is that whenever your mate does not look happy, there may be others that may step into the situation. You may find out that not only your mate but that may happen in your case too. So we need to be careful of that because that is a very, very dangerous situation.

You Will Feel Fulfilled

The second benefit is that you will feel fulfilled.

The first one is your mate will feel fulfilled because you are taking steps to meet your husband’s or your wife’s needs. When they are also doing that, then it becomes reciprocal and you will feel more fulfilled also.

Being happy is a very good thing.

A Warning

I mentioned how others may creep in when either of you are not having their needs met very well. Someone may come along and ask, “Do you want to talk about it?”

You need to be careful in that situation because that can be very dangerous. Especially if the person who wants to show that sympathy to you wants to step in and maybe meet an unfulfilled need. That’s a very dangerous and vulnerable place for you or your mate to be.

It’s one thing to talk with someone who has a similar situation as you. If you’re a man, you could talk to another man. But even at that you need to be careful about airing your problems with your friends and with others.

Now, it may be that you really do need to talk. You might be better served to talk with a professional counselor or a professional religious worker and for it to all be in the proper setting.

Just be careful. If you don’t look happy, or if your mate doesn’t look happy, someone else may come along.

The Bible speaks of those who creep in to women’s houses and they creep into their minds and their souls.(2 Timothy 3:6) It can also happen by getting into your mind and your soul. This can happen to a woman or a man, so you need to be very careful.

You want to affair-proof your marriage and you want to have a happy marriage.

You Will Be Encouraged by Knowing What to Do

Another benefit of doing this is that you will know what to do.

I mentioned husbands not liking the feel like failures or feel ashamed They need to know what the steps for success are.

I remember a young man who was placed on a basketball team and he was very good. His major contribution was his speed and his quick reflexes. He was very good on defense. It could be between his opponent and the basket. If his opponent was not careful, his quick hands would steal the ball.

fter a while he began to anticipate where they were going to throw the ball and sometimes he could jump in and steal the ball that way. But when it came to offense, he felt very inadequate.

Then not too late in the season, the coach came up with a series of plays, and they started practicing them. They knew where the ball would start, they knew where it wouoldd be thrown next, when somebody would run from one side of the court to the other, and when somebody would run to a certain position.

He really appreciated those plays, because then he knew what to do.

Well, one of the benefits of listing each other’s needs is that it will give you a step towards knowing what to do to be able to attempt to meet each other’s needs more fully.

The List

As we think about that, we’re going to come up with a premade list of 10 categories of needs. These will be felt needs that have been identified by professional counselors, marriage researchers, and many surveys that have been conducted.

Once you look at that list, you may feel that there’s a felt need that’s not on the list. In that case, you and your mate should just add that to the bottom of the premade list that I will give you. So instead of having 10 categories of needs, you may have 11 or 12.

After listing the needs, I will show you how to rank them.

Hopefully, it will encourage you to know that you are taking a step towards something that you can do that will be beneficial to your marriage.

Now this is for newlyweds or for those who have been married for quite a long time. In the process of doing this exercise, you may discover a few revelations that may just help you to improve your marriage in a way that you did not expect.

Well I hope this has been helpful to you.

I currently have two books on marriage on Amazon. The first is “21 Ways the Principle of Leaving Will Benefit Your Marriage” and the second is “From Mountains to Molehills”

Also, if you’d like more tips and advice on marriage, click here to be taken to my blog where you will find more posts like these.

Be sure to check back to find the next blog in this series.

I hope you have a great day!