The Science Behind a Happy Marriage Part 2: Brian & Jen Goins

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The Science Behind a Happy Marriage

Guests:Brian & Jen Goins

From the series:The Science Behind a Happy Marriage (Day 2 of 2)

Air date:December 20, 2024

Dave:I tell you what. What we do here at FamilyLife is only possible because of listeners like you. And we’re in a season right now where your support is critical. Every gift you give allows us to reach many more families with God’s love and is designed for relationships. So if FamilyLife has impacted your life, please consider giving today. It really makes a huge difference.

Ann:And you can give online right now at FamilyLifeToday.com or by calling 800-358-6329. Again, the number is 800-F as in Family, L as in Life, and then the word TODAY. Thanks for listening and thanks for giving and being a part of our family.

Brian:It’s easier to act your way into a new kind of feeling than it is to feel your way into a new kind of acting. And so in marriages that are highly happy, they don’t wait for the feelings. They just start acting as if my spouse is forming, acting as if my spouse really actually does care.

Ann:Welcome to FamilyLife Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I’m Ann Wilson.

Dave:And I’m Dave Wilson. And you can find us at FamilyLifeToday.com. This is FamilyLife Today.

So we’ve got a highly happy couple sitting in the studio with us today.

Ann:Yes, we sure do. Our friends.

Dave:Brian and Jen Owens are back and they’re laughing because they know what we’re really talking about.

Brian:We’re in the So-So couple category. There’re three couples, right?

Ann: You are not.

Jen:We’re in the highly happy marriage; that’s right.

Dave: Ann is happy today. I don’t know about you, Brian.

Ann:If one person says it, you are.

Brian:No, I got to be happy.

Dave:You better be. Well, yeah. We had you in here yesterday; had a great time talking about something you’re doing on Married With Benefits. Go ahead and tell our listeners about your interviews with Shaunti about highly happy couples.

Brian:And this is really a book that Jen clued me in on and I love it, and it really is, you think about if we could learn from the best, like the best couples that are out there, and statistically what Shaunti and Jeff Feldhahn did is they found that they’re actually highly happy couples that generally they love being married. They just love it. And they then talk to those couples and say, okay, what is it they do? What are the patterns? What are the habits? What are the practices that they consistently do? And they found 12 secrets. And then they actually found out there was a 13th secret.

Dave:And you know what? You said that yesterday. I’m like, what’s the 13th?

Brian:You have to listen to Married With Benefits. I’m not going to give that away. Yeah, but—

Dave:You did them all?

Brian:We did them all.

Dave:Okay.

Brian:And we had one episode for each one and it was great. There was some really, really good ones. And the other thing I thought was interesting is that all of the secrets, Jeff alluded to this yesterday, can be done by just one spouse.

Ann:Yeah, that’s interesting.

Brian:And they make a big difference. And we talked about that at the Weekend to Remember, right? This whole idea of, “Hey, when you’re at this conference, draw a circle, imaginary circle around yourself and just focus on the person in the circle. What do I need to change?” And so if one spouse is listening to this and the other one isn’t, the response shouldn’t be, “Well, I need to make sure they hear this.”

Ann:And Brian and Jen, haven’t you heard that from couples? I’m all in, but my spouse, no. And I think they feel very hopeless but we’re saying, “No, you can feel hopeful because you by yourself can even make a difference.”

Brian:You could make a change. And once that one spouse starts seeing that change, people actually, I mean, and this is what we’re talking about, people actually want to have a great marriage. So when they see one spouse treating them in a way that they weren’t expecting; it was going against the pattern.

Ann:Or deserve.

Brian:Or deserve, exactly. They’re showing them mercy. They’re showing them grace. That gets catchy and the other spouse then starts responding, “Well, I probably need to change my way.” There’s only one secret that both have to do it. And that secret is, I’ll give you this one, that highly happy couples have a secret language that is reciprocal. And so when one spouse does it, the other spouse has to respond in kind.

Jen:But all the other ones, it really only depends, or it could only depend on one person.

Brian:Right; one person.

Jen:You could make a change. To me, that is so hopeful.

Ann: Me too.

Jen:I always love telling people that and I feel confident because of the research that she’s done. But I feel like that’s such a hopeful thing because I know like you said, people are like, “We’ve got to have us both. Both have got to be on the same page. And obviously, eventually, both do have to be on the same page, but it can start with one.

Ann:Even counseling, I’ve had couples say, “My spouse won’t go with me.” I’m like, “But you could go. You can go by yourself and make a difference.”

Dave:But it does get hard. Again, I’m going to be devil’s advocate. If I’m the one saying “I’m going to change. I’m going to do the right thing,” I lose motivation after a while if he doesn’t change, if she doesn’t change after a month; that’s a long time. But usually it’s after three or four days or a week. What do you say to that couple, that person, that spouse, it’s like, “I’ve tried. I’ve done it for a month, nothing happened.” Do they quit? They keep going.

Brian:Well, it’s like, man, with those two options, you can quit. Where’s that result going to go?

Dave:Just keep going.

Brian:Or do you keep going? And maybe like it says in Peter that when Peter’s recommending to a woman that is married to somebody who’s unbeliever that maybe they’ll be won over without a word just by her actions of respect and showing love and grace again to somebody who doesn’t deserve it. Does that guarantee it? No, but it’s probably your best option.

Dave:Yeah. Let’s hope.

Ann:And I’ll just add this with that is that there is a God through Jesus that loves you, sees you. Every time you make that move to help your marriage; it’s noticed. And I think King Jesus is applauding you, like, “Well done.” It’s a worship experience because you’re not getting anything back, but He sees it so don’t give up hope. And I think it’s beautiful when we can serve and love people when it’s not always reciprocated.

Dave:Yeah, that’s a great word.

Jen:Sometimes I’ll talk to a woman who she’s telling me the story. And of course when you’re talking to one person, you only hear one side of the story. But I’m thinking, “Here’s what I would do.” And I give her what I think and I’m like, it sounds really piddly. And when she comes back and she’s like, “I did what you said. And I started showing him a little bit respect and we’re doing so much better.”

Ann:I know.

Jen:I’m like, why did I even doubt my advice because it’s biblical? And so anyway, yes, a month is probably going to be a hard month but keep going. And you never know the breakthrough that could happen after a while and what a blessing.

Ann:And have girlfriends that cheer you on too.

Jen:Yes.

Brian:And I think it’s like giving God a chance to do a miracle. Do we really believe that He can change a heart? But He’s not going to change it through nagging. He’s not going to change it through disrespect. He’s not going to change it through not loving. It’s going to be “Okay, I’m going to have to do something that doesn’t come natural. I’m going to have to be forbearing. I’m going to have to endure. I’m going to have to persevere. I’m going to have to show kindness when the other person doesn’t deserve it.” But it’s God’s kindness that leads to repentance. And that’s ultimately what we want to see. And I think that’s what is so great about this secret is if you start with a mindset that “I actually believe my spouse is for me,” that changes the way you look at them; that changes the way you view.

Dave:Yeah. So today we’re sort of part two of Believe the Best. Highly happy couples believe the best about their spouse. Yesterday was sort of the science and how that affects our brain, even our marriage. Today is how do we do this? So we’re going to go listen to you and Shaunti talk about this and then we’re going to respond. So here’s Brian.

[Recorded Message]

Brian:1 Peter 3:9 where he says, “Do not repay evil with evil or insult for insult. On the contrary, repay evil with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may actually inherit a blessing.” Paul says the same thing in Romans where he says, don’t return evil, like there is this principle where we’re going, “Well, you can do it your way.” You could when you get the ow, you can ow back. And all of us know what that experience is like in marriage.

Shaunti:And where it goes

Brian:And where that cycle never wins. Whenever Jeff said the silent treatment, I’m a stuffer. When Jen and I are in an argument, I just retreat. And it’s not like I roll tape back on that argument and go, “That really helped her come around. That really helped her apologize and seek forgiveness and see it my way.” No, it always fails miserably. We know the snarkiness and sarcasm, it all ends in the same place. So what God is going, it’s like you can go your way and have the same results or you could actually believe something different and maybe experience a blessing.

Shaunti:We had, I can’t remember when this was Jeff, but do you remember that couple where I think it was the husband who put something on his mirror. Was it the husband?

Jeff:It was the husband, bathroom mirror.

Shaunti:He said he heard us talk on this topic at a marriage conference. We did; this is one of the talks that we often do at a marriage event. And he went home, and he took a sticky note, and he wrote, “Believe the best” on the sticky note; put it on his mirror, his bathroom mirror. And basically it was a, “I am going to choose every day. I’m going to choose today that when I’m hurt, when she does whatever, that I’m going to look for a more generous explanation for what that was and choose to believe she wasn’t doing it to drive me nuts.”

Brian:We’re talking about in this season how we really want to do the little things that can move us in the right direction.

Shaunti:Yes.

Brian:It’s usually the little things going in the wrong direction that causes such friction in marriage.

Shaunti:Yes.

Brian:So take this and make it super practical, Feldhahns. Believing the best sounds like it’s just tricking my mind. It is just a Jedi mind trick on my marriage.

Shaunti:Well, here’s the thing, it kind of is, but it’s a Jedi mind trick about the truth remember. You’re actually choosing to believe the truth rather than the lie you were believing.

Brian:Yeah. And the lie was, again, say it.

Shaunti:The lie was that this person doesn’t care about me. “They knew how that would make me feel. They said it anyway. She knows how much it bugs me that she doesn’t put stuff away. And even with something as big of a deal as this, she just doesn’t care to change. That’s how little she cares about me.”

No, the truth is, and this is the first thing to help with that Jedi mind trick, which is again, there’s a tip here, there’s a habit building here. There’s a step-by-step in the right direction here is that when you feel that ow do what the happy couples did, which is yep, you’re going to feel that. It’s going to be frustrating; it’s going to be painful, whatever that is, that is accurate. It’s legitimate.

But then ask yourself, what is a more generous explanation? Is it that they don’t care about me or is there another potential explanation here? And look for it. And when you look for the more generous explanation, you almost always find it. And even if you don’t, you can actually then, step number two, you can actually go to your spouse and you can be like, “I’m really disappointed. I’m really upset about such and such. Help me understand.” Because you can’t stuff everything. You have to be able to raise these things.

Brian:So it’s not ignoring the ow. I think we need to be clear about that.

Shaunti:Yes. It’s not.

Brian:The ow is legitimate. I’m going to choose to believe the best. When I choose to believe the best, then I can start asking questions. I can say, “I don’t know if you know how that came across, but this is what that felt like to me.”

Shaunti:Exactly, and here’s what you just did in the way you said that. You are asking them the question in a way that assumes there’s another explanation.

Brian:Yeah.

Shaunti:Okay. You assume when you say, “Help me understand,” or “You probably didn’t realize how this came across.” What you’re doing is you’re actually saying, you’re handing them a generosity of spirit in that question and giving them the opportunity. Now some people are going to say, “You are letting them take advantage of you.” And okay, there is that small percentage. Unfortunately, I wish that that was a hundred percent. It’s not. But there is that small percentage of people who just, they’re done. They don’t care. Their brain and their heart has checked out. But that is a very rare situation. And so the vast majority of the cases, you’re actually giving them an opportunity to share what is the truth.

Brian:It made me think of good friends of ours that are Weekend to Remember speakers, Ed and Amy, and they have a thing, and I think they heard it from somebody where it’s the take it back card.

Shaunti:That’s awesome.

Brian:If their spouse says something that is really rude or unkind, you prompt them by going, “Do you want to take it back? Do you want to take that card back?” It just gives them, and it’s kind of funny. It’s like, “Yeah, I do want to take it back.” Or it’s like—

Shaunti:Can we start practicing that, Jeff? Would that be okay with you? Because that would really work. Yeah, yeah. No, I need that take it back card. I actually said something yesterday right before I came here. I think I hurt his feelings. I’m like, “Dang.”

Brian:Right.

Shaunti:Yeah. Take it back.

Brian:And maybe you just be the one to say even, because I think most of us know, right when we say, right when Bruce says, “I’m giving myself another opportunity to serve you,” he knows what he’s doing with that card.

Shaunti:It’s like “Ooh.”

Brian:I know exactly what card I’m playing. And then for me to even say, “Oh wait, can I take that back?” If you just get in that habit. Again, I’m going to choose to believe the best. I love that Post-it note. And maybe that’s one of the great practical things is just for until you get it down in your head, keep putting reminders out in front of us. So you talked about we feel that ow, ask, “Is there a more generous explanation for what just happened?” If it hurt, assume it wasn’t because of the worst, right?

Shaunti:And you can now ask them. That’s actually part. Step two is actually pretty important. If there is something that needs to be addressed, that’s when you go, “Well, you may not have realized how this came across,” but or “Help me understand such and such.”

Brian:“What are you going through to have you treat me like that? What’s going on in your mind right now?”

Shaunti:That could be it too. That really could be. And then the third thing that I think is actually important is overall recognize in how you’re, as you’re learning this, especially as you’re choosing to try to believe the best, even when you’re hurt, recognize that how you are treating your husband or your wife in that, try to be kind.

Jeff was reminding us of this quote that’s attributed to Plato or Aristotle, or a Scottish philosopher named Ian McLaren. It’s attributed to a lot of people, but I saw it on the back of a t-shirt.

Brian:It’s Abraham Lincoln, I’m sure.

Shaunti:Yeah, I’m sure. Yeah. I saw it on the back of a t-shirt a number of years ago, and it says, “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a great battle.” And the reality is you would want your spouse to believe the best of you. You’re in that when you’re like, “Oops, take it back. I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.” You would want them to believe the best of how you feel about them. Well give them the same grace.

[Studio]

Dave:I mean, I just want to go home now and live it. Honestly, just hearing that it’s just like, okay, “Believe the best” on the mirror. That is an image I won’t get out of my mind and possibly put it on the mirror. It’s a reminder. It’s like this is not only true about my marriage, but it’s what highly happy couples do. And I’ll be better if I do it. That’s what I got.

Ann:Okay, Brian and Jen, let’s get down into this. Tell us what that has looked like, not the perfect you guys but tell us a time where you haven’t done this well, where you haven’t assumed the best.

Brian:Where we haven’t assumed the best?

Jen:Totally, in the beginning of our marriage.

Brian:Yeah.

Jen:Yes. Because he had the same problem that Dave had and that he would come home late.

Brian:Dave passed it down to me.

Jen:I would be so angry and so hurt.

Ann:Did you have kids?

Jen:Yes. And that was part of it is because I wanted a break. I needed him home. I had made dinner, and he was late. Sometimes it was work and maybe I could understand that. Sometimes he was playing racquetball and that ticked me off.

Ann:Yeah. Dave was basketball or softball.

Brian:You can’t hide that. You don’t come in with your sweaty clothes and go, “Yeah, I’m sorry I was late. I had this thing at work,” and I was like, “No, wait.”

Ann:And you’ve got spit up on your shoulders. You’ve been doing—

Jen:You’ve eaten mac and cheese for the fourth time that week for lunch.

Ann:You haven’t had a conversation.

Dave:Haven’t showered in a week.

Brian:How long are we going to talk about this? Can we keep moving on?

Jen:Anyway. The poor mom. No. So I did not believe the best.

Dave:I mean, what did you say? What’d you do?

Ann:And what did you think? Where did your mind go?

Jen:I thought he was extremely selfish; that he had no idea what I had been through. I just went down a rabbit trail. He also doesn’t care about the kids, apparently.

Ann:They’re not a priority.

Jen:They’re not a priority. I’m not a priority.

Brian:The first two things were true; selfish, yes. I was being selfish in that moment. And what was the second thing you said was, oh, that I don’t know what’s really going on with you. I think that that’s really what happens with a lot of us is that we are just in our own heads and we’re not really understanding the impact that we’re having on our spouse.

Ann:Like, “He doesn’t see me. He doesn’t care about me.”

Brian:But when you go down to that third level of, he doesn’t care about me, that’s where we get into trouble. That’s usually the level that comes out when I now confront the situation. It’s not, “Hey, do you understand what’s going on in my life right now?” It’s not asking a question. It’s not any of that. It is. You come in the door and it’s like, “You don’t care about me. Do you not see what’s happening?” And it’s accusatory, it’s negative, it’s or cold shoulder.

Jen:And it is questioning motives, which we can’t know each other’s motives. It is going right down to that real level of I know what you’re feeling. I know what you’re thinking, and this is what it is. Instead of, putting yourself, believing the best. Maybe he was playing racquetball, but he had a stressful job, and racquetball is really helpful in getting out stress. I mean, of course I want to do things too, but if I’m going to just think about me and put the circle around my chair and figure out how I want to treat my husband is to understand and believe the best. That he was really trying to beat this guy at racquetball and that would’ve been really helpful.

Brian:It was a game three. I won the first one. He won the second one. You got to play the rubber match. But I do think there is something to be said about when there is a pattern, it’s “Okay, now let’s really talk about this.” But it’s all about how we come to talk about it.

Ann:That’s the key.

Jen:That’s the key. And that’s what I was getting that yesterday when we were talking about that, of saying, “Hey,” when you do confront the pattern to say, “I know that you care about me, and I believe the best about you.” Even saying those things—

Ann:You might not feel it, but you’re going to say it like that.

Jen:Exactly. You’re going to say it like that. That’s immediately going to soften them, I think, for the most part.

Ann:I would wait for the opportune time because right when they walk in the door, that is not what you’re probably want to say. So wait for a time that you can both listen. You can both, you’ve eaten, maybe not right before you fall asleep. Pick the time. But you’re right. Choose a good time and then say it just like you said, Jen, I liked how you said that.

Dave:So it sounds like it’s pretty perfect now for you guys.

Brian:Haha. I asked her, I was like, “Are you going to say what happened this past weekend?” Because there was, I mean—

Dave:Yes, you are. You have to, now.

Brian:This is the whole thing where it’s like everyone gets hurt in marriage and it doesn’t stop. Our illustrations aren’t all in the past.

Ann:Wouldn’t that be nice if they were.

Brian:It would be nice if all of a sudden, we had graduated sanctification, and we just are at the level of Jesus and that’s how we treat each other. But instead, my sin comes out on a weekly basis, on a daily basis,

Jen:The pain and hurt can still be there but I do feel like this past week, which actually was what, two days ago, we got there a lot quicker and underneath it all, even though I was pained and sad—

Ann:Wait, we need details.

Jen:I’ll tell you. We’ll tell you. We were able to work through it.

Brian:Thanks Ann, for bringing us on here so that we could share this to everybody.

Jen:So I had a speaking engagement this week and I had been waiting for a while. I got this great illustration that I was so excited about. It was the end of my talk, and it was going to be what we call the haymaker. It was going to rock.

Dave:Knockout punch.

Jen:It was going to knock out. I was going to have women crying. I was going to be declared the best speaker ever. I was so excited about this illustration. So I finally said, I had told it to my daughter and her boyfriend, and they were like, “Oh my goodness, that is amazing.” I told it to another friend and they’re like, “That’s really, really good.” So it’s early in the morning—

Dave:I can see where this is going.

Jen:We’re sitting down, and I was like, “Brian, I’ve been waiting to tell you about my talk. I’m really excited about it.” And I told it, point one, point two, but wait until you hear point three. And I told it to him, and I was like, “What do you think?” And he literally said, “It’s okay.”

Brian:Not my best moment.

Jen:And for some reason I just started crying. I was so hurt by that comment. And then he felt bad. He said, “I’m so sorry”. And I said, I mean—

Ann:You needed to take it back.

Brian:I needed to take it back right in that moment. I wish I had.

Jen:But it was too late.

Brian:You know those moments where the words are coming out and you don’t even know why you’re saying—like in that moment, I’m going, “I know that she’s wanting me to respond with her emotions. I see how emotional and passionate she is about this.” And I’m coming out with like, “Yeah, it’s alright.”

Jen:That’s exactly what he said.

Brian:And even if I didn’t love the exact illustration in the moment, what Jen needed, I knew what she needed because I’m a communicator, and I know what I need in that moment. I need to feel like, okay, I’m going. I’m about to go speak. It’s not like she’s going to have time to change this.

Ann:She needs encouragement.

Brian:She needs encouragement. She needs to be ready for battle. She needs to know that she’s going to do awesome. And I just poured water all over that.

Jen:But I knew underneath it all, I knew the reason. I mean, I cried. I was hurting, but I wasn’t crushed. I didn’t tell him, “I don’t think you don’t care about me,” because I knew he did. I knew he had made a mistake.

And so in that sense, I was hurt and I kind of went silent and he’s like, “Jen, I’m so sorry.” He apologized right away because he saw my tears. I got up and just walked away. I was still really hurt and kind of mad about it or just hurt. And he kind of gave me a minute and I took a walk, and I even cried a little bit about it on the walk and realized there’s some other stuff behind that too. But I came back and he’s like, “I want to talk with you.” And he apologized and I was like, “I know. I know you care about me. I know you just made a mistake.” And so we moved on within a morning instead of maybe a day or two or longer letting it simmer.

So that’s where I feel like we’ve grown in our 28 years of marriage of learning. I believe the best about him. I knew he didn’t want to hurt me. I also had to say to myself, there have been times where I’ve done that to him. He communicates more than I do, and he’s asked me about some things, or I haven’t said something about a talk. And so I’ve hurt him as well. It’s like put myself in his position where maybe he’s given this big talk, and I didn’t say anything. And so just again, giving him the benefit of the doubt.

Brian:Yeah, I like this quote that Shaunti says: “Once you believe your spouse absolutely cares about you, those distancing feelings of hurt, anger and resentment arise a lot less often.” It’s not that they don’t arise, they will. And I wasn’t looking for a fight that morning. I didn’t wake up that morning going, “I can’t wait to put Jen down.” I just did it because I was insensitive in a moment. But I think what I’ve tried to in the past, I think that insensitivity would’ve just created more distance. And I would not have come to say, “I’m sorry,” nearly as quick. I would’ve been prideful about it.

Ann:Well, take us back guys, because I think all of us are saying, so Jen, you got to the point, you’re taking a walk. You could have chosen as you had in the past to think the worst. But in that moment, we keep getting back to that word, choose. Tell the listener, and you too, Brian, how do we choose to go the opposite way? How can we practically do that on a consistent basis?

Jen:Here’s what I’ve been learning lately. For me, it’s helpful to use my imagination and to imagine—you don’t have to imagine. We have an enemy, and he can see our choice that we’re hurting and get in there and be like, “He doesn’t care about you.”

Ann:And he can’t read your thoughts.

Jen:No, he cannot read your thoughts.

Ann:But he can watch you.

Jen:And he knows humans are very similar. We go down the same patterns. So when we’re hurt, we get mad, and it causes distance. And so I’ve had to do this with some other situations recently in my life where I thought “Satan wants to get in here and ruin my marriage. He wants to ruin my relationship with my kids, and he wants to ruin my relationship with my friends and our church,” so on and so forth. So I think to myself, when I take, and this has happened a couple times on a walk where I think, “No way. I’m going to make a different choice. He’s not going to ruin my marriage. This is something good in my life and I don’t want it to be ruined.”

So I can go down that thought. I can go down that path as you say and go home and yell at him and be frustrated and give him the cold shoulder and treat him. And next time he does a sermon you know what I’m going to do, I’m going to say, “That was okay.” I could do that. But what’s that going to do? Who’s going to win? Not my marriage.

Dave:Jen, I don’t know if you did this on purpose, but the walk is an illustration for all of us. Take a moment. You need to take a moment. Sometimes you can’t in the moment respond. I mean, you cried in the moment, but then it’s like on this little walk, five minutes, ten minutes, half a day, whatever you are able to do. I wrote down as we listened to Shaunti, she said feel it, remind yourself of the truth, share the hurt, assume the best and ask them in kindness to clarify. You did all of that. And she wasn’t giving us a pattern or roadmap, but she sort of was. And I know you’ve done that many times. It’s like I need a minute. And that helps you go, “I’m believing a lie. Here’s the truth.” And in that process, you sort of bring God into the picture and say, “God, I need you to give me the right thoughts.” And by the time you get back, it’s a different conversation.

Jen:And it’s such a blessing. I don’t have the time most mornings to go on a walk because I work, but that morning I got to have a short walk. And it does really help. So even if you can’t physically; you’re thinking, “Oh man, I can’t do that all the time,” just go someplace, get it alone. And just take a minute to really think and pray and make some choices.

Brian:Yeah, I think it’s okay to call a timeout, a timeout. Dave, you like sports, right?

Dave:I hate them.

Brian:Yeah. The reason why a coach calls a timeout is because the momentum in the game is going a direction they don’t want it to go.

Dave:Yeah, got to stop it.

Brian:And we know when that momentum hits in our marriage. And you can either keep going down that road and start escalating and do tit for tat and repay evil for evil and insult for insult. Or you go, “Let’s call a time out here. We’re both a little heated. We’re both a little frustrated. Let’s go into our corners for a second. Let’s go on the sidelines and just reconnect with a coach.” And the coach is going to go, “Okay, what’s true?” Going back to your point, what are the lies? For me, I’ve found that I don’t question my feelings enough.

It’s like feelings feel. They’re not necessarily right or wrong. You just feel them. You feel hurt, you feel frustrated, you feel disappointed in expectations. And so it’s just when those feelings start taking down the road of “So they must not care for me. They must hate me. They must. They’re against me.” We need to stop that train and start going, “Okay, how do I act towards them as if I believe the best about them?” And we like to say it at the Weekend to Remember, it’s easier to act your way into a new kind of feeling than it’s to feel your way into a new kind of acting. And so in marriages that are highly happy, they don’t wait for the feelings. They just start acting as if my spouse is for me, acting as if my spouse really actually does care and love me.

Dave:That’s good. And at the end of the day, we all know the truth. Brian was wrong and your illustration was a killer. And the women were cheering at the end.

Brian:They did.

Jen:It was so funny because actually, I hate to say this, but—

Brian:But she’s about to. “I hate to say this but let me go ahead and talk about it.”

Jen:It was an amazing illustration.

Brian:It really was. And I had this lady come up to me because apparently Jen decided to tell this story to her friend.

Jen:Well, my close friend, I told one friend.

Brian:Which is fine.

Jen:She was a fellow speaker, and she said, “I wanted to give this talk to my husband,” and I was like, “Oh, wait until you hear what I did when I gave it to my husband.”

Dave:Don’t tell your husband.

Jen:And we both laughed. And so when she got down, she goes, “Oh, I can’t wait to tell Brian.”

Brian:And so I came to help clean up after this event, after all these ladies had a great experience, and Jen did an incredible job. She led the whole thing, and she came up to me, she says, “Brian,”—this is this other girl—”Brian, Jen was awesome. She was great. But you know what the best part of her message was?” I said, “I have a pretty good idea of what it is.”

Jen:So we had fun with it. We let it go. And I do believe that Brian has my best intentions at heart. And so we’re over it now and we can laugh about it.

Brian:The day ended a lot differently than when it began. And we didn’t wake up expecting that hurt. She didn’t expect that hurt. I didn’t expect to give that hurt. We just did it. And that’s what happens in marriage. It’s like you don’t know when it’s going to happen, and you don’t always have the luxury of being able to see the believe the best Post-it note because you’re not always in the bathroom when it happens. And so it’s almost like you’ve got to figure out, how do I get that in my head?

Dave:Post it on your brain.

Brian:Post it in the brain. And that’s why you reconnect with the coach and say, “Okay, help me believe the best about my spouse.”

Ann:That’s good.

Dave:Yeah. I’m telling you this, that story in itself is a take home for every listener. Thank you. Seriously, you modeled how a highly happy couple gets to highly happy. It doesn’t always start there, but you go on a journey. That was beautiful.

Jen:Thank you.

Dave:Thanks.

This is FamilyLife Today. We’re Dave and Ann Wilson, and we’ve been talking with Brian and Jen Goins about the FamilyLife podcast called Married With Benefits. And you can find that wherever you get your podcast.

Ann:Wasn’t that fun to be with them and listen to that?

Dave:That was awesome.

Ann:It was so good. I love how these conversations that we have, like this one with Brian and Jen, they help our marriages. It gives us tools to know what we can do. And that’s what we do at FamilyLife Today. We want to help you, your marriage, your family. And honestly, this time of year is really critical for us at FamilyLife Today because it’s a time where your donation, if you give and become a partner, your donation will actually be doubled this time of year. And we’ve had a matching program up to $3 million that if you give it will be doubled, and we need that. And this only happens at this time of year. That’s why it’s so critical.

Dave:So now’s the time to go to FamilyLifeToday.com and become a financial partner with FamilyLife. Or you can call us at 1-800-358-6329. That’s 800-F as in Family, L as in Life, and then the word TODAY. And it would mean the world to us if you gave us a call or went to FamilyLifeToday.com and made a donation. That will help us change the world.

Ann:And this is kind of a fun little bonus of what we’re doing. When you give to help more families, we want to send you two books as our thanks. The first one is A Devotional by Katie Davis Majors called Our Faithful God Devotional, which is 52 Weeks of Leaning on His Unchanging Character.

And then the second book we want to send you is a children’s book by Ruth Chou Simons called Home is Right Where You Are. It is a gorgeously illustrated book based on Psalm 23. And both of these books are our thanks to you when you give a donation of any amount this month.

Again, you can give online at FamilyLifeToday.com or give us a call at 800-358-6329. Or you can mail us your donation at FamilyLife, 100 Lake Hart Drive, Orlando, Florida 32832. Just make sure to let us know that you’d like copies of Our Faithful God Devotional and Home is Right Where You Are.

Dave:For Dave and Ann Wilson, have a great weekend. We’ll see you next week on FamilyLife Today.

Ann:FamilyLife Today is a donor-supported production of FamilyLife®, a Cru® Ministry. Helping you pursue the relationships that matter most.