When Your Relationship Isn’t Working
There’s little if anything that makes a greater difference in your sense of wellbeing than the quality of your closest…
attitude
Giving Thanks for the Unexpected: Reflections on Gratitude This Thanksgiving
Today is Thanksgiving here in the United States. It’s an opportunity to remember that we are not God but creatures.…
Disentangling Messy Relationships: People, God, and Your Heart
People. Need them. Can’t stand them. Messy relationships seem to be the only kind available. The push-pull of your true…
From Rupture to Repair: Working Towards Healing in Your Relationship
Every relationship experiences ruptures. Husband/wife, parent/child, good friends – we are all sinners, and that means some rupture in relationships…
Your Body: Friend or Foe?
Your body can be a touchy subject (no pun intended). Is your body a friend or foe? Many if not…
The Power of Gratitude: Three Unique Blessings I’m Thankful For in 2024
Today is Thanksgiving Day in the United States. Research continues to demonstrate how gratitude is good for you; it improves…
Married Sex: Can it be Good?
Maurice and Monica weren’t sure their marriage would make it. They had lived together for a few years prior to…
The Practice of Being Grateful For in a Difficult Season in 2023
The fourth Thursday of November is Thanksgiving Day in the United States. And that’s today! As good-for-the-soul as food, family,…
When You and Your Spouse are on Opposite Sides in the Bedroom
You may have expected sex to just “work” when you got married. Or that married sex would fix your porn…
Boundaries and Freedom: Embracing What You Can and Can’t Do
You are not God. You are not all-powerful. Sometimes that’s a revelation; you are not the center of the universe.…
5 Out-of-the-Bedroom Keys to Better Married Sex
The need for intimacy is a part of every human heart, regardless of relationship status. For those who are married…
How’s Your Soul Doing, Really?
At breakfast with a friend recently I asked her, “How’s your soul doing?” That led to conversation about some really…
How to Plan Your Way Through the Holiday Blues
I love the Christmas season, but it hasn’t always been that way. Some Christmases have been really really hard. I…
When One Spouse Has A High Sexual Appetite
What’s a normal frequency of sex in marriage? That’s usually asked by the spouse with a higher libido looking for…
The One Thing that will Transform Your Relationship Starting TODAY
What grade would you give your marriage today? A+? Hallelujah! But perhaps it’s more like a D. There isn’t one…
How the Old “You” Will Have to Die for Your Marriage to Survive
OH! That’s not what the preacher said when he or she pronounced you man and wife. Dying is not what…
The Biggest Thing Missing From the Abortion Debate
Roe v. Wade and the abortion debate has been a volatile topic for decades. And the US Supreme Court’s decision…
What It Looks Like to be FOR Your Relationship
Deeper than any specific words or actions is the position from which both you and your spouse come to your…
It’s Time to Let Your Husband Off the Hook
This is not what you signed up for. When you said Yes you thought you were getting friendship, intimacy, even…
Are Your Reasons for Marriage the Right Reasons?
Why did you get married in the first place, or why do you want to get married? And if you…
How to Build the Marriage You Desire in the New Year
There’s nothing magic about January 1. But there can be something almost magical about you making a decided change and…
2021: A Different Year, A Different Gratitude List
Today is Thanksgiving Day in the United States. I love that it’s the least commercialized of the major holidays. If…
How Gratitude Transforms Your Marriage
Thanksgiving comes this week in the United States. Many research studies demonstrate how intentional gratitude can improve your mental and…
When You Need an Attitude Adjustment
A couple days ago I could feel the tension rising in my body. My mind was ruminating on all the…
How to Help Your Wife Navigate Menopause and Midlife
As a husband, if your wife is approaching or experiencing menopause you may feel frustrated and powerless. You may feel…
Four Questions to Help Diagnose Your Painful Marriage
Where on the spectrum of happy-to-unhappy is your marriage? What’s really the problem, and how serious is it? How can…
Where to Start if Your Marriage Lacks Intimacy
You want intimacy with your spouse and it’s not happening. You’re living as roommates, as if passing as ships in…
How to Build Connection Needed for Healthy Intimacy
God created you with the need, desire, and capacity for intimacy. But intimacy doesn’t just “happen” even if you and…
10 Proven Ways to Connect With Your Spouse
You want to feel connected. That’s what you expected in marriage. The hormones and pheromones and all the other “mones”…
Uprooting Why You Feel Unhappy in Your Marriage
Every marriage has challenges. It wouldn’t make sense to expect the union of two different human beings to proceed without…
10 Resolutions that will Revolutionize Your Relationship in 2021
The only helpful thing about New Year’s resolutions is that they get you to focus on what you can do.…
Three Powerful Keys to a Better Marriage in 2021
Last year was so – 2020. A year many people want never to repeat. Most are hoping and praying for…
How to Stay Resilient During a Blue Holiday Season
Holidays are supposed to be “happy and bright,” right? But every year I hear from people for whom the holiday…
How to Strengthen Your Marriage Through the Holidays
The holiday season is always stressful. In spite of the joy, for many people the holiday blues are very real.…
How to Choose to Be Thankful Anyway
Today is Thanksgiving Day in the United States. I love this day. Without the commercialization of most other holidays, we…
How to be Grateful For Your Messy Marriage
This week we celebrate Thanksgiving Day in the United States. The challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic, racial and political…
Do This, Not That: 5 Attitudes for a Better Marriage
Attitudes color everything. Attitudes develop usually without you realizing it. Some attitudes you brought to your marriage and some you…
The Power of Going First in Your Marriage
If your marriage relationship is great, you already understand what I’m going to talk about here. But if your marriage…
How to Hold to Truth Without Being Judgmental
Jesus was full of both grace and truth. (John 1:14) But we as humans tend to easily fall into the…
When You Care More Than Your Spouse
Feeling as though someone else doesn’t care as much as you do hurts a lot. You want things to work…
Ten Questions to Understand Your Spouse Better
How well do you know your husband or wife? You may have thought you knew them quite well when you…
12 Things Your Spouse Needs to Hear You Say During This Crisis
Stress can make people prickly. Crisis can uncover both the worst and the best in people. You need some grace,…
Your Marriage Under Lockdown
If things are wonderful between you and your spouse, lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic may seem great; you’ve got…
Battling Fear Over the Coronavirus (COVID-19)
Within the past few days life for those of us living in the US has changed. In some other parts…
What You CAN Control in Your Marriage
Human beings love to be in control. But in marriage, when one person tries to control another true intimacy is…
How I Learned to Love Well
While learning to love well is a life-long process, loving well was something I was privileged to deeply experience with…
Single at Christmas
Christmas is only a few days away – and you’re alone. Well, not really alone, not totally. But you’re single.…
Broken Creche, Broken Heart at Christmas
The little olivewood creche was special to me ever since I had purchased it at a little tourist shop in…
My Grateful List
Today is Thanksgiving in the United States. Scientific research, countless personal stories, and good old common sense demonstrate that being…
Holidays and Relationships: It’s Complicated
This week in the United States many families will gather together to celebrate Thanksgiving. And Christmas is just a few…
