Tip #14 Stop and Listen

It is a fact that two people (or even more) can have completely different opinions on something and both be right. I recently came across an old cartoon that does a great job illustrating this point.  

In the drawing, the two people stand at opposite ends, arguing over what they see. I imagine this argument going on for some time because each person is so convinced they are correct they can’t imagine that what the other person is arguing could be true. Obviously, we can see the one scenario neither of them is considering. In reality, they are both correct.  

Situations like these happen in marriages all the time. We can get so focused on only what we see that we can’t imagine our spouse's perspective. Sometimes, all we need to do is stop arguing our point of view long enough to be able to see our spouses. 

One thing that has really helped in our marriage is having other couples we love and trust that we allow to speak wisdom into our lives. Sometimes, especially early on, when we were having trouble seeing something from the other person’s point of view, we would take our situation to those amazing friends and they would help us get a new perspective. One closer to what we see in this picture; is a “bird's eye view” that allows us to each see where the other one was coming from. I don’t know why we sometimes hear things from other people that we cannot hear from our spouse, but at least for us, I have often found it true.  

That being said, be careful when selecting who you talk to  Make sure it is someone who is ‘for’ your marriage. Someone who will speak life into your marriage, and that it doesn’t turn into a gossip session about your spouse.  

Some of the most influential people in our marriage were our friends K & R (I didn’t ask for permission, so I am just sharing their initials). They loved us and were for us. They wanted to see our marriage thrive and were an incredible resource for us as we learned to communicate better. I am so thankful for those friends and their voices in our marriage.  


There’s a quote that say,s “We often need to lose sight of our priorities in order to see them” (John Irving, Trying to Save Piggy Sneed).  I think it fits well here, sometime we have to stop fighting for our own personal priority to remember the bigger priority-the miracle of our marriage.  
As always, I would LOVE to hear your thoughts.  That is what this site is about, feel free to share your insights as well! Thanks for reading!