• Relationships Take Work

    Create The Relationship You Want

    Like most couples, my mom and dad established particular roles for themselves in our home, and they didn’t wander far from their lanes. Mom’s lane included furnishing the house. Dad didn’t know what new couch he’d be lounging on until the truck arrived. They like it this way. When we tie the knot, we take what we’ve learned into our marriage. Often we don’t realize that we can create what we want our relationship to be. So when I got married, and it came time to buy furniture, what do you think I did? I called Mom to arrange a shopping date. When I hung up the phone, my husband…

  • Relationships Take Work

    In the Middle

    I was listening to a great song this morning called “Here Again.” The first few lines say, “Can’t go back to the beginning. Can’t control what tomorrow will bring. But I know here in the middle. Is the place where You promise to be.” The song is about how God is always there for us. I believe that we are to emulate God, as best we can, in every way that we can. I started to think about how this applies to our romantic relationships. The beginning of our relationship is often referred to as The Honeymoon Phase when everything is easy. An endless stream of dates and late-night talks…

  • Relationships Take Work

    What Story Will You Tell?

    My husband Bobby recently reconnected with his childhood friend Kevin on social media. He read me a post written by Kevin about how he’s managing quarantine. Bobby knew I would be intrigued by it because I’m endlessly interested in relationships and how we navigate our way through them. That’s a fancy way perhaps of saying that I’m nosy about people’s personal business. In my defense, I do share some pretty personal business of my own in this blog so you get equal opportunity. I’ve been thinking a lot about this extraordinary situation we’re in and how we’ll tell the stories of it to our kids and their kids. We are…

  • Relationships Take Work

    Blood Transfusion: How to Avoid Generational Curses

    I’m a singer, so song lyrics matter. I’ve been obsessed with John Mayer’s “In The Blood” lately. Yes, obsessed. I’ve listened to it during my 45-minute work commute – on repeat – several times in the last two weeks. “Several times” is as close as I’ll want to get to revealing my level of craziness about songs. Now, don’t look at me so loud. You’ve done this. You know you have. This song made me wonder why so many of us repeat our parents’ mistakes. And our grandparents. We let our past cause unnecessary relationship struggles. A friend of mine calls this the Generational Curse. Would you kindly give it…