The Illumination Project

If you want your husband to express appreciation for your attempts to be respectful, you must speak thankfully when he tries to be loving.

When there is confusion, I try to refrain from attacking another for not listening carefully (which may not be the case). Instead, I take a run at communicating again, but more clearly.

Husbands primarily want to hear ‘respect” talk during conflict. Wives primarily want to hear “love” talk during conflict.

We must bring our identity in Christ to our parenting—we must not derive our identity from our children.

His love blesses regardless of her respect; her respect blesses regardless of his love.

Clearly, in the marriage, in the family and in the household, when you speak words of blessing, you are speaking to the Lord, and for this you will be rewarded.

When a wife feels unloved, it can be such a shock to her heart that she is oblivious to her disrespectful reactions toward her husband, though any man watching could see it plainly.

As a wife, if you can start to understand how important your husband’s work is to him, you will take a giant step toward communicating respect and honor, two things that he values even more than your love.

The mature one in the marriage seldom moves second.

His love motivates her respect. Her respect motivates his love.

Marriage is a tool and a test to allow God’s will to be revealed in our lives.

Here is the secret to marriage that every couple seeks and yet few find: Unconditional respect is as powerful for him as unconditional love is for her. It’s the secret that will help you achieve a brand new level of intimacy.

A woman needs love like she needs air to breathe. A man needs respect like he needs air to breathe.

The Love and Respect message is not about a husband earning his wife’s respect by being more loving any more than it is about a wife earning her husband’s love by being more respectful. Always love or respect is given unconditionally according to God’s commands.

Your husband knows you value his friendship when you tell him you like him and you show it (he knows you love him, but he often wonders if you really like him).

The parent-child relationship is as easy, and as difficult, as love and respect.

Research and experience prove that men and women see and hear differently. Recognizing these differences and adjusting to them is absolutely necessary for reaching mutual understanding and better communication.

A major step toward a happy marriage is accepting differences and working them out with love and respect.

Mutual understanding, not communication, is the key to a healthy marriage relationship.

When you play the blame game your marriage never wins.

When you love or respect unconditionally regardless of the outcome, you are following God and His will for you.

When you look to God and His Word as your ultimate source of significance and security, you don’t demand that your spouse take that role in your life. And as you draw strength from the Lord individually, He draws you closer together as a couple.

There is power and freedom that comes in understanding that no one can cause you to react in a certain way. It is your choice.

If you want your wife to express appreciation for your attempts to be loving, you must use thankful words when she tries to speak or act respectfully.

The heart of my communication means the other person cannot get my heart to be unkind, unloving, or disrespectful. Instead, I have made a decision about who I will be independent of the other person. I won’t blame my unkindness on someone else.

If a husband loves his wife as he should, she will feel honored and respected. If a wife respects her husband as she should, he will feel loved and appreciated. It’s a win-win.

A man has a natural, inborn desire to go out and “conquer” the challenges of his world – to work and achieve.

Accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative with lots of love and respect in between.

When we speak before we think, we widen the chances the other person(s) will be notably hurt, frustrated, confused, angry, fearful, or offended by something we’ve communicated.

She’s not wrong for not being male. He is not wrong for not being female. When you put pink and blue together, you get purple, the color of royalty; the color of God. Together, a husband and wife reflect God’s image.

Avoid like the plague trying to punish each other as a means of “motivation.” Christ-followers instinctively know that this destroys any opportunity to act out of reverence for Christ. In all marital issues, love and reverence for Christ must be our primary motivation.

Your spouse may meet many of your needs, but your deepest dependency should be on your Lord.

It’s crucial to communicate with the right tone of voice and the right expression on your face.

“Respect is a man’s deepest value. I have had numerous men tell me, ‘I would rather live with a wife who respected me but did not love me than live with a wife who loved me but did not respect me.’ These men are not saying that they are indifferent to love. They know they need love, but they need to feel respected even more than they need to feel loved.“

So I encourage every husband and wife to commit to the Jesus Way of Talking. Instead of allowing the stress of the situation to control you, you can say to yourself, “Because I love the Lord and I know that He rewards every good word, I am going to be truthful even if my spouse is not. I will also be uplifting, forgiving, thankful and scriptural in my speech because my ultimate goal is to please the Lord. Whatever my spouse’s weaknesses or bad habits might be, I will not let them cause me to sin with my lips.”

Self-interest should never come ahead of your spouse’s interests.

Your spouse has a need only you can fill.

With a better understanding of God’s promises, you will be on your way to a renewed mind and a changed life.

[Husbands] the most powerful weapons you have are your ears. Just listen to your wife, and she is much more likely to feel understood.

When parents genuinely trust and follow the Lord and His ways, their faith spills over onto the children.

Money squabbles don’t undermine love and respect; they simply reveal unloving and disrespectful attitudes, which are the real reason why a marriage can start to wobble on the Crazy Cycle.

Do you bow to the influence of Hollywood or God’s Holy Word?

Before hitting send, ask yourself, "Have I listened carefully and understand the exact issue on the table?"

You must “ask God from the wealth of his glory to give you power through his Spirit to be strong in your inner selves.”

When one of you makes a mistake, control any anger you may feel and trust God completely, no matter what happens.

The Lord made women (Pink) and men (Blue) with differences, and He expects us to recognize and deal with those differences in a loving and respectful way.

Be quick to listen and understand and you have a much better chance of being understood.

Do you seek to understand or only to be understood?

Fight like a loving man and a respectful woman. Fight fair.

As mature men, we need to take leadership and put this out on the table. We must acknowledge our feelings- we need to feel respected. However, as we do this we must acknowledge our wife’s feelings- she needs to feel loved!

When you relinquish an offense, you need to send that offense somewhere. So follow Jesus’ example and release it to your heavenly Father.

Thank the Lord that in the very beginning He created them male and female – Blue and Pink. Ask Him for patience and ever-growing understanding of how men and women see and hear differently. “He created them male and female, and He blessed them.” (Genesis 5:2)

Marriage is a tool and a test to deepen and demonstrate your love and your reverence for Jesus Christ.

You have to become proactive, rather than just trying to stop the reactive.

To stay the course in speaking words of Love and Respect, keep your heart in Scripture, trusting in and talking about His promises to help you.

Your spouse can have a need that you don’t have and that’s okay.

Recognize your different gifts--how each of you (Pink and Blue) functions according to God’s perfect design.

When a husband feels disrespected, it is especially hard to love his wife. When a wife feels unloved, it is especially hard to respect her husband.

You can be right but wrong at the top of your voice.

Your husband knows you appreciate his desire to protect and provide when you praise his commitment to provide for you. You empathize when he reveals his male mindset about position, status, or rank at work.

A husband may deserve contempt, but that doesn’t win him any more than harshness and anger wins the heart of a woman.

Your wife feels you are open with her when you discuss financial concerns, possible job changes or ideas for your future.

Don’t conclude that your spouse is wrong when he/she is seeking to do the right and righteous thing.

Never give up. If you want to have a strong marriage, you need to accept temporary setbacks as part of the game.

Pink and Blue perceptions not only affect seeing, they affect hearing as well. Women hear with pink hearing aids and men hear with blue hearing aids. Even more important to understand as you and your spouse seek to gain better communication, you can hear the very same words, but each of you will hear different messages.

We fool ourselves into thinking the other person causes us to be the way we are. They really don’t! But if we lock into that idea, we become helpless, hopeless victims.

God designed the woman to love. He’s not going to command her to agape her husband when He created her to do that in the first place. God is not into redundancy.

No matter how difficult your spouse may be at the moment, your spouse does not have control over your reaction; you do. You may be experiencing disappointment, frustration or anger, but you always have a choice. A wife can choose to be disrespectful or respectful. A husband can choose to be unloving or loving.

A marriage relationship will be energized when couples learn how to motivate each other God’s way.

We send each other messages in “code” based on gender, even though we don’t intend to. What I say is not what you hear, and what you think you heard is not what I meant at all.

Most marriages will succeed when obeying the command to Love and Respect.

Focus on the positive in the midst of the negative, and the Energizing Cycle will keep right on humming.

Your position in Christ is what counts, not your less-than-perfect performance.

Do you believe that there is a God who really loves you and wants to help you?

There is a plan to parent God’s way, even when our children may seek to go their own way at time. The secret is to follow this plan regardless. When you do, I believe you succeed in His eyes.

Wives, you never know: The way you handle this [conflict] might bring your husband not only back to you, but to God. Husbands, you never know: The way you handle this [conflict] might bring your wife not only back to you, but to God. (1 Corinthians 7:16)

Through Jesus and Peter, God set forth His standard for living in the unconditional dimension: choose to be loving even when the other person is not; do what is right regardless of the treatment you receive. I believe this standard applies directly to marriage. A husband who speaks lovingly to his disrespectful wife will be rewarded; and a wife who speaks respectfully to her unloving, not-worthy-of-respect husband will be rewarded. Whether you are husband or wife, the reward is what can keep you going in the midst of the craziness: knowing that God commends you, knowing that you have found his favor for your words and actions.

It’s true that women have intuition and that men should listen to them. It’s also true that women have blind spots and need the insight of their husbands.

Clarifying is what you do before you step on your mate’s air hose and deflate his or her spirit. For example, you are having a typical conversation, but you can tell there is a misunderstanding. One of you isn’t being clear or isn’t hearing correctly. Then and there you clarify the misunderstanding before your spouse’s spirit deflates. You lovingly or respectfully clarify matters so that your spouse will not feel unloved or disrespected. The reason you take pains to clarify a seemingly small matter is to prevent the situation from becoming a love and respect issue that needs decoding. Clarifying is what you do to stay off the Crazy Cycle and keep positive, energetic feelings flowing between the two of you, to keep yourselves on the Energizing Cycle.

Always see your mate as an ally. Feedback is of little use if you see your spouse as an enemy. Giving and receiving constructive feedback is based on feelings of goodwill in both partners. Both of you need to remember that, even if you don’t always agree and even if you become irritated or angry, you are friends, and neither of you means to hurt the other.

When we feel crippling discouragement by the sinful choices and outcomes of our kids, we must not let this permanently deter us from parenting God’s way.

The Crazy Cycle is, indeed “the evil of folly and the foolishness of madness” (Ecclesiastes 7:25)

He will feel appreciated when you recognize his problem-solving approach as his male brand of empathy.

If we subscribe to the belief that because we are equal we are the same, then we’re going to expect our spouse to respond the way we do.

God’s commands are there to help us, not to hinder us or hold us back as male and female.

The difference between successful couples and unsuccessful couples is that successful ones keep getting up and dealing with the issues.

You cannot use unholy means to achieve a worthy end.

We get on the Crazy Cycle because without love a wife reacts without respect, and without respect a husband reacts without love.

Don’t label each other as bad because you differ on how you solve your troubles.

Do you give yourself grace and your spouse judgment?

Mistakes can’t be undone, but they can be forgiven.

When a husband feels disrespected, he has a natural tendency to react in ways that feel unloving to his wife. (Perhaps the command to love was given to him precisely for this reason!) When a wife feels unloved, she has a natural tendency to react in ways that feel disrespectful to her husband. (Perhaps the command to respect was given to her precisely for this reason!)

Positive changes flood a relationship immediately when both husband and wife cancel the blame game!

Women give a report to build rapport. Men bond through shoulder-to-shoulder activities without talking.

When a wife asks, “Do you love me?” She is not trying to put her husband on the spot. She is simply looking for reassurance.

If a husband chooses to be a peacemaker--taking the needs and concerns of his wife totally into account during any kind of argument or conflict--his wife will be motivated in turn to respond to his authority during stalemates.

The key to motivating another person is meeting their deepest need, especially during conflict.

Optimism or pessimism? It is always a choice, no matter what your natural temperament.

Thank God for His forgiveness of your mistakes. In trying to be a loving man or a respectful woman, we blow it. Owning up to mistakes is never easy, but it is always the way to move forward. Take good care not to accuse your spouse of mistakes as you pray. Also, pray about any forgiving to be done in the family, any forgiveness that needs to be asked. Children may need forgiveness (and what about Mom and Dad?). “There is no one on earth who does what is right all the time and never makes a mistake.” (Ecclesiastes 7:20)

[Husbands] as the church places her burdens on Christ, so a woman needs to place her burdens on her husband. When she shares with you, don’t assume she is asking you to solve the problem. Ask your wife, “Do you want a solution or a listening ear?”