love and respect - Ashley Zin

I usually would never title a post with such a serious name. I am always skeptical when I read an all-encompassing title such as this one. I’m skeptical because well, how could another person possibly know what is the most important thing for my marriage. Whatever they’re thinking probably is the most important thing for their marriage, but certainly can’t be for every marriage. So if that’s what you’re thinking, I will encourage you to keep reading. I think you will agree with me on this one. And even if you don’t believe it’s THE most important thing to remember, I am convinced that you will at least agree that is in the top three most important things to remember when it comes to a healthy marriage, and will understand why I named it the most important thing for a marriage.

I actually read this little bit of advice from a book, Love and Respect. (I actually did a book review on it a few years ago, so if you’re interested you can check that out here. It is definitely one of my favorite marriage books. It really opens your eyes to what a husband or wife really needs from their spouse.)

The most important marriage advice I’ve heard is to remember that your husband (or wife) is a good-willed person, specifically when they do something that hurts you. Remind yourself that he loves you, and whatever he did to make you upset doesn’t change that. Also remember that whatever it was, he did not purposely do it just to hurt you. He might not have even known that it did hurt you.

I think this might be better shown through an example. Let’s say you ask your husband to take out the garbage the following morning, and he forgets. And let’s also say that you guys have been going through a harder season where it feels like he seems to forget a lot of things that you ask him to do lately. I think it can be so easy to jump straight to the conclusion that he keeps forgetting to do these things because he doesn’t care about you. (I am always very quick to jump to this conclusion.) This is when it’s important to remember that your husband is a good-willed person. Remind yourself that while it may be easy to think that he did this because he doesn’t care about you, he more likely didn’t do it because he forgot, and that’s it. I think it’s also helpful to remind yourself in this moment of the last thoughtful thing your husband did for you so that you don’t jump to the conclusion that he doesn’t care. Dwell on the reason why you know he cares.

While I’m not saying that this will just make everything better. It still might make you upset or angry, and I am not saying that those feelings are wrong or not justified. I just think it’s important not to run with those feelings. Once we start believing that our husbands do not care for us, we get into very dangerous waters. I believe if we start thinking that they don’t care, that’s when the foundation of your relationship starts breaking down and it can only get worse from there. Without trust there is no relationship. We really need to be able to trust our husbands for us to be able to work out issues or for our relationship to thrive.

Please note that I do recognize that this may not be true for every relationship and that I am aware that there are abusive relationships where this basic truth does not apply. If you are in a relationship and you do not feel that this is true, and you do not feel that your husband genuinely cares for you or know that he does things to purposely hurt you, please think about seeking help. You do not deserve to be in a relationship that is hurtful or abusive.

I really like to read but never really make as much time for it as I wish I did. Over the past few months though I have been reading more than I normally do and I love it! The most recent book that I finished is called Love and Respect by Emerson Eggerichs and it was amazing. I first got the idea to read it off of another blogger who suggested it and I’m really glad I did- it taught me soo much. If you are someone who is in a committed relationship leading towards marriage, engaged, or even married I highly suggest you read this book.

The book is broken up into three different parts and I want to just recap each part for you guys to see if maybe this is a book you might be interested in. The three parts were called: The Crazy Cycle, The Energizing Cycle, and The Rewarding Cycle

T H E C R A Z Y C Y C L E

In what Emerson calls “The Crazy Cycle” he explains how men and women are very different in the way that they see the world and what they want from the world. He explains how God created men to desire respect above all else and for women to desire love. We see everything based off of these desires and whether or not we are receiving these desires. He also explained how when women are not receiving love the way they react comes off as disrespectful to a man, and when men are not receiving respect the reactions they have come across as unloving to a woman. Even if neither the man or woman mean for the reactions to come across as unloving or disrespectful, Emerson explains that these natural reactions are just picked up by the opposite gender as this way. So this is what he refers to “The Crazy Cycle” because when a wive senses her husband is being unloving, she reacts in a disrespectful way which causes her husband to react in an unloving way and it just becomes a cycle of messiness. Emerson writes about ways to identify what type of signal you might be giving off so that you can be aware and stop the crazy cycle.

T H E E N E R G I Z I N G C Y C L E

The Energizing Cycle is the part where Emerson breaks down the needs of a man and woman and specifically writes out how a husband or wife can meet these needs. He calls this the energizing cycle because this keeps the couple in harmony because each spouse is meeting each other’s deepest need. Obviously we are still sinful people so this never works perfectly but it is super helpful. I never really exactly understood how to show respect or what Tommy really needed from me until I read this book. It opened my eyes to a lot of ways I can love and support him better.

T H E R E W A R D I N G C Y C L E

The Rewarding Cycle is what makes all of this important. Emerson explains how none of this would really matter if we were just doing this for ourselves or to get what we want from our spouses. He isn’t even good enough to just do it to make our spouses happy. Emerson explains that this is all important because it is what God commands from a husband and wife. Ephesians 5:33 says “However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.” Emerson explains that when we obey God in this way it gives Him the ability to work in our marriages and gives Him the most glory.

This book I thought was going to be an easy read but ended up taking much longer than I imagined but this was because it has so much information to get from it. It’s filled with knowledge that I wanted so desperately to soak up every word of it. I lent it to Tommy to read but it is definitely a book that I will probably read over and over because it was so helpful. If you are interested in how to love your significant other better and in a way that will most naturally appeal to them then I highly suggest this book!

The Most Important Thing To Remember In Your Marriage

Love and Respect: A Book Review