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It’s funny how we have so many misconceptions throughout our lives. The older we get, the more we learn. The more we learn the more we know we don’t know.

I often joke about how someday I will have learned so much, I won’t know anything at all.

I also poke fun at my marriage in similar ways. It is a familiar question to ask someone you don’t see every day, “How are you doing?” Or, “How’s it going?” I commonly respond to this with something like: “Fine. Well. . . I think I’m doing fine. I haven’t talked to my wife yet today. Sometimes when I think I’m doing fine, she’ll let me know I’m mistaken.”

Little quips like this are fun to play with and usually harmless. Many of us tend to develop a number of such quips that we use to avoid a serious conversation. Usually because we are too lazy to really get to know someone, as if we needed another person in our lives to worry about.

So, we go about our lives with a set of superficial relationships with their respective superficial interactions. It’s not that we don’t care about people. It’s that we care TOO much, and don’t need another person’s problems tearing at our hearts. At least that’s what we tell ourselves. It’s probably closer to the truth that we are so selfish, we don’t want someone interfering with our life. Maybe it’s in between the two extremes. Let your own guilt trip tell you where you’re at.

Anyway, I’ve noticed how easy it is to develop a crust over our true selves. Sometimes it happens because we’ve been hurt. But, it can also happen because we have filled our time up with being busy. Between work, home responsibilities, TV time, computer time, and personal time, we don’t have time for relationships.

Now, this is tough enough when it comes to people outside our inner circle. The problem with many of us is that it is creeping in on our inner circle as well. Worse, it is becoming the definition of our generation. We don’t have time for others. We don’ have time for our family. And, we don’t have time for our spouse.

A while back, my wife’s and my friend married after many years of living single. A few weeks ago, she sent an email out to her entire address book with a change of email notice. That’s all fine, but she went on and on about how special her man was, how she changed her name, and wasn’t it so-o-o special how she changed her email to the absolutely perfect man’s name. She had changed her email to MRS.HisLastName@her.net and it was so scrumptious and sweet and—-my goodness, it was just stinking and reeking of sweetness over-full of giddy, puppy-like love. For crying out loud! Wasn’t she old enough to be past that!?

Shortly after, I realized how sad it was that any of us ‘get past that.’ I talk an awful lot about relationships. And, here was an example of what mine could be [it once was]. And, I was tromping it down in my mind as silly.

Well, we should all be so silly. I’m gonna open my wife’s car door all the time from now on. Even when we’re in my old beat up pick up truck, and it doesn’t seem as appropriate.

Anyway, you do it too. Do what it takes to keep your spouse feeling special. And, it wouldn’t hurt all of us to scrape away a little of the crust we have to reveal softer hearts toward others in our lives as well. We may find there’s a few folks out there that would make some really good friends.

Regards.

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Change the following little story around however you wish. Has the following kind of argument ever happened in your house?

“You never help with the dishes.”
“You know I’m too clumsy to do dishes without breaking them. Besides, I mow the lawn.”
“Aww, ‘Bo Hoo’, you mow the lawn. That’s only in the summer, and that’s only once a week!
I do the laundry, vacuum the house, get the groceries, do the bills . . .”
“Shut UP!!”
“I pull my weight around here. Who took your car to the garage–Huh? Who hung the ceiling fan? Who makes the most mon–”
“—you had it running back wards for three weeks before my father came and straightened it out!”
“Oh, bring your stupid father into thi–”
“STUPID FATHER!?”
Blah, blah, blah————–

Regretfully, most of us have experienced this or something like it. This is a disaster about to happen in any relationship.

It is a relationship built on reward. Like it or not, this is the foundation all such relationships are built on: “I’ll love you if you give me what I want.”

What happens? Eventually, in any relationship like this, you won’t get what you want. All such relationships end up in one of two ways: Either they break up, or they live in separate compartments of existence in the same house–mostly linked together by the kids, common responsibilities, or just plain dogged commitment to keep it together. Neither condition is happy. Both partners in such a relationship are constantly wishing for something else. They abide the other partner, but that is the extent of it.

Such relationships find happiness in the kids, other friends, the house [and stuff], future goals, and the dreams of what will be [which will never be].

Did you hear about the guy who won the lottery and ran straight home. He got there and excitedly told his wife to pack her bags:
“Pack your bags, I’ve won the lottery!!”
“Should I pack for warm or cold weather,” she responded.
“I don’t care,” he retorted. “–As long as you’re out by tomorrow!”

That is funny, in a sick sort of way. But, the fact of the matter is that the underlying ‘funny’ part of it is that it is so descriptive of many relationships. And worse yet, that it at least touches our understanding of things in such a way that we understand where it is coming from; we are able to see it; And it becomes funny in that understanding. In other words: it’s funny because it’s a reality we have all seen, and many are experiencing or have experienced (not the lottery part, but the relationship). Since he has won the lottery, he doesn’t have to put up with this stupid, unhappy life he has been living.

Why would we all hold to the dream of a relationship out there somewhere that is completely fulfilling to us while so many of us live trapped lives–apparently having missed the dream?

It’s because we live in a reward oriented world.

We work for REWARD.
We get education for REWARD.
We obey for REWARD.
We play for REWARD.

Consequently, we are SO reward driven that:
We have friends for REWARD. And, we love for REWARD.

The honest truth of the matter is, we do it for what is in it for us.

Well, today, I’m going to tell you who to blame for our messed up, reward oriented way of living.

It’s the fault of the kindergarten teacher.

What did the kindergarten teacher do when you did anything the right way?

The teacher put a star on your chart!!

This was even reinforced with great ceremony. “Yaaay, everyone. Joey got a star on his chart!! He is only two stars behind Sara. Sara is so wonderful. Sara has more stars than anyone else. Yaaay for Sara!!”

Consequently, we all learned to live our lives for stars on our chart, and jewels on our crown.

You didn’t have a kindergarten teacher? It doesn’t matter. We were all treated like little dogs from the first day we began our training. Do the right thing, get a reward. Do the wrong thing, get punished or lose reward.

It becomes such a base component of how we interact with the world and others that we simply can’t bridge the gap into the selfless kind of living it takes to break open the relationship of our dreams.

You know that you have heard all your lives that good relationships are a 50/50 proposition. I call that a fair trade relationship. Believe me, a fair trade relationship might work with an employer, but, it will never work in a loving relationship. Any such relationship is headed for a YOU DO, I DO argument or set of rules.

How do you break out of a life time of selfish, reward based living? Understand this. If you don’t, then you are doomed to live in a very dismal relationship. And if you think you have a good relationship living in such a set of rules, you are missing out on life itself. You are to be pitied.

So, how DO you break out?

First of all, it won’t be easy. Nothing worth while ever seems to be easy.

You got where you are in life developing habits and living certain ways that rewarded you and by avoiding punishment. And it has been reinforced for all the years of your life. We are like monkeys that have learned to open one door for food, but not open one that shocks us. The way we are is deep-seated into our very fiber.

I’m going to tell you something that may break your heart. I don’t intend it to break your heart. I intend it to challenge you into the greatest journey you may have ever taken. It is this:

Dating services, counselors, parents, friends, common understanding, and all such helps in finding a mate will tell us to find a person with similar likes and dislikes. Don’t get me wrong in what I am about to say. I fully believe it is fun and makes for smoother living when we share likes and dislikes in relationships. But do you know why this is placed at such a high position in the things to look for in a mate? It is because most, yes MOST, relationships will never get past rewards based living. They can develop lasting, very meaningful, very fulfilling relationships, this it true. BUT, I am telling you right now that there is a place you can go. There is a place you can discover. There is a challenge that, when accepted, will take you into a relationship with your partner that is the greatest experience life can bring. Only spiritual things are this great, and this kind of relationship–this kind of love–actually becomes equal to such things.

Do NOT miss out on the greatest experience of love with your partner you could possibly ever have.

A fair trade relationship can be good. It can be wonderful. It can be fulfilling. It can last a life time. If this is all you want, fine. That’s not bad in the scope of things.

However, if you want to taste the sweetness of the sweetest fruit. If you want to bask in the refreshing intoxicant of true love, then you must accept the challenge to bridge the gap. You have to step into the world that isn’t rewards based where your lover is concerned.

It’s hard for all of us. But it is where we will finally thrive and revive from the dismal of all else when we finally taste it. And, the funny irony of it is that it has the greatest REWARD of all!!

It begins with placing the needs of our partner first. It is expressed in selfless acts of kindness, of self removal, and of pure desire for the best for our partner.

It is harder when only one gets the picture I’m painting here. It is difficult to step back when your partner is still operating in the world of selfishness and reward. But, trust me, they won’t be able to do it long. No, this kind of selflessness finds the same response in your partner.

It may take a while if you are in a harsher relationship. And, I WILL say, there are some relationships that have gone too far for repair–especially those with physical abuse. But, take the challenge. You will be surprised. You will be astounded.

What do you have to lose?

Well, only you can do this. Let me tell you that you CAN have the relationship of your dreams. You CAN live the life you always thought was out there, but couldn’t quite capture. You can experience the giddy, silly places of love that you thought were only in puppy love. And you can have it with the one you have.

Do it.

Do it now.

Regards.

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What I’m about to share with you must be kept in the strictest confidence. If you cannot agree to keep quiet, then you must stop reading at this point. Seriously, I could get in a lot of trouble for years to come for sharing this openly.

You are sworn to silence.

This is something that has been hidden by all men for generations. In fact, you can’t tell anyone you know this, and especially can’t tell anyone you got it from me. I could be hunted and killed like a snake. Which is what the men reading this will think I am.

Yes, I will be labeled a traitor.

Anyway, Do you remember when you first got married, how you walked in on your husband when he was doing laundry?

I know this is like asking you to go to the library and sort through all the microfiche or dig through all the newspaper archives. But if you give it some effort, I’ll bet you can remember your man actually putting some clothes in a washer at least once.

What you likely didn’t know, until this betrayal, was that he had been waiting there for quite some time for you to walk in and see him. He might have even been making some noise to attract you into the laundry room. At the very least, he worked hard to make sure you were seeing him in the process of putting the clothes in the washer at just the right time to catch him.

OK, so you may feel that this is much to do about nothing. Well, that is where you are mistaken.

This is, and has been for 3 generations, actually since the late 1940’s, a closely guarded secret with sworn silence. The young men returning from World War II had all been involved in this–actually indoctrinated. It began with high-ranking marines and filtered its way through to every branch of the military. In fact, this wasn’t just an American phenomenon. It made it’s way through the ranks of all the allied troops. In fact, you’ll find much higher, more polished forms of this in Great Britain–albeit some Canadian forms, while somewhat obscure, are well refined.

Men train up their sons in this religiously. In fact, I’m almost compelled by the shear force of revere and brotherhood to break off this discloser at once.

For you women out there that really believe your husband is truly stupid about washing clothes, I have news for you. We really know what colors not to mix. Come on. Think about it. Only and idiot wouldn’t know this. Do you think for half a second that our putting the reds and whites together wasn’t a carefully calculated plan to never have to help with laundry again?

Ok guys. I’m truly sorry. But 3 generations of this distortion of truth just had to be set right. I’m to be pitied for being the one to do it–I know.

Well, I’m a bit taken back as to whether I should share the whole of it or not . . .

Oh, why not. Let’s just make a clean sweep of it, while we’re at it.

I know you ladies have had the pleasure, be it a rare pleasure, of finding your man doing the dishes (sorry guys). This is more of the same, but with a different twist.

This behavior actually didn’t develop until the wide spread use of automatic dishwashers. It has two forms.

The first form is related to the laundry event. It has the same goal, namely: to never have to help with dishes again.

It usually expresses itself in dropping one of the more noisy pieces of the finer silverware. It is done in a fashion designed to attract the most attention. The door of the dishwasher is wide open with all the rest, that could be fit, of the china and silverware in the dishwasher. “Oh dear.” is the intended spousal response. Yes, “oh dear.”

Oh dear, and Voila! No more dishes for such and ignorant man.

Now the second form this behavior has exhibited is expressed in attention just the same, but attention for another purpose. It takes the form of filling the dishwasher with all the dirty dishes, but, instead of removing the chore from the man’s list of things he can do, is designed to be raised as a memorial to the man’s help and support of his darling wife. This will sometimes be done prior to a request for getting a computer or some other thing he wants, but it is often used just to get points for later use as well.

This second form, while not quite as malevolent as the first, can be quite devious. Especially when one considers that the man may have had the dishwasher loaded for the better part of a day waiting for the wife to be in just the right spot at just the right time for the greatest impact.

Well, there. You have it. I may have just signed my own death warrant, but right is right. Now, I can go to bed with a clear conscience. One of the first in over 60 years of keeping such a thing from our women.

Forgive me.

Regards.

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What I am about to share with you could save your marriage or relationship. 

For you men out there, this might hurt. It might even make you feel a little like gagging. Believe me. The payback is tremendous. You will want to make sure you take steps in your life to follow the instruction I give you here to the best of your ability.    

I know there is no surprise when someone says that women are in control. That is why I am about to really burst your bubble. 

The truth of the matter is this: the man is in control of the happiness in a marriage. OK, ok. I won’t argue the finer points of who wears the pants. I’m just telling you that the sooner you realize that you as the man control the level of happiness in your relationship, the better off you’ll be. AND, the sooner you’ll see a shift in the one you love, when you put to practice the steps for real love to grow. 

A few weeks ago, my wife and I were returning from some busy thing in our lives that I can’t remember. It was very cold outside, being the dead of winter. We were in her car, and the oil light had come on. So we pulled into the convenient store around the corner of our house for me to go in and get some oil. As we pulled in, I asked if she needed gas while we were there. 

“Sure,” she responded. “That would save me having to do it in the cold.” 

So, I filled her car up and opened the hood to check the oil level. When I went in to pay for the gas and get a quart of oil, I noticed they had some clipped roses packed as singles by the counter. 

Now, pay attention to this. This was an opportunity. You want to practice seeing and recognizing opportunities like this. This is critical to maintaining and developing a thriving relationship where the right kind of sparks fly. Earlier in our marriage, I used to allow most of the opportunities to pass me by. Don’t make the same mistake in your marriage. Making the most out of every opportunity to make your wife feel special will make all the difference between happiness and dullness. And when your wife feels special, you can count on it. You’ll be treated special and the happiness will ignite all kinds of little rewards that go both directions in your relationship.   

You guessed it. I bought her a rose. 

But, you can still ruin the whole thing if you don’t get it right at this point. I didn’t just tromp back out to the car with my oil in one hand and a rose in the other. NO, that just won’t do. I carefully placed the rose inside my coat and walked out as if nothing was special at all. I put the oil in the car, closed the hood, and tossed the empty container in the trash all without event. 

Then, I walked to her car door and motioned for her to open her window as if to tell her something that couldn’t happen in the car. The moment she opened the window, with all the skill and grace of a Robin Hood wielding his sword, I stooped and kissed her before she could realize what was happening, pulled the rose from my coat and very, very sweetly–almost whispered, but with great conviction–told her, “I love you.” 

Now, have you ever seen a woman melt? Trust me in this. This will make her melt right before your very eyes. This is guaranteed.   

OK, now the men out there that are gagging right now can continue down the dismal road of a marriage that has lost all of its pizzazz and mystery. Remember, you are making your own road. In deed, you are in control of happiness in your marriage. 

Do you ever find yourself thinking of your life in a different set of circumstances with longing in your heart for things to be different? This is one of the main signs of a lack of happiness. I’m telling you it is under your control. If you keep feeding dreams that shouldn’t be, then you will destroy what you have and likely never get what you were dreaming about either. You’ll be left with nothing.   

Romance doesn’t just happen. No. That’s called lust. You have to practice romance. It’s an art with great rewards. Understand this. No amount of romance, no amount of sweetness, no effort of any kind can fix what you hurt with harsh words spoken in anger or spite to the one you love. Harsh words cut to the depth of the soul. They destroy utterly and completely. They can be forgiven, but they will never heal without leaving a mark.   

Do not ever get into the you-hurt-me-I’ll-hurt-you syndrome. First of all, you’re a selfish baby if you do. Secondly, a relationship built on being compelled to do what the other partner wants in order to avoid being treated in this childish manner will never last. The cycle has to stop somewhere. Always be quick to say you’re sorry. 

Now here’s a hard one for all of us. But, this is possibly the strongest remedy for the tough times in any relationship.   

Be willing to be wrong. 

I’m not talking about some pitiful act. This isn’t a feel sorry for me quest for patronage. I’m talking about a life changing humility that is actually WILLING to be wrong.   

You’ll find most the situations that come your way, which could go badly, will never materialize if you live life with this kind of attitude. This isn’t just true in your relationship. 

Finally, before I go, NEVER ever never get into a fair trade relationship. “You do this. I’ll do that.” Or, as it usually goes: “I would do that if YOU would do this!”  That is a dead end. It doesn’t work. It never has worked. It never will work.    

You have heard it said that marriage is a 50/50 proposition. Well, I’m here to tell you ”that’s stupid.” That’s a formula for failure from the beginning. That’s a fair trade relationship. 

Remember this: A marriage is a 100/100 proposition—each giving to the other without expecting anything in return. And, the beauty of it is that both get blessed with happiness.   

So, remember. You’re in complete control of happiness in your relationship. Never let the romance die. Practice romance. Give 100%. It’s worth it. 

Regards. 

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