A Measure of Loss
When change happens, there’s always an element of loss no matter how slight. When I left teaching, I lost my students. When I moved, I left friends behind. When I changed churches, I missed my brothers and sisters in Christ. And when I left a ministry where I worked, I missed the daily interaction of my former colleagues. Though each of these was a good change, a needed change, a healthy change, there was still an adjustment to be made.
In any kind of change, you are leaving behind the known and are expected to embrace the unknown. That’s not easy. It’s often scary. And it’s never comfortable. Every change brings a new direction, a new perspective, and if you let it, a greater faith. Yet every change also brings a measure of loss.
You lose independence and your singleness when you marry. You lose freedom, time, and all kinds of other things when you have a baby. Then, as that baby grows, each age and stage brings boatloads of changes, sometimes multiple times a day! No wonder a mother feels undone when her child enters school or a father freaks out when his daughter has her first date.
So when does change end? Never! The ancient philosopher, Heraclitus, accurately reminded us that, “Nothing is permanent except change.” So why do we have such a love/hate relationship with change? Because any change feels uncomfortable at best.
Whenever we are out of our comfort zone, it’s usually not fun. Something as simple as a snowstorm, a new school year, a bout of the flu, or a home remodeling project can send a family into transition, and the unexpected often takes us by surprise. Yet it’s how we handle that change is important to God and to those around us. After all, our children are watching, and they are learning how you deal with change, with loss, and with transition.
How have you dealt with change lately? I’d love to know.
Growing Together Spiritually
As this new year gets underway, it may be a good time to revisit your spiritual needs—individually and as a couple—and discuss how can each of you can help meet those needs. As we grow and mature, our needs often change, so it’s good to adjust to them accordingly.
First, if you haven’t already, find a church and commit to attend regularly. Next, be sure to pray together. For some, this isn’t easy, but start by saying a prayer before meals. Then you can learn to pray at other times and for other things—for safety on a trip, for God’s will, and for His plan for your marriage. If you’ve let either of these fall by the wayside, reignite your commitment to prayer and fellowship.
Third, plan to grow spiritually together. If you aren’t in one, find a Bible study or small group with other couples with whom you can “do life” together. If your church doesn’t have a group, start one!
Fourth, find another couple and ask them to mentor you. Meet with that couple every few weeks or monthly. Be honest, transparent, and inquisitive. Ask them how to deal with issues you’re encountering. Seek their advice on struggles you may have. And be accountable to them for your walk together as well as individually.
Fifth, but possibly the most important, maintain your covenant commitment to God and to each other. Choose, daily, to maintain and develop your walk with God through faithfully growing in His ways. It’s not always easy, but who expects that everything should be easy?
Finally, realize that, as you grow and mature spiritually, these needs will continue to change. Life is ever changing, and so is your spiritual life.
Adapted from The ReMarriage Adventure: Preparing for a Lifetime of Love & Happiness and Countdown for Couples: Preparing for the Adventure of Marriage. Copyright © 2012, all rights reserved.
Preparing for the Adventure of Change
It’s a new year, and I suspect there will be many changes in store for all of us—the good, the bad, and maybe even the ugly. Whether it’s in relationships, parenting, careers, schooling, church, moving, or more, each of us will likely face lots of changes in 2016. But how do we handle the changes that come our way?
I sure haven’t dealt with change perfectly. Sometimes I’ve done okay; other times I’ve dealt with a change rather pathetically. But, by God’s grace, I’ve always trusted that God truly had me on a great adventure. Somehow I understood that these times of change were just chapters in my bigger story, so I hung in there until I could turn the page.
Sometimes, I dug in my heels and merely endured it and, frankly, I didn’t learn the lessons that a situation was meant to teach me. Most of the time, though, I embraced the things that God brought my way and allowed the challenges and changes of life to transform, at least parts of me, into the woman he wants me to become. It’s rarely been easy, and I know that he’s not done with me yet.
Though change is a natural and normal part of life, it rarely feels natural or normal. So how do we handle change? When something changes, are we ready to walk through it, get to the other side, and set a good example for our children—or for anyone who is watching? Do we know how to maintain our integrity, our faith, our peace, and our joy, even when unexpected changes come our way? Change truly is an adventure, and it’s best to prepare for it as best we can.
What changes might you face this year? I’d love to know and will pray for you. Please leave a comment and stay in touch. Blessings!
Be-Attitudes for the New Year
Emotions, stress, expectations, and frustrations can easily find their way into the blending family life, so it’s important for you as a couple to try and address probable stressors ahead of time. Because our attitudes have a lot to do with our actions, here are eight be-attitudes that can help you manage your blending family emotions, attitudes, and decisions:
• Be positive: Prioritize what’s most important and why, and don’t sweat the small stuff. Tackle the mundane with a positive attitude and enthusiasm, even if it’s planning your new year resolutions. And be sure to model a positive attitude for your kids.
• Be unselfish: Pull your own weight. Don’t expect the other to do all—or even most—of the work. Do your fair share and don’t keep score if you feel you’re pulling more of the load at times. Especially as you look to the new year, this is a gift that keeps on giving.
• Be willing to use your skills and abilities: Use your strengths. If he’s a good cook and she’s a good organizer, go for it. Don’t feel tied to traditional duties—but use each other’s skills to your mutual benefit. And that should go for the kids, too!
• Be a team: Take on work as a team or “divide and conquer.” Just be sure to choose duties together and compromise peacefully when necessary. Model for your kids how to do this well.
• Be servants: Just as Jesus washed His disciples’ feet, serve each other—by doing something without the other knowing it or by making dinner when the other has had a tough day—serve with a true servant spirit.
• Be content: You know that there are always things to be done, but avoid becoming discontent and grumbling. Extra chores during the blending family adjustment season are a part of life, so be content with the transitions that come.
• Be adaptable to change: When one of you is sick or has too much on their plate, the other can pick up the slack. And show your kids that life is full of change and it’s best to have a be-autiful attitude about it.
• Be careful to use time management: We can always put off those mundane things, but they’ll just pile up and get worse. Manage your time so you can deal with things on a daily or weekly basis; this will keep your holiday schedules running more smoothly.
Adapted from The ReMarriage Adventure: Preparing for a Lifetime of Love & Happiness and Countdown for Couples: Preparing for the Adventure of Marriage. Copyright © 2012, all rights reserved.
Building Traditions That Bond
For blending families, there are a lot of “but we always did it this way” challenges that come during the Christmas season, whether it’s about food, gift giving, visiting and traveling, or even decorating. Younger children may adapt fairly easily to your new blending family Christmases, while older children may want everything the way it was and try to sabotage your holidays, your relationship, and the potential for creating a healthy blending family holiday—if you aren’t proactive in preparing for the holiday adventures.
One of the couples in our book, Tom and Megan, learned this the hard way. Since Megan moved into Tom’s home when they remarried, Tom’s kids had a hard time adjusting to any changes or renovations that happened in “their home”, even though they were adult kids living elsewhere! They even had expectations of having a Christmas tree in a certain place and continuing other family traditions, so they had to work through all that.
In hindsight, it would have been more proactive for Tom and Megan to discuss the reality that they were making a new home together but the kids would always be welcome. It would have also been important to get their kids input early on and understand their expectations and deal with them wisely. But they just didn’t know any of this would be such a big deal. So talking about the holidays ahead of time might have made an easier first Christmas for all of them.
The truth is, building new traditions that bond you together as a family can be difficult, but it’s well worth the effort. Whether expectations stem from gender, family culture, or individual personalities, or whether they come from your past histories, it’s important to know how they may affect your relationship and your holidays.
So be proactive. As a couple, talk about how you did things in the past, and then brainstorm how you might want to do things now. And be sure to talk to the kids about what’s most important for them.
Perhaps putting the tree in the same place is critically important to one child, or maybe it’s not a big deal at all. But unless you hear everyone’s hearts and decide what’s is reasonable and doable, it’s easy to hurt or offend others without even knowing it!
It might be best to gather everyone’s ideas, write them all down in order of importance, and then let each person choose one tradition that’s most important to him or her. But also consider finding one or two new traditions that are special and unique to your new blending family. God can use your holiday expectations to draw you closer, and you can build traditions that can bond you together.
Check out The ReMarriage Adventure: Preparing for a Lifetime of Love & Happiness and Countdown for Couples: Preparing for the Adventure of Marriage for more ways to strengthen your marriage. Copyright © 2012, all rights reserved.
When Christmases Clash
The Christmas season can reveal differences between the two of you that didn’t even know you had, and this time of year can even exacerbate the differences you already know you have. When you’re aware of your holiday differences, you can plan to balance them. One couple in our book, The ReMarriage Adventure, had to learn how to do just that.
Tom and Megan remarried and had six young adult children between them, but they had very different ways of interacting with their kids. Tom always did a lot of activities with his son and daughters, but Megan always had a lot of relational talk time with her three girls. The girls also played games, watched movies, and went on walks together.
So when all of them got together for the holidays, there were glaring differences in what they wanted to do. It was hard to spend quality time together when they were so different, but Tom and Megan had to figure out how to find a balance and help the kids adjust to their new blending family.
They all had to compromise—a lot—and it wasn’t easy. Yet Tom and Megan were determined to create holiday memories that were positive for all of them. But how could they make it work?
Tom and Megan discovered that, more than any other Bible passage, Ephesians 4:2-3 could help them make their holiday differences draw them together instead of apart. This scripture reminds us to “Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.”
Here’s how we all can apply it to our holiday relationships:
Be humble. Realize that your way of doing things may not always be the best way. Your mate’s way or your kids’ way may not be either. Whether it’s how to decorate, what gifts to buy, what Christmas cookies to make, or where to visit on Christmas day, sometimes it’s best to find a new way to do something, especially during the holidays.
Be gentle. When a difference makes you crazy, be gentle as you discuss it. Remember that differences are a part of the ones you love, and your relationships are much more important than the way you do something. Holiday expectations run deep and there are a lot of emotional attachments to them.
Be patient. You are on a lifelong journey of learning and growing together. Sometimes you just need to learn to live with that difference—you “bear with it” as the Scripture says. But that also doesn’t mean you grudgingly put up with it and make the person feel bad about that difference. Instead, you love him or her in spite of it.
Keep the unity and peace. Differences can make you feel disunited and steal the peace in your relationship, if you let them. Trust God’s Spirit to help you find peace when differences want to tear you apart.
Most of all, be sensitive and recognize that some of your differences are actually blessings in disguise. It’s all in your perspective and the way you choose to view the differences you do have. And as you model Ephesians 4 as a couple, you will help your kids learn how to live it out too.
Check out The ReMarriage Adventure: Preparing for a Lifetime of Love & Happiness and Countdown for Couples: Preparing for the Adventure of Marriage for more ways to strengthen your marriage. Copyright © 2012, all rights reserved.