Hello and welcome back to another episode of Upfront and Undivided with Luke and Dean'na.
Hi.
Hi babe.
How's it going?
You were doing the equipped man and upfront and undivided voice all at the same time.
Was I?
That was fantastic.
I'm sorry.
No, don't apologize.
I'm just like, whoa, where are we going?
I'm not making, I'm sorry babe.
I'm not making fun of you.
No, I know.
If anybody has ever heard my husband's other podcast, he drops an octave.
It's pretty intense.
I'm talking to guys.
It's really good.
Yeah.
Do I do that though with the girls?
A little bit.
Do I?
I go a little higher.
Yep.
Do I?
It's because I'm talking to two other females.
We've talked about this.
If you want to dominate a conversation as a dude, you drop low.
If you want to try to dominate a conversation as a girl, you go as high as you can.
It's like we're puppies.
It's not even so much, I wouldn't even say so much dominate a conversation.
Just to be heard.
To make your point.
Make your point.
That's a good way of saying it.
When people are trying to make their point is when that inflection really comes into
play.
I like that.
No, I like that.
That's a lot better than what I was trying to say.
Me and my besties, we don't try to dominate conversations.
We do have three totally different tones.
You being our sound guy.
Even Heather, who normally is- She's our low key.
Our low to mid.
Even when she's just with the two of you, she does get higher.
She does get higher.
Brighter.
Her face gets brighter.
Yes.
That's fun.
Yeah.
Okay.
Well, Heather, there you go.
Yeah.
Because she listens to us, which is nice.
She does.
Thanks.
Yeah.
We missed last week, right?
We did miss last week.
Okay.
Have we talked to everybody since we've been back from Thanksgiving?
Since we gave them that speech of, hey, don't be a douche.
Be a great person.
Love the people that are around you where they are and have lots of really great food?
I don't think we did here, but we just did.
There you go.
Yeah.
We do.
We hope you guys had a great Thanksgiving.
We hope that- Oh, no.
We did do a little bit of Thanksgiving.
Did we?
On our last episode.
Yeah.
Did we?
But we didn't do the week right after we got back from our trip.
That's right.
That's what we didn't do.
So we did the Thanksgiving prep, if you will.
Have a great Thanksgiving.
Well, yeah.
We were telling everybody to be nice and not be knuckleheads.
Right.
Yeah.
So we did the Thanksgiving prep.
We just didn't do the Thanksgiving debrief, if you will.
I see.
The after action report, as some would say.
The after action report.
I like that.
It was good.
Yeah.
Our Thanksgiving was good.
We've had an opportunity to kind of be home for a couple weeks now, which has been nice.
It's always nice.
A week?
Just a week?
It's been a week.
Is it really?
Yes.
Are you sure?
Yes.
Okay.
No, you're right.
Yeah.
That's why we need video.
My head just tilted.
My brain just shut down.
No, it's good.
And we're moving into December.
But it was good.
It's good to be home.
Yeah.
We got a chance to see...
It was low key.
Yeah.
That's the best way that you keep saying it, which is really sweet.
Because we're so used to...
See, guys, I come from a fairly big family.
Not like a monster family, but we're a good size.
I would say we're a good size.
I've got brothers that have families, that have kids, that have families, or that have
children.
I mean, one of your brothers is a grandpa.
He is a grandpa.
Yeah.
Two of my brothers are grandpas.
And then third one, he's got a son.
Well, see, I was going to go into the...
The fact that it's like...
Because you've got...
And then I also have sisters.
You've got siblings.
You've got halves.
You've got steps.
You've got...
Yeah.
That's what helps make your family so really big.
That's why I'm a big family.
I am one of 11.
I am the baby of all of them.
It is.
It's hers.
They don't have any theirs.
Neither one of my parents, the spouses, my step family, they didn't procreate.
That sounded weird.
But...
Your mom and stepdad did not procreate.
They didn't procreate.
Yeah.
Together.
Neither did my dad or my stepmom.
Right.
And so, but we've got the...
So we've got the steps.
We've got the full.
And then we've got the half because my dad was married before he married my mom.
And I have two brothers from there.
And then I just got a boatload of people.
But we're never really...
We're never under the same house as far as never the same roof.
It was funny because when we were in the kitchen with my sister, my step sister, but we just
say sister because she's been...
We've been family since we were nine or since I was nine.
So that's a long time.
That's almost 40 years if that tells everybody my age.
And so you finally just drop off those names.
You don't do the step or the half.
Because we even do that with our kids.
It's, no, your siblings, your brother and sister.
There's no half about it.
I mean, yes, you do look different.
But the fact is that, listen, we're family.
And then we've got friends that we've adopted along the way because I've got an adopted
sister that my dad...
And she basically adopted my stepdad who is...
So she's now...
I don't see how does that work?
And then you've got the family from the adoption of Charlie and Karen.
From Charlie and Karen.
And it's like...
And that large family.
It's just...
I say all that to say, because this has nothing...
Actually nothing to do with what we're about to talk about.
No.
But I think it just shows the beauty of what our God can do.
Even in the midst of unfortunate...
I mean, obviously divorce is what created that.
But even in the midst of what could be destruction, I'm really grateful that I've got siblings
that have said, irregardless of what our parents have done or not done or together or not together,
we're still gonna be kind.
We're still gonna be respectful.
We're still gonna love each other.
Even if we never ever really see each other much at all, if ever again.
But the fact that I've got incredibly sweet fond memories growing up with my blended family.
And I tell people a lot, our family included, just appreciate who you have in front of you
in this moment.
Because God has entrusted this person, whether it's for a season or for a lifetime, the fact
is that you get to love this person in a space that only you can love.
And that can only be...
Yeah, I said it.
So it just sounded funny.
Yeah, I get it.
But it was neat.
It was neat because I was trying to recount a time back when we were kids and we all lived
in a trailer.
And we were in Texas, San Antonio area.
And there were five of us, all on...
Five of us kids all on one roof.
Plus my mom and stepdad.
And we were sharing a three bedroom trailer.
And I'm just, you know, I'm grateful.
I'm grateful that even in the hard, even in the stupid, even in the dumb, when we were
fighting like cats and dogs and being idiots, that we all have grown up in this really neat
space because the next one above is six years older than me.
So there's a little bit of a gap.
But you wouldn't be able to tell it now.
We come into contact with each other and it's like we just saw each other yesterday.
So it's a treasure.
So I hope you guys had a beautiful Thanksgiving.
We hope you guys did.
And y'all just keep praying for Luke because he does.
He has to deal with my very, very, very big family.
But he blends in beautifully.
I try.
You really do.
I try to hold my own.
I think you do really well.
And when it gets too much, you just go onto the front porch and you sit.
He's mad at us.
He just wants quiet.
Decompress.
So, babe, that kind of just walks us into our topic.
Our topic this week, this episode.
Yes.
We're calling it Decompressing Avenue.
I like that.
Thanks.
That's catchy.
Decompressing Avenue.
Yeah.
Take you down to Decompressing Avenue.
See, in my mind, I almost wanted to go to the Schoolhouse Rock.
The Conjunction Junction.
Oh, yeah.
That's kind of where I was going with it.
I mean, it doesn't matter.
I was trying to think of something really cool and it just came out of Decompressing
Avenue.
I know you are.
You're welcome.
Then I'll wake you up and say, all right, we need a chorus now.
All right, babe, so talk about it.
What does that mean?
So this kind of came about because we were having a conversation with some friends of
ours and a couple other couples and talks with ourselves, amongst ourselves.
Kind of it came about with, I know in the past, we've talked about the difference of
introvert versus extrovert versus ambivert.
What do you do to quote unquote charge your batteries, either after or before a social
interaction or an event or after a long day, how do you recharge your social battery or
something or whatever?
So it's like we've kind of talked about that, but then this conversation of, okay, that's
cool how you recharge your batteries, but what if it has been a big stressful day?
How do you decompress?
Yeah.
And in some ways it's similar, but in some ways it's completely different.
Because one of the revelations that I had was in some ways you need to, it almost seems
like you want to do the opposite of what your day has been.
Because one of the examples that I used or a couple of the examples that I used when
we were talking this over was four out of five days a week, I'm sitting here in the
basement by myself, even the days, and then there's the days where it's like Sebastian's
at school, Gabriel's at work, you're at work or cleaning or doing all your stuff.
So it's like I'm literally in the house all by myself for eight hours.
And it's like, okay.
So all of a sudden it's like my decompression after a stressful day like that, it's like,
okay, I want to go out, I want to be around people, I want to talk, I want to do things.
You're like, you want to go to the grocery store?
Do we need to go out and get anything?
And I'm like, dear God, I just want to go home and I just want to be still.
And then the days where, especially when you were doing full time at the high school as
a health teacher, those chaotic days where it was like all the students were asking the
questions and wanted to go to the places and it felt like...
Because I was health and gym teacher.
That takes...
You're on a constant pivot just throughout the day.
And so to decompress from all that chaos overflowing, you were like, I want to find a little cave,
wrap myself in a blanket, start a fire.
I'm pretty certain you found me on the floor in my closet.
I have.
I was just laying there a time or two.
And it wasn't...
Now there's some times I was crying.
But yeah, it's just usually just, I just need silence.
But it is.
And then it's those times of...
It's like when you want to come together, but yet you also want to decompress.
And sometimes the decompression isn't very conducive to you two coming together.
Sometimes I like to...
Even at the gym.
That's a really bad example.
Because I like to listen to heavy music and it's like, but you like to listen to heavy
worship music.
So it's like, we're both listening to heavy, fast paced music.
We're just not very talkative at the gym because we're listening to our intense music while
we're intensely working out.
But sometimes when I'm coming home from the office, I'm in the car by myself and I've
got the music loud and I'm just going.
But then there are other times where it's like, I just want to be quiet.
I went the music down, I want to chat or something.
And it's like, if you're at the point where you need to decompress with loud music and
I'm at the point where I need to decompress with quiet and chatting.
Yeah.
And we're in the same car.
Right.
And what do you do?
Right.
What do you do?
Wow.
And it's...
Yeah.
So it's not...
There's not going to be a one answer for this.
There's not going to be all of a sudden at minute mark 24 and 32 seconds, there's the
magical answer.
Because there's not going to be an answer for this.
I mean, it's going to be based off of the personality and the couples and who they are.
It is.
Yeah.
I would say...
So this might be one of these spaces, I'm going to assume, one of those spaces where
you and I get to maybe tell people what we do in those kind of moments.
Yeah.
I will...I think about our trip, right?
Our trips usually.
And a lot of days on our trips, that didn't make sense, but that makes sense.
I'll just go for the one that we had for Thanksgiving, right?
Okay.
So we're talking like a big trip.
Yeah.
So there's four of us in a car.
Yes.
And we have truly different personalities that have four different desires and God bless
them tiny little bladders and four different size bladders.
But the point is when we are driving, you've got four different ways of going about it,
right?
You've got four different ways of even having not so much decompressing, but maybe even
processing.
Is that a good way of saying it?
Trying to process even the travel, processing the day, processing, yes, decompressing, but
you'll see where I'm going.
So with the processing, I notice with our kiddos, they enjoy kind of just a little bit
of chat chat, but not a whole lot.
Our little guy, he's a major bookworm.
Our girl, she really enjoys movies.
Well, they both do.
And I've noticed that like when the kids need kind of a space, Sebastian will grab himself
a book and he'll just kind of be very quiet.
Gabriel will put her headset on and she'll just listen very still to music.
And then when you're driving, you have a tendency to like tap your fingers and just kind of
take in the day and just look at what's going on around us.
And yes, there's three other bodies in the car with you, so you can't specifically crank
the music or turn it really down low.
And then I try to do my best to gauge you like, do you like this music that's going
on right now?
Is this helping you?
Is it too hot?
Is it too cold?
Is it whatever?
You are always so funny because you call me the car stewardess.
Yeah.
I think you started that.
Would you like a napkin?
No, I think I saw that on a video.
Yeah, would you like a napkin?
Can I get you this?
Would you go ahead?
Throw this away for me?
Yeah, I'll put it in the trash for you.
Are you too warm?
Do you need a pillow?
Are you okay?
Would you like your drink now?
So yeah, it's like making sure that everybody for the most part is taken care of.
And it's like just learning how to process through the travels and through the journey.
And then because even though all four of us are in the same car, we're in experiencing
a lot of the same things, we're processing it differently.
And so there's those moments where I think based off of how people process during their
day is what's going to be the catalyst of how they decompress it later.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, that makes sense.
Did I go really deep on there sort of?
I mean, not really deep, but I think you hit-
A jump into the five feet?
Yeah.
Okay.
I mean, it does, that makes sense.
I mean, the way I'm hearing it, it makes sense because it is.
You know, again, it's how do you take in and process what's in front of you or what's been
handed to you.
And it's like, what do you deal with that?
Again, if somebody hands you a box of puppies, how are you going to process and deal with
that information versus if somebody hands you a box of lizards?
I almost said snakes for fun.
Oh, see, thanks, no.
Yeah.
Neither one is fine.
But again, it's kind of, if somebody says, let's say for fun, you're in a situation where
it's like an icebreaker or team building exercise and they're like, they hand you a box of stuff
and they say, you have 20 minutes to build something.
And if they hand you a box of pipe cleaners versus a box of Lego, you know, what you're
handed and how you process what you've been handed is going to really determine the outcome.
And it's really going to determine how do you handle that information.
And maybe I'm overthinking it, but I'm an over thinker and this is what happens.
I think you're saying the same thing.
And that's kind of what I was trying to do.
Yeah.
You know, it's just kind of like repackage it just in case, you know, because again,
everybody's different and we know that everybody's going to hear something different.
And even if you present the same material in three different ways, you're going to get
something new out of it each way.
Right.
But yeah, so it is.
It's one of those things that it's everybody with all sorts of the different personalities,
you know, and again, we could we could even bring in the love languages, you know, that
we've talked about with that.
You know, it's you know, what are you going to do with the information that you're you're
handed and how is it going to come out of you?
And so it's so it does.
It's I mean, I almost feel like this is going to be like one of those short and sweet.
It's like, well, just talk it through.
You know, but I mean, genuinely, because I know with you, you know, number one, scientifically,
women, we have a tendency to talk more.
We just we are very fine print.
You guys are the headlines.
Right.
And I'm not going to I refuse to be stereotypical because I just there's too many wonderful
people in our lives that literally can go from one space to another.
Yes.
Are very fluent in in their communication skills.
And so but I know that with you and me, so even though you and I gave these scenarios
of like how how is your day going, how are you even processing it?
Yeah.
I think when well, guys, tell us what we even need to do.
How does that even go about?
And my my suggestion to you would be this like so it's you and your spouse or you and
like your best friend or somebody and you're like, I really need to decompress, but we're
decompress, we decompress it two different ways, two different levels, but we cannot
separate.
We're in a car.
Yeah.
Or we're on a plane.
The situation doesn't allow us to decompress the way we want separately.
So how do we go about this?
And we personally have had to do this.
And I would say with us, we just give each other space and time.
It's like, how are you?
What do you need from me right now?
Yeah.
Do you need me to just be still?
And then it's like, if it flip a coin, if you have to, I don't know, rock, paper, scissors,
but it's like figure out what the other person might be needing in that moment.
And even if it's, I need to give you like five minutes to just breathe.
Or it's, or I know I said this the other day and I know this can come out bad and this
can sound horrible.
But again, where's the foundation of your relationship?
What are the conversations that have been going on?
Yeah.
Whose day was more crap?
Right.
Not even whose day was more crap, but just, you know, like if I'm at the point where I
just need silence and I just need to just kind of be.
But you're in a, I need to talk this through and I just need to talk my day through.
It's like, to a degree, I can kind of just be quiet and be while you talk through your
day.
Yeah.
And it doesn't involve a lot of interaction on my part, but it allows you to get it out.
And I can kind of like hit, pull the highlights out as you're talking while I'm just kind
of driving.
Right.
You know, and so, but again, it's, I'd say to a degree that takes practice and that that's
a learned skill.
You know, because again, I never want to seem like I'm zoning out while you're telling a
story.
I was going to say that.
Yeah.
That unfortunately would not decompress me.
No, it would.
And I never want to do that to you or make you feel that way.
And I never want to encourage others, other people to do that to their spouses, especially
or to a friend.
You know, but again, it's, if there's a way that, I don't know.
I, I'm, it's like, I'm trying to say it with, and maybe it's not coming out right.
It's going to take both people in a space to where you are being sensitive to one another.
Yes.
It's one of those, when we were talking about this originally, I looked at you and I said,
this would be where I would look at you and say, I need, I need 10 more minutes of you
focused in even before you check out on me.
Yeah.
Before you, before you decompress.
Yeah.
You know, give me, give me 10 minutes.
You know, I'll even, we'll time it.
We'll do it that way.
Number one, it doesn't take me into a spiral, but it gets me out of my junk.
Yeah.
And then it, it keeps you from being buried in such a space where you aren't able to decompress.
And that takes sensitivity on both parts.
Both people have got to be willing to allow the other person to decompress in that space
in the way that they need to.
That's, you got to.
Yeah.
And, and you know, conversely, if, if I've had one of those days where I'm like, babe,
I, I don't have it to give.
I can't, I don't have it to give.
Give me five minutes.
Yeah.
And then I'll let you talk.
Yeah.
But see what we did there.
Yeah.
Communicate.
It is.
It's, it, it is.
It's, it's all about communication.
Yeah.
And, and, and it is, it's, it's communication and it's taking turns.
It's knowing your spouse because I would have to say nine times out of 10, you and I, when
we first see each other towards the end of the day, or, you know, after I get off work
or after you get off work, within the first like five to 10 seconds, we each have a pretty
decent idea of how the other one needs to decompress.
Yeah.
And then we're like, okay, do I have the capacity of where I need to decompress to allow you
to decompress in the way that you need to decompress?
Yeah.
You know, and if the answer is yes, go ahead.
Go for it.
Decompress.
If the answer is no, hey.
Yeah.
We need, we need to figure out the balance here.
You got to vocalize it.
Yeah.
And, and it is, you know, so it is.
What a shocker.
We have a podcast episode that talks about you need to communicate with your spouse or
friend.
And just, you know, and because immediately, you know, what I heard in my brain, spirit,
whatever you want to say was, well, if, you know, if, if the person loves me enough, then
they just need to, they need to hear me.
They need to be able to whatever.
And I want to say to you, don't be a douche, don't do that.
Don't, don't, if you love, if you love your person, again, whether it's a spouse, a friend,
family member, whatever, if you love them enough, then you, you need to be able to take
that backseat in that space, you know, or recognize, you know, look at them and say,
when you have time to recharge, I really have got to talk some stuff out or I just, I need
you.
And then give, give that, I know we keep, I know we keep kind of repeating it, but it,
but it's true.
It's just, you've got, you've got to take that time.
You got to take the time to get the time.
Yeah.
And, and also something else I'll say is we, we, we saw a video recently and I know overall
the, the video was talking about sex.
As I say, I know where you're going on this one.
Yeah.
It was really good.
But, but one of the key elements of, of this talk, while yes, the, the, the main speaker
was talking about sex, but what was said could be applied to so many areas of a marriage
of one of, one of the great honors, one of the great benefits that we have in marriage
we get to serve our spouse, you know, and, you know, part of service is, is laying down
your wants, you know, in, in the moment, you know, and if, I mean, if you're able to, you
know, again, go back to the, if you have the energy to give towards your spouse decompressing,
give them, give them that space, give them that time, give, you know, serve them in that
manner and, and let them, let them have it, you know, and, and again, it's, it's not going
to be for the rest of the night.
It's not going to be all day long.
You know, they, they might just need five, 10 minutes to just shout.
Yeah.
You know, and it's, right.
You know, and, and all of a sudden then it's like, okay, sweet.
I got, I got my, my decompressed life back, you know, or, you know, oh, I just, you know,
oh, he needs to, you know, I need to go sit in a cave for, for 10 minutes and just, you
know, where it's semi dark and I just, I'm going to, I'm going to check emails and look
at random things on the internet.
Yeah.
Sweet.
Then after, you know, 10 minutes, oh, he's back and he's, he feels like a normal human
again.
Sweet.
Cool.
Yeah.
You know, but, you know, but, but part of service and part of serving our spouses and,
and being that, that helpmate, if you will, is, is to give, give each other that space
to decompress so that they can go into the rest of the evening or the rest of the day
of being a normal human being so they can be mom, dad, husband, you know, friend, whatever
needs to happen, you know, so that way the family can prosper.
You know, the family can prosper, the family can, can be healthy by giving each other the
space to do this.
And again, it, it gets a little complicated when, if you, like you said, if you are in
a car or if you are in an airplane where it's like, okay, well, I don't really have the
opportunity to like, I can't step outside.
Right.
I can't go outside while this is going on.
Yeah.
You know, but find, you know, again, have the conversation, you know, hey, give me,
give me 10 minutes.
Yeah.
To, to blast some music or to, you know, to, to maybe listen to something, you know, kind
of like heavier or something like that or maybe listen to classic music.
I don't know.
The other, the other thing that crossed my mind was if you cannot give that person that
space or it feels like you might be exploding inside one way or the other, whether it's
the person needing quiet or the person that needs to talk, you know, and again, it's so
funny that God puts them together and as a man and wife.
Yeah.
But I, I know that I've learned in those times where when you've needed the silence, but
I needed some sort of communication, I would just hold your hand or just touch you.
You know, it's like, if you, if you feel, even if you don't have the capacity to really
be fully engaged or giving them that true silence, at least try to compromise somewhere
along the way.
Maybe find a different avenue to babe, what do you think we could do that we can decompress
kind of together in this moment?
Because obviously, you know, and, and, and then ask the Holy Spirit even just ask, you
know, is there a creative way you can maybe go about this?
Because both of us need just to breathe and we breathe kind of differently, but we know
that you can help us through this.
So if you could just show us, but you know, just physical touch, just, you know, again,
when you're driving, you're very focused on driving, but it's like, I'm just chatting
along that a lot, but your hands on my knee or you're just, again, you're letting me know,
I'm right here.
Obviously you're, you haven't gone anywhere, but I'm right here, but I am kind of divided
in where I'm my thinking just because I'm trying to keep us alive.
So I think if we take that moment, instead of being angry or being upset because the
other person didn't give you the space or the loud or the quiet or the whatever that
you needed in that moment, you know, take that extra second to just be still, tell them
kind of what's going on.
This is what I'm dealing with.
And even if nothing else, especially when you're believers, you want to take that spot
to say, we both have had a really rough day.
How about we just take this next 30 seconds?
Father, we need, could you just help us today?
Today has been a really hard, heavy day for, or just, it's just been a lot, not even hard
or heavy, just, it's just a lot.
You know, our beautiful girl, she'll come home and sometimes she collapses.
Sometimes she tells us all the fun stories, but it just, you know, like it's just heavy
that day or it's just a lot that day.
And it's like, let's just, let me give, just give me, let me give you that moment, but
let me also hug you and hold you and remind you who you are and that it's going to be
okay.
And, you know, and it's, it's kind of all of these things, but just, just give each
other space to breathe and remember that you're on the same team and that you want nothing
but the best for each other.
Whatever that looks like.
And I love, serve, remember that you're here to just serve and take care of each other.
Because when you're at your best, it makes me better.
And when I'm at my best, it makes you better.
And just us remembering that, that we want our person to be whole.
And we want our person to be good.
And we don't want to demand our way because that's gross.
Yes.
It's, it's, that's not, that's not healthy.
Love doesn't demand its own.
It doesn't push itself.
It's patient and it's kind.
It's if you guys don't know what I'm talking about, I'm talking about first Corinthians
13, the love chapter, and we go back to it a lot, but we haven't talked about it in a
while.
And that's, that's where a lot of that is, you know, if you want to know how to, you
know, care for your person again, whether it's family, friends, spouse, children, love
is patient.
Love is kind.
It's not demanding.
It believes the best hopes the best.
It covers a multitude of sins.
It doesn't keep a record of wrong, you know, all of the things just, just meditate on the
things that are good.
And it, and it, and that section always ends, you know, ends with love never fails.
Because love never fails.
Yeah.
Remember that love doesn't fail.
Yeah.
And remember that God doesn't fail.
You know, I mean, God doesn't make mistakes.
God has put the two of you together for a reason.
That's right.
You know, um, what was it?
We shared something with each other the other day.
Um, remember when, when God sat down and made the plans for your life, you already factored
in your stupidity.
That's the most freeing.
It really does.
That was the most freeing.
I just, I, cause I literally said that to somebody at church and I was like, just look
to them and I said, do you realize?
And remember that you were going to be a bonehead.
Come on.
Right?
Like, come on.
And it's not even just a boneheaded moments.
It's just the, the things that we even tell our children, like Gabri, especially right
now, just looking at her and going, you're growing.
Oh my gosh, you're growing.
And guess what?
You don't, you, you don't know everything right now.
And that's not a slam.
That's a man.
Hey, you're learning.
And it's okay that you, you didn't get it right the first time.
That's okay.
I'm 48 years old and there's still days I'm like, I'm still learning.
I want to continue to learn.
I want to continue to fail because that means I'm still trying.
It's like, don't stop.
It's it's okay.
And God factors these moments in.
And it was like, cause I was sharing with the girls, like even the moment of who's to
say that sometimes these fall down moments that we're trying to save each other from
what who's to say that that's not part of God's plan.
We're thinking that these are stupid bonehead moments and God's like, I know the beginning.
I know the end.
I know the in between.
Yeah.
And I am very much in the midst of it.
You can't outrun me out, fail me out, fall me out, nothing me.
You're not so far gone that I can't reach you.
Right.
I'm in the midst of all of this stuff.
So it's like, it's a, it's a freeing thought.
It's a freeing thought.
So when you guys are decompressing and you can't seem to be getting maybe the decompression
from the spouse or from the person that you think you need to then go to the source then
that would be my other practical example, my practical advice for you.
Go to the source.
Take the time to just say, father, how would you like to decompress today?
Because he knows what your day was and he knows what it is.
It's going to help unwire what might've been, what might've gotten miswired or have gotten
a little, you know, made you, made you a little cray cray.
Yeah.
And sometimes it's almost like, you know, talking about some of this, it kind of reminds
me of some of the times when I'm like out in the workshop and I call you to quote unquote
help me and you come out, you stand in the garage, you look at what I'm working on.
You don't say a word, but I tell you the problem that I'm trying to figure out.
And then as I keep talking, I'm like, oh wait, and then all of a sudden I get ideas and I'm
like, yep, that's it.
That's how I got to fix it.
That's how I'm going to solve the problem.
And you just smile and you look at me, you're like, okay, you're welcome.
It's like you haven't said a word.
You haven't helped.
You know, sometimes, sometimes all we got to do is talk through our problems and talk
through our issues and talk through the obstacle that's in front of us.
Simplify it.
Yeah.
And again, sometimes, you know, sometimes talking it out loud demystifies it.
That's good.
You know, it's kind of like, you know, when, when you, when you bring it out into the open,
yeah, it loses its power.
Yeah.
You know, yeah.
Sunlight is the greatest disinfectant, so to speak.
Come on.
You know, truly, truly.
I love that.
Yeah.
I love that.
So yeah.
That's, that's my thoughts.
I like it.
I don't think we came to any major conclusion, like you said, which I think is good.
I think I, I hope that this gets you guys thinking.
I hope this gets you guys talking.
I hope this gives you guys a little bit more of an insight, perhaps.
Yeah.
Kind of get you outside of your belly button.
I like that term a lot.
Again, I've used it a lot.
Just get yourself outside of you.
No.
Get yourself that it's not all about you, that especially when you are in any kind of
relationship, whatever that looks like, that, that it is something that you, you get to
be a person that gives as well as receives and vice versa and the things that go with
it.
And so just, I hope that this provokes some good thoughts and that this helps.
Like you said, that was really nice demystifies.
This is not that hard guys.
Yeah.
It's, we hear it a lot.
People look at us and they're like, how you guys make this look easy?
And it's like, we, we've just learned how to major on the major and minors on the minor.
And when you get those two twisted, that's when you start having problems.
And so, and when the majors come, lean into God and know that he's going to direct you
and he's going to give you the wisdom.
And also to pull, to, to peel back the curtain.
I mean, we, we talk and think about a lot of this stuff all the time on a daily.
Yeah.
I mean, we, we have a whole lot of conversations with each other about a whole lot of things.
So, so it's, so that, that is, that is why, you know, some people might say, look at us
and say, well, you guys got it together.
It's like, we talk through a lot.
We work, we work.
We've earned our lumps.
So if hubby's been gone all day, you've been home with the kids, you guys work it through,
figure it out.
If you are traveling from point A to point B and you both have literally had a long day,
but you're needing to get where you need to go, figure it out.
If you have been cooped up in the same house and you have only 13 steps, you can go up
and you're not driving from 20 minutes to here to get where you need to be.
I'm pointing at my sweet hubby.
You get to figure it out.
Commuting to the office.
You get to figure it out.
Or if you were driving from KC to Texas and your youngest wants to stop every 20 minutes
to empty his bladder because he keeps chugging his water.
Rejoice in the fact that the boy's hydrated, but figure it out.
Just figure it out.
Nothing is so blown or so important that your person gets to be blown up.
Do not blow up your person.
Just don't do it.
Love them enough to serve.
Love them enough to figure it out.
Figure it out.
Talk it out.
Figure it out.
If you have to say, so I was listening to this podcast and this is what they were saying.
If you need to use us as a catalyst, that is why we do what we do.
Figure it out.
We're going to trust that you guys will.
All right guys.
Have the best week.
Enjoy the journey.