Crazy Cycle CD (10 Pack)

We might say that every negative action in the family has an equal and opposite negative reaction.

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.

Holding back your love or respect will just keep the Crazy Cycle spinning away, but being mature and making the first move could slow it down.

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

We have discovered that as women motivate their man God’s way, men are energized to love them better. It doesn’t matter if your marriage is good or seems like there is no hope. We have seen God move in powerful ways even when things looked hopeless.

Do you seek to understand or only to be understood?

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

Just because you may feel unloved or disrespected does not mean your spouse is sending that message.

When a wife insists that her husband earn her respect, she puts him in a lose-lose situation.

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.

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.

Being friendly to her man is one of the most effective things a woman can do to strengthen her marriage.

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.

When you play the blame game your marriage never wins.

A most significant point of this book is this: If what we think is true, kind, necessary, and clear, we need to have the courage to hit send. This isn’t about refraining from speaking; this is about speaking.

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

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

We all need to wrestle with the spiritual truth that God is good. If you don’t believe God is good, you won’t trust His word. If you don’t trust His word, you will find excuses to ignore His commands.

When you possess a forgiving spirit, words of Love and Respect will flow authentically from your lips- and realize that the Lord Himself is listening to you at moments like these. He knows you are not powerless, but actually full of power that He has granted you.

Our research shows that couples who pray together are more apt to reap all kinds of benefits, including better and more frequent communication, going on “dates” more frequently and having sex more frequently.

Unconditional respect is as powerful to him as unconditional love is to her.

God is not pink. God is not blue. God is purple. When two become one, they have the potential of displaying God’s attributes and character.

Troubles over sex and money do not cause a marriage to go under. The lack of love and respect during conflict cause the marriage to go under.

When the wife flatly says her husband will have to earn her respect before she gives him any, she leaves the husband in a lose-lose situation. Now he is responsible for both love and respect in the relationship. He must unconditionally love his wife and earn her respect.

Words of wisdom for all husbands and wives are these: We easily see what is done to us before we see what we are doing to our mate.

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

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.

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

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.

No one can really practice Love and Respect unless he or she does it as unto Jesus Christ.

You cannot use unholy means to achieve a worthy end.

Research shows that 70% of the couples who were extremely unhappy in their marriage, but hung in there and worked through the tough time, identified themselves as being very happy five years later.

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

Each of you must focus on what God is calling you to do toward your spouse. Do not focus on what you think God is calling your spouse to do toward you.

The moment we cry to Him for help, He is already pleased. He gives us strength to love our children.

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

Our trustworthiness rests on our truthfulness.

When a husband chooses to come across lovingly even though he feels disrespected, he can prevent the Crazy Cycle from spinning and possibly getting out of control.

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

As strong and powerful as marriage bonds can become, our deepest dependency must be on the Lord, not another human being.

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

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

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.”

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

[Women], your self-love cannot be derived from your husband’s love. It can affect it, but it does not determine it.

Though the end can be worthy (to be loved and respected), when each uses unholy means (unloving and disrespectful words and actions), it will not achieve those ends. We must treat others as we expect them to treat us. To deny this makes us arrogant or fools, or both.

“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.“

Do not live by the standards of Hollywood; trust what God says in His Holy Word.

Your hunger for God can create an appetite in your children.

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

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).

Christian maturity involves a lot of things, but surely it includes knowing how to process your anger.

God’s commands are not burdensome, but are given to us to spare us from more pain. Why would God command you to do something that doesn’t work?

Since it is easy to focus on the negative, focus on your mate’s good qualities and express thanks with positive words of Love or Respect.

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.

Your wife will feel esteemed when you speak highly of her in front of others.

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.

Truth will carry its own weight if delivered respectfully and lovingly.

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

Thank the Lord for all the trouble-free moments in which you and your spouse enjoy Him, each other, your family, your ministry and life as a whole. Ask Him for the strength to accept your measure of trouble, and the wisdom to deal with the annoyances and irritations by loving and respecting each other with new commitment. (You may also want to pray about troubles at work, at church, with the children…) “But those who marry will have trouble in this life” (1 Corinthians 7:28)

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.

One thing to remember in this culture is if we say something complimentary towards one gender, we aren’t saying something against the other.

Marital researchers agree that a huge percentage of communication problems between husband and wife are due not to what is said but to how it is said – the attitude and tone of voice.

Love and Respect is a faith venture, not a formula.

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

As you pray together, you will truly learn to love and respect together.

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.

Be friendly. Be friendly. Be friendly. Watch what happens.

We can communicate the truth in the best of manners, but the person may be so insecure he or she can only react and attack like a wounded bear.

Whether visiting a prison, feeding the hungry, giving the thirsty a drink or speaking a word of love or respect, everything is to be done to and for Christ.

Let the Lord change you, but don’t try to change each other.

[Husbands] do you realize the power of just holding your wife’s hand?

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.

Husbands, to energize your wife give her face-to-face time, allowing her to talk and share her feelings.

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

Feeling unloved, a wife gets defensive and acts offensively without respect. Feeling disrespected, a husband gets defensive and acts offensively without love.

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

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

In the ultimate sense, your marriage has nothing to do with your spouse. It has everything to do with your relationship to Jesus Christ.

Words of Love and Respect must include thankfulness spoken to or about your spouse; don’t fixate on weaknesses and faults.

Don’t pressure yourself with perfection. We are going to fail. A righteous man falls 7 times but gets back up.

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

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.

Although the Crazy Cycle is not what God intends for any marriage, all couples get on it at times from one degree to another.

“With eyes of faith, envision Jesus standing just beyond the shoulder of your spouse and listening to every word you speak in every conversation, pleasant or tense. When you speak lovingly or respectfully to your spouse, you are speaking to Christ. Your spouse just happens to be there too.” This truth has sanctified the lips of many. Instead of giving their spouse a verbal whipping or choking on the idea of saying anything positive, now some spouses are motivated to speak words of unconditional love or respect.

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

It is crucial for a husband and wife to see that neither one is wrong, but both of them are very different--in body function, outlook and perspective.

It is so easy to draw wrong conclusions about a spouse’s character and motives due to an occasional flare-up or silly comment.

The woman absolutely needs love, and the man absolutely needs respect. It’s as simple- and as difficult- as that.

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.

You may believe that the careless, unloving or disrespectful words you speak are because your spouse is causing you to speak this way, but Jesus says that it is coming out of your heart.

Life is too short to fuss and fret over trivial irritations.

He will feel appreciated when you disagree with him only in private and honor his authority in front of the kids.

Do you give yourself grace and your spouse judgment?

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.

Often the apparent issue isn’t the real issue; the real issue is always a matter of love or respect.

It is hard to be negative while being thankful.

When you come home after you have been apart, the first few moments of reconnecting will set the tone for the rest of the evening.

Ladies, be careful. “A nagging wife goes on and on like the drip, drip, drip of the rain” (Proverbs 19:13).

She’ll feel at peace with you when you let her vent your frustrations and hurts and don’t get angry and close her off.