Amor y Respeto - Cuaderno De Trabajo: Videoconferencia

The more we are upset at something, the wiser it is to let twenty-four hours pass before responding.

You must “ask God from the wealth of his glory to give you power through his Spirit to be strong in your inner selves.”

Responding to offensive words or actions with your own offensive words and actions is damaging and unproductive.

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

When your wife comes to talk to you, listen to her. Realize she is coming to you because you matter more to her than anyone else. She has certain emotional needs and only you can meet them. Sometimes she may say things that don’t make sense to you and she is apt to misspeak and exaggerate when she is upset, but don’t put her down. Instead, listen to her heart. Give her a chance to express her concerns and, as she does so, don’t try to fix her. Don’t give her your solutions unless she asks for them.

God rewards your obedience to love and respect, even if your spouse does not respond!

Being a person who communicates what is true frequently demands tact, and at times it can feel like sidestepping land mines. It takes work to be both truthful and tactful.

Unconditional respect means we confront their wrongdoings respectfully. We do not become uncivil because they are. Who they fail to be does not determine who we will be.

Recognize your different gifts--how each of you (Pink and Blue) functions according to God’s perfect design.

Do you give yourself grace and your spouse judgment?

When a husband chooses to do or say something loving, and that includes saying, ‘I’m sorry for coming across in an unloving way,’ he energizes his wife. When a wife decides to express herself respectfully, and that includes apologizing for her disrespectful attitude, she energizes her husband.

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

A parent needs to feel respected, especially during conflicts...A child need to feel loved, especially during disputes.

You both forgive for one simple but profound reason: because you know Christ has forgiven you!

The Crazy Cycle is, indeed, “the evil of folly and the foolishness of madness” (Ecclesiastes 7:25).

Assume goodwill about the person you are in conflict with.

We fool ourselves into thinking the other person causes us to be the way we are. They really don’t! But if we lock into that idea, we become helpless, hopeless victims.

Words of love from a husband are like good medicine that brings life to the marriage.

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

Could you be facing a crisis in faith more than a crisis in your marriage?

Wives, you never know: The way you handle this [conflict] might bring your husband not only back to you, but to God. Husbands, you never know: The way you handle this [conflict] might bring your wife not only back to you, but to God. (1 Corinthians 7:16)

Thank the Lord for the goodwill each of you has toward the other. Ask Him for strength to give each other the benefit of the doubt during moments when someone’s goodwill seems to be lacking. “He who seeks good finds goodwill, but evil comes to him who searches for it.” (Proverbs 11:27)

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.

When sorting out how to slow down the Crazy Cycle, it helps to remember that men are commanded to love because they don’t love naturally, and on the other side, women are commanded to respect because they don’t respect naturally.

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

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.

When you play the blame game your marriage never wins.

You can be right in the argument, but wrong in your approach.

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

Your spouse can affect you, but your spouse does not control you.

I had often asked God to compensate for my mistakes, but in return had I thought He would give me perfect children?

At the very bottom of things, in every case and in every conversation, you can do your marriage a huge favor by assuming she is seeking to feel loved or he is seeking to feel respected and give your spouse some grace!

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

The Love and Respect message is not about a husband earning his wife’s respect by being more loving any more than it is about a wife earning her husband’s love by being more respectful. Always love or respect is given unconditionally according to God’s commands.

A husband may deserve contempt, but that doesn’t win him any more than harshness and anger wins the heart of a woman.

If you are seeking positive change in your marriage, you will need to make a positive change in your attitude and actions.

As a husband, if you can grasp that you don’t always have to solve your wife’s problems, you will take a giant step toward showing her empathy and understanding.

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

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.

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.

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

Focus on the positive in the midst of the negative, and the Energizing Cycle will keep right on humming.

Respect for the husband is just as important as love for the wife.

Self-interest should never come ahead of your spouse’s interests.

Always remember that Pink and Blue have different wiring, different preferences. Assume your spouse has goodwill toward you, no matter what. Both of you can be right, while being different.

Getting married reveals, usually sooner than later, an incontestable fact: your spouse cannot possibly meet all your needs and desires

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.

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

Will we decide how we see God based on our circumstances, or will we see our circumstances in light of how we view God?

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

You cannot use unholy means to achieve a worthy end.

Your spouse deserves the truth from you. Do your best to tell it with love and respect.

To not forgive is to shoot yourself in the foot and put extra gas in the Crazy Cycle.

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

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

If husbands and wives are to understand the Love and Respect Connection, they must realize that they communicate in code. And the problem is, they don’t know how to decipher the messages they send to one another.

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

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.

“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.

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.

It’s true that women have intuition and that men should listen to them. It’s also true that women have blind spots and need the insight of their husbands.

You’re the only person in the world who can meet your spouse’s deepest need for love and respect. After all, you alone are married to your spouse.

Your wife feels you are open with her when you discuss financial concerns, possible job changes or ideas for your future.

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

The heart of my communication means the other person cannot get my heart to be unkind, unloving, or disrespectful. Instead, I have made a decision about who I will be independent of the other person. I won’t blame my unkindness on someone else.

Do you bow to the influence of Hollywood or God’s Holy Word?

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.

We all need love and respect equally. But, during conflict our felt needs are as different as pink is from blue.

When confronting your spouse, attack the behavior, not the person.

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

We have to step back as Christ followers and ask, “Do I have false expectations that my relationship should be romantic 99% of the time?”

Be quick to listen and understand and you have a much better chance of being understood.

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.

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

We can all have moments of anger, but this does not mean we have to lose control and sin.

Optimism or pessimism? It is always a choice, no matter what your natural temperament.

To build a lasting legacy, use proven wisdom that you glean from the Lord.

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.

Above all trust God when the “whys” of life threaten to overwhelm you.

Suppressing negative feelings is not loving, respectful or very wise. Speak up tactfully.

Don’t conclude that your spouse is wrong when he/she is seeking to do the right and righteous thing.

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.

It’s so easy to dismiss our spouse as childish because we don’t have the same vulnerabilities they do.

The Lord made women (Pink) and men (Blue) with differences, and He expects us to recognize and deal with those differences in a loving and respectful way.

No matter what your struggle- criticism, constant conflict, sex, money, parenting, harsh words- learning to communicate the Love and Respect way can help you make crucial changes and build the kind of relationship that God blesses.

When we feel crippling discouragement by the sinful choices and outcomes of our kids, we must not let this permanently deter us from parenting God’s way.

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.

How we react to a situation reveals more about us than about the other person.

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.

Accidental sparks (unwise remarks) ignite and fuel a fire, and vroom goes the Crazy Cycle.

The mature one in the marriage seldom moves second.

We are equal but we are not the same.

Just because you’re offended doesn’t mean the other person is offensive.

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

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

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).

There is a discrepancy between who we want to be and see ourselves to be and how we actually sound in voice and writing. But with self-reflection and honesty, we can turn the corner and improve our communication. We need only evaluate what we are about to communicate.

We have different vulnerabilities. We can pass judgment on one another all day long or we can say God made us different and that’s ok.

When a wife asks, “Do you love me?” She is not trying to put her husband on the spot. She is simply looking for reassurance.

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.