EP8. MAKING YOUR MARRIAGE GREAT: PART 3 Continued-Say Goodbye to Crazy Busy: Tips for a Balanced Marriage Continued

Welcome to the Married and Lovett Podcast.

We are Greg and Linda Smith, your host from Raleigh, North Carolina.

It is great that you are taking time to invest into your marriage by listening to our weekly podcast.

The goal of our podcast is to.

Provide you with a weekly dose of.

Marriage teaching to help you keep focused on your marriage.

See it as a freshening up of.

Your marriage, preventive maintenance, a marriage tune up, or fanning the flames of romance, love and passion.

You could even call it continuing education.

We will be covering everything that has to do with your marriage including hot topics like sex, communication, love and much, much more.

Our teachings are based on Christian principles plus over 47 years of marriage to each other and ministry experience.

We want to help you make your marriage great by teaching you how to be married and loving.

It is an honor and privilege to.

Have you join us on today's episode.

We're going to be continuing Saying goodbye to Crazy Busy Tips for a Balanced Marriage, which is part of the six action steps to God's plan for your marriage.

And for that topic, we're using Ecclesiastes 9:9 as a scriptural base which says relish and enjoy life with the spouse.

That you love each and every day of your life.

And from that particular scripture, we're coming up with six action steps that you can apply so that you can actually enjoy your life.

Because that's what God wants for you.

He wants you to have life and life more abundantly.

And that includes having a marriage that is, wow, sizzling.

It's fun, it's rewarding, and it's just great to be married.

You're having a marriage affair with your spouse.

Imagine that.

And that's what we're going to talk about.

And the action step number one, do you settle for?

Or you decide and you can go back to episode six, which we recommend that, and pick up on that.

And then the next one is Action Step number two, which was last week's episode number seven and it was say Goodbye to Crazy Busy Tips for a Balanced Marriage.

And today we're going to do a little recap and we're going to get into the to some more of that.

One of the things I shared about on that episode was in Florida we would go after school or even later on in life we could go over to the beach in about an hour and we would get in the beach and go surfing, walk around in the water, use an inner tube, whatever.

We want it to float around.

And what would happen is you'd get in the water and you would start drifting down the coast.

And all of a sudden you would look up and you're going, where's my towel?

Where's the car?

Where's my other friends that are sitting on the beach?

What happened is the current pulled you down while you're doing all your surfing or talking and you didn't even realize it.

And what happens in marriage is we can be busy.

And then all of a sudden all the marriage busters and such come in, all the activities, the Christmas activities, your daily activities, everything that you got on your platter and add more to and you get busier and busier and busier in your marriage.

And all of a sudden you don't even realize it.

And the current of life is pulling you further and further away from what you have for your.

What you want for your marriage and the different goals that you had.

You got caught up in the marriage drift.

That's why so many people go, we just feel like roommates.

We're not connecting.

So what we did is we used that scenario to go into and talk, to talk about how we can get caught up in the current, but how to get out of that current and correct that.

So you can go back to episode seven and we'll go into more detail on that.

And we also covered in there number one action step tip for getting out of the crazy busy was remember what you want.

Your marriage is a journey and it's the number one priority in your life is next to God.

So what is best for your marriage?

What does your marriage need?

And that comes under remember what you want.

So we go into that in a lot more detail.

And you can actually look at First Corinthians 9, 24, 27.

It talks about Paul was talking about running the rate, running the race.

And he says, if you're going to run a race, you need to have a goal, you need to have a target, you need to have an aim.

And then you buffet your body.

In other words, get a game plan on how you're going to reach it.

And that's what we talk about.

Remember what you want in your marriage, what do you want it to look like, and set a game plan up.

So I recommend listening to that.

So we're encouraging you to count the cost.

Go back and listen to those three tips there.

And I think they're really going to help you get rid of the crazy busy.

So we're going to be talking about making the most of your time.

That's a step number four out of Ephesians 5:15 through 18.

It says, Therefore Be careful how you walk.

Not as unwise men, but as wise men making the most of your time.

Because the days are evil.

So then do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.

And it goes on and it says, and do not get drunk with wine, but be filled with the spirit.

So we see here that we've got to be intentional and on purpose.

And we don't want to waste our time.

We just want to be aware of that and be a wise person.

You know, Linda, on that, we need to look at our time because it says make.

Yeah, make the most of our time is in every.

All of us, in our wallet.

We have 24 hours a day.

Oh, yeah.

See it like money.

You got 24 hours a day.

How are you going to use those 24 hours?

Go ahead.

It's our decision.

We get back to deciding how.

How are we going to manage that 24 hours?

And unfortunately, if we don't use those 24 hours properly or we waste them.

They don't roll over.

They don't roll over that.

You took the words right out of the mouth.

They don't roll over.

So there's just a few things that we can do.

We're just going to throw out some different ideas about how you can use your time wisely.

And some of that is to share the housework, share the things that need to be done around the home and allow that.

That actually is going to allow for more play time together.

Yeah.

Really get organized and all that.

Be mindful of what Greg had mentioned on the time that you had to spend, count the cost, budget your time.

So you're saying, like on the home front, if you.

The family's got something going on that week, you got some things you want to get accomplished instead of just looking over at the wife and say, okay, you got to take care of all the house stuff, and I'm just going to go over and do this.

No, maybe the husband comes in and helps with the housework, cooks the meal.

Pack lunches if needed, whatever needs to get done.

So the time is freed up and you're not as busy as you normally would be.

It's not all on one person's responsibility.

Right, Right.

Team effort and find the balance.

Sit down and coordinate your schedule together.

Just like Greg said.

There's.

What if you're too busy to sit down and coordinate your schedule?

Well, then you really know.

You got to sit down and get past that.

You know, sometimes in life we just got to say, world, stop.

Yes.

We got to take authority over the time.

Right.

Because if you don't, you're going to get spun off the world.

Well, you're going to get caught in that current and.

Right.

And it's going to be kind of like going down the toilet bowl, you know what I'm saying?

Your life just goes to.

Because sometimes you just got to say stop and regroup.

It's that vital.

And not everybody's in that situation, but maybe you are.

And you know, it's really not that if you do sit down, you're going to find that it helps get you through all of those busy times, those crazy times, because then you're more organized, you're on the same page and you're, you know, working around the house as a team and getting stuff done around the house and not feeling that crazy busy.

Yeah, right.

Yep.

Yeah.

I mean, like some things that you can do is what can you do on your drives?

Maybe you got the kids in the car and that's okay, but if not, or maybe they're okay with it.

Plug in a podcast.

You know, plug in a.

Something that you can listen to to educate yourself.

Maybe one of the goals that you've had, like Greg said, remember what you want.

Maybe the one of those goals is to learn more about your marriage.

Maybe you wanted to do a yearly marriage conference, but you didn't have where you could do that.

Well, then do it a different way.

Find a way.

Read a book, Listen to a podcast.

We've got a great one we can recommend to you.

It's called Married and love it.

Yeah, I know.

I personally know the podcasters.

Yeah, yeah, they're great people.

And plug it in.

And the timing on it is perfect.

You know, I was talking to.

I had a physical, annual physical with one of my doctors.

And so I was asking her, she's married.

And I said, do you ever listen to podcast?

And she's like, oh, I love to do that.

She goes, I have a 45 minute drive to work every day.

And she said, I love this.

To just plug it, you know, turn on a podcast.

I said, well, here you go.

And you'll know, you know, the person, the people personally.

She goes, you guys are podcasting that?

I'm like, yeah.

And she goes, oh, my goodness, this is exactly what I've been looking for.

I've been wanting to get something a little more variety in on my drive to work.

And she said, this is just perfect.

So something like that, you know, keep it in the back of your mind.

You can do it while it take time.

When you double time your efforts, manage your time.

If you're going to do a workout and you're going to spend some of your time that way, then manage it by listening to a podcast instead of just tuning out on music, which.

There's nothing wrong with that.

A playlist.

There's nothing wrong with that.

But just.

Here's just an idea.

Okay.

So another example is there's a couple that had gone to one of our Married and Lovett classes, and normally they would not have carved out that time to go, but they made the decision that they were going to carve that time out, get a babysitter every two weeks.

It was every other week.

Right.

And they had three kids, young kids, and they were going to have to set up for babysitting arrangements and all that travel, get to it, take that time.

And they did so through the course of the class.

They realized after the class was done, how come they had not been having date nights?

They're too busy, because they were too busy.

And they had not carved out the time, but they realized they had done that for the class.

So they made the decision that they were going to just keep that little pocket of time and carve it out and make it a date night for them every other week.

And she told me that it has just been awesome to have that, the having that time carved out for them a date night, because then they realized that they could do it.

It would fit into their calendar.

Yeah.

So that's a great.

That's a great testimony right there.

And a key part of that is they were already busy with the kids, but they made a decision.

We need to invest into our marriage.

That's it.

That's right.

So they made time, making the most of their time, and they made it a priority, and they figured out how to make it work.

And then besides everything else they learned in the class, they said, like Linda just said, I won't repeat all that, but they made a way to make date nights work.

But then they're gonna have to stay intentional of that because then they get caught up in the current again if they don't stay on purpose and then get stretched off course.

Yeah.

Make that one of the non negotiables.

Yes.

Right.

We talked about that in episode seven about the non negotiables, and this was one of them for them.

And, you know, don't waste your time.

You know, just a good example that I think everybody relates to is sitting down, you say, I'm just going to look at my phone for a minute, and all Of a sudden you go into one of these apps, Facebook or Instagram and you start scrolling.

Now you know, you know you can run but you can't hide.

But that five minute scroll turns into 30, 45 minutes sometimes.

And what could you have been done?

What could you have done during that time?

I heard somebody other the other day because they, they do that, they said, you know what, I just set my timer on my phone for I'm going to do this for 5 minutes or 10 minutes.

That way they don't lose track of time.

Well, there's some we gotta also the next point would be deal with this.

No, we're not coming to that one.

We're not ready yet.

Nope.

I just thought of something.

Tell me, you know this weekend was a good what weekend for me on just in our life.

How Planning time.

And you got to be aware of it because I don't.

Do we say anything about doing a to do list?

Oh no, I know a lot of.

Y'All do a to do list.

I do them sometimes.

Sometimes I don't do list.

But I know when I do a to do list for a particular day or for a week, my time is more managed.

I don't overbook myself or I just, I stay focused and that's what we need to be.

And it's so fun checking it off when it doesn't.

Right.

I don't know if you had mentioned coordinate your calendar together.

Right.

It's good for a husband, wife to sit down and what's going on this week?

What activity or church or what, what do you, what's the kid's schedule?

And you plan and that's when you got to say, okay, we got too much stuff going on in this day.

Something's got to give.

Yeah, you can adjust, you can adjust.

You've got to control your time for those times.

And we'll come to that in a minute when you can't control it.

But I just thinking about this weekend.

My number one goal this weekend or two of them was for us to do this recording, which that takes time, work out our information.

But I said that's number one.

Nothing else happens other than that that's on this Saturday.

And then Sunday's church.

And then our Sunday afternoon was already booked up.

Having lunch with somebody, which we got to drive a little ways to.

And then I said, oh, I'm going to have somebody come over and help me do set up tents for my Christmas light display.

And then last night my son called and said, hey dad, can you help me Move some stuff out of an office.

All of a sudden your to do.

List, I didn't think I put that on Sunday.

And I told the guy who's helping me this afternoon, we can do today or tomorrow.

And then all of a sudden I went, oh no, I'm starting to get double booked on everything.

How am I going to handle my time?

So I had to go back and replan contact people.

And then my son said, dad, we got to have it out of that office today.

All of a sudden, a time crash.

All sudden, his need, his emergency, he put on me.

And so now I had to rearrange stuff.

But it's real easy when all that starts happening.

These are those little minor issues can compared to what goes on in life and more major issues, how quickly that current, that undertone that can start pulling.

And all of a sudden a weekend can be total frazzle or somebody miscommunicates that can cause frustrations to happen.

Something gets cut short.

So we've got to make the most of our time.

We have to be that intentional and beyond purpose, as Linda said.

Yeah, that's great.

That's a good point.

Very good.

And I'll let you know how this weekend turns out.

Okay.

Episode number nine, right?

Yeah.

So we're going to deal with the distractions in the riptides.

How do we do that?

Yeah.

Now the distractions, you know, got busy life going on all the time.

But sometimes you just get distractions.

I mean, that distraction could be somebody calling you up and your day is going real good and somebody calls you up and you decide to take the phone call.

And that phone call could turn into four or five minutes or an hour or you can see, I don't need to get that phone call right now.

You can put it off.

But a distraction is anything that gets you off track.

You know, sometimes you can reschedule a distraction.

Maybe, maybe it's somebody that calls up and say, hey, this is going to be going on in two weeks with this organization.

You think you can come, come help us do something with this, whatever it is, Maybe you're going to go wrap packages or something for Christmas and you go, oh yeah, that sounds like a great idea.

Well, you don't check your calendar and all of a sudden you say, oh, wait a minute, I'm supposed to go do A, B and C in that day.

Well, now you've got a distraction coming in.

What are you going to do about that?

Can you like, kind of like my weekend?

Can you rearrange it?

Can you change It.

Or do you need to say, you know what, call that person back, Say, you know what, I'm overbooked and I'm not going to be able to do.

It that day because in other words, the big word.

No.

No.

Because what happens if you don't say no?

Now you keep it on there and think, oh, I might be able to get, get that on there.

And then you.

Then all of a sudden you, if you don't do that and then your husband comes in or your wife and then they want to do something on that day or you forgot to tell them about it, then you know what happens?

The enemy comes in and you get confusion strife.

Why didn't you tell me about that?

Or I can't believe you're gonna do that.

Or man, we got too much going.

You know what?

Johnny's got a football game that day too.

Oh, I didn't have it on my calendar.

Oh, blame it on the calendar.

Well, did you sit down the distraction.

So did you sit down together and organize your calendar?

I didn't have time.

Oops.

Didn't have time.

I mean, you almost got to do some of, especially some of y'all that's got.

Still got two or three kids at home now you got to do this probably every day.

I mean, me and Linda don't have any kids here other than our doggy.

But you know, we still get things going on.

Doctor's appointments, church activities, married and love stuff going on, going to the gym, trying to exercise.

But you know what?

Keep.

Keep component of that is priorities.

Yeah.

Go back to what we talked about before.

What's negotiable, what's non negotiable.

That's, that's really, you know.

Yeah.

So distractions can come in.

I know.

Like, and then sometimes an extraction be can be totally unavoidable.

Like when Linda had her back surgery, we had been living in a routine, but right up before the back surgery and for the last few years with everything that's gone on with her, our routines have gone out the window.

So as we can, we readjust, get routines going, try to stay on top of doctor's appointment so we don't get so busy that we get out of sync again.

So you got to plan something falls in the crack.

But then see, if you, if, if you got a good routine going before the major distractions hit you, things that you really can't control, it's easier to get back on schedule after that situation settles down.

Because if you were frazzled before, you're going to Be more frazzled afterwards.

That's true.

And another example here is going on a diet.

Let's talk about diets.

It's Christmas time.

You really wanted to go there.

But you know what happens a lot of times, like when I lost weight, because I lost about 60 pounds, about 10 years.

Eleven, I guess it's been 11 years ago.

But what happens is you can maybe.

So a lot of y'all can probably relate to this.

But I remember you go real good.

You go two or three weeks, and you're eating, you're following your plan, you're losing weight.

Momentum is good.

Momentum is good.

And all of a sudden you have that little cheat meal.

You know, maybe it's one that's in your plan, but you have a cheat meal, and then the next day you get busy.

There's that word.

You get busy at work, and you got to grab a quick sandwich, and everybody at work wants to go to the Mexican restaurant, and you go, oh, you know, just.

Just another meal.

So you mess up there.

And then what happens on day three?

Is it easier to get back on track depending on where you're at?

Or you go one more day and you.

And you happen to have leftovers in your fridge, easy to grab.

Right?

Right.

So what happens?

You can.

When you get out of sync, it's easy to go further on it.

So you got to stay focused.

And a lot of that comes back to remembering what you want and making a decision.

Making a decision.

So, okay, wife, deary, we're off track here.

We got to get back on our game plan.

And.

And a lot of times the distractions come in and there's nothing you can do.

Like maybe you know somebody.

You.

You've got a stretch of time.

Maybe somebody's going to be traveling for work.

Maybe there's an operation that's going to be happening.

The kids have got a football season coming up and, you know, a tournament.

They got a.

No, you're going to have distractions.

So you plan for that distraction.

I remember when I was doing.

I was doing a weight Watcher plan back then.

So when the.

The holidays come up, which started Halloween for the people, like candy starts in October, I would remember, say, okay, on January 1st.

I want to weigh this much weight, or I want to.

I still want to lose five pounds over the next two months, or I want to stay the same, or maybe you say, you know what?

I don't care.

I don't mind if I win.

Weigh 10 more pounds at the end of the holidays.

But you set a game Plan.

How are you going to function while that distraction is going on?

Because if you go into it with a plan, you can come out on the other end where you want to be.

Because if you don't, especially people on a diet, they're going to come out with a gain of 5, 10, 15 pounds because they didn't have a plan and they didn't remember their why.

So when all these distractions hit.

I'm talking about the biggies, there can be the small ones, but when they hit, what is your plan?

Are you going to make the most of your time during the distraction?

Peter 5, 8, it says, be of sober spirit.

Be on the alert.

Your adversary, the devil.

And it might be someone buying Oreo cookies and keeping them in the house or something.

Yeah, we won't mention any names there.

No names.

Blue Bell Ice Cream.

Okay, we're gonna change that.

Okay.

So prowls your adversary, the devil, prowls about like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour.

So you gotta.

You gotta realize who your enemy is and what's happening there and move on from that place.

Like, we've got, like, sporadic invitations, going out to eat with a friend.

And especially now with the holidays, you got all the holiday parties and unexpected events or events that normally would not occur.

So we just have to be aware.

Be on the alert.

Yeah, be.

Be aware.

Be on the alert.

And like I was saying a moment ago is when, you know, like, the holidays are coming up, we want you and for ourselves to enjoy Thanksgiving.

Yeah.

Enjoy that time with your family, whatever.

You'Ve got going on.

Enjoy Christmas.

Enjoy the weeks before Christmas.

But look, don't stress out.

Don't stress out in all of it.

Remember what you want.

What do you want your holidays to look like?

Yeah.

Prioritize your time.

Sit down, talk about it.

Count the costs.

If we go to, you know, some.

Some people I can remember these days, they go to five houses in two days.

I remember there was that movie years ago called Four Christmases where they had that one group had.

It was hilarious, but it was weird.

But anyway, they had four houses they had to hit in one day or two days, right?

You got to prioritize your time, count the cost, then make the most of your time, and then be able to handle your distractions.

Well, here's a good example in the Bible of someone that was looking well to the way of their marriage, their home, their household, their husband, and all their household.

And that's Proverbs 31.

And most of you know it.

You all know it.

It's Proverbs 31, 25, 27.

And it says that she is smiling at the future and looks well to the ways of her household.

And I think that's something that we can keep before us and that, that is a word of wisdom for us as women, even as a married couple.

Yeah.

To look well to the way of your households.

Proverbs 46, 10 also talks about be still and know that I am God.

And that's going to pull us back to the God factor.

The God factor.

Be still and know that I'm God.

And everybody says, I don't have time to sit down five minutes.

I don't have the time.

I'm crazy busy.

Well, it's amazing how it works.

But when we take that five minutes and we learn, we just sit, breathe, take a deep breath, slow down, slow your mind down, that you're able to accomplish so much more.

So with the God factor in mind.

Greg, what do you, what do you have to say about that?

Okay, that's going to be in Proverbs, but I want to go back to the one you shared on Proverbs 31 there, where it says the.

The wife is smiling at the future.

That's right.

You know why she's smiling?

Because number one, she did probably got still before God and got a game plan.

But because everything's.

She's not crazy busy, that lady.

If you look at everything she was doing, she was probably very organized, but she had.

If not, she had every reason in the world to be crazy.

Yeah, yeah.

But she wasn't.

And probably have an attitude about her husband sitting around the gate all day.

Oh, that's right.

Because it does say he sat at the city gates with the leaders of the land.

That's.

But she smiled at the future because she had her trust in God and she was taking care of her household because it said she looks wells to the way her household.

But no, don't just make that scripture for the wife.

Because I believe the husband was some type of business leader, leader in the country.

He was looking on his part to taking care of the household and what he was called to do.

So with that in mind, they're able to smile at the future.

So Proverbs 3, 6.

I call it getting back to the God factor, which we talked about in episode one and two.

It says, in all your ways.

How many ways?

All your ways.

Acknowledge the Lord and he will make your path straight.

So if you take this time, like Linda said, be still, acknowledge God.

Invite him into your daily life.

Yeah, he Says your paths will be straight because he knows how to make your paths.

God will direct your paths paths, he'll direct your steps, he'll bring in favor and he'll give you wisdom and you will be fruitful.

So trust God, put your schedule, say world, stop.

Grab your spouse by the hand and say, daddy, God help us guide out our future.

Thank you for helping us get through this coming week.

What are the priorities you want us to have?

What direction should we go?

Should we have the kids playing all these sports games?

Or maybe we need to limit them.

Should we be going to do this?

Do we need to back off on this?

Do I need to get to the gym?

What do I Just give us wisdom even with our work.

Whether you're a stay at home mom or a working career mom, whether you're a stay at home dad or you work or you both do stop the world, get God involved and you can smile at the future.

That's good.

That's good work.

Amen.

All right, well, let's talk about a little bit of homework.

Okay.

Our honeydew.

And here we are talking about the to do list right now.

This is a priority.

There's non negotiable, right?

That's right.

Okay.

Anyways, well, just talk about the action points that we've covered.

I think started with episode six and we've gone through to the episode eight and talk about if you are too busy, realize, you know, talk about the beach story in episode seven that Greg shared.

How are you on that drift?

Are you drifting?

Is the riptide pulling you under?

And what adjustments you can make, write it down, you know, as you're, as you're sitting in connecting or do a walk and talk as you're walking and talking, just, you know, converse about it.

And if you didn't listen to episode seven, I recommend you get back and especially that one.

It's really good.

Of course, number six is also good too.

Matter of fact, all of the episodes are good.

I think you're biased, you're prejudiced.

But the first one to this section or first two are really good because it all flows together.

Really.

Everything overlaps.

It does.

And the second part of homework, guess what it is?

It's really not homework.

It's fun work.

It's fun work.

Yes.

And you can do it on the weekends.

It's the ten second kiss.

So make sure you grab your spouse, grab them, pull them to you and give them a good old kiss.

Set your timer for 10 seconds or again, like we say, get extra credit and go a little bit longer and just give them a good old kiss.

And believe me, as we talked about last time, it can help set the pace for your day.

It does.

Helps you slow down and then and focus on each other.

Right?

Focus on each other.

And don't be thinking about all the honeydews when you're doing the kiss.

All right.

But then take that 10 or 15 seconds extra and say a quick prayer for your day and speak blessings over your marriage and your kids, your doggie who, whatever you're doing.

And with that, we will be back next week.

Thank you for investing into your marriage by listening to the Married and Lovett podcast.

Be sure to be a part of.

The ripple effect of making marriage great by sharing this podcast with other couples to equip them to be married and love it.

And be sure to check out our website at www.marriedandlovitt.com where you can learn more about Married and Love it.

And contact us with any questions or comments that you may have.

And remember with God that you have a future and a hope and you can be married and love it on purpose.