Wendy”s GONE – HELP!!!

leaving for HAITI!!!

getting ready for the tv crew…DAY 10

Today we have the TV crew coming…I assume we will be doing our dare with them today?? who knows…I am playing hookie from church today and cleaning the house and getting some stuff ready for the crew to come. I will let you know how this goes…

Oh yeah, by the way…we are going to be a little different than the other couples as this “love dare” continues…Wendy is getting ready to go away for 8 days on a missions trip…more on that next time!

talk soon…make sure you comment and let us know how this “love dare” is effecting your relationship!!

Kevin
www.kevinpauls.com

update and overiew after 8 days…

I have to admit that the need to create a blog daily…video or written, has heightened my awareness of our daily interaction. What impact is our speech having? Are we communicating well and having the impact we desire on each other? Often, sadly…we do not have the impact we would like to have. Often times the impact is opposite to our intentions

But this is good learning…we need to be better aware of how we are saying something…it’s not always the content that is hurtful!

But that said…these first 8 days have been, for the most part positive. Wendy and I are fortunate…we actually like each other!! We are starting from a place of “happy” so…from my perspective this is only an enhancement to the already good marriage!!

The really cool thing is this…even though we both feel that our marriage is good…i have seen times in the last 8 days that it can get a lot better with attention to details!!! A little effort goes a long way!! Intentionally trying to be loving is always a good thing!

Do I recommend this for every couple? YES!!! Stay tuned and we would love to hear from you!!

Kevin
www.kevinpauls.com
(a shameless plug!!)

day 8 (catchy title eh??)

Day 8 – Ok…I might have cheated a bit…

Well, I must admit…I kinda ruined Day 8 by reading about it ahead of time. When I realized we were going to be burning the negative list from Day 7…I took a short cut. Basically…”I cheated”!! I just wrote a BIG list of positive things and “thought” of my couple of negative ones – then “burned them in my mind” LOL
So, no flames in this house today! (Anyway, if it was a bad day…I might rather just light Kevin on fire…kidding…just kidding!!!!)

On another note, one of my reasons for wanting to do “The Love Dare” is that I value authenticity and transparency…so I thought it would be good to mention another “mildly tense conversation” today – even though it doesn’t necessarily relate to today’s dare. Overall, as Kevin mentioned, things have been much more pleasant and peaceful around here due to our focus on “daringly loving” each other. Today, though, it was interesting to see old patterns peek out. I was a bit frustrated and disappointed about some differences in expectations around here. And I voiced it! Kevin had a negative reaction…and told me the way he “heard” what I was saying. The way he received my message was SOOO different than what I had intended…so, we had to really work on the conversation – actively listen and repeat back what we were hearing and then clarifying what we were TRYING to say. I am glad that we put in the time & effort…because soon we both understood what the other was reacting to. We took responsibility for our parts and it was all good! Whew!

Summary – marriage can be hard work – but it’s worth the effort!
Hang in there everyone!!

day7 – one of deep thought

OK – seriously, finding a list of things I don’t like about Wendy is hard. In the moment, when she is making me upset, I can name quite a few…BUT today it is a little tough.

I have made my lists and we are to wait to use them…but I also had to encourage Wendy with an attribute from the positive list. This is easy for me. This is one thing that comes naturally…I love to shower her with compliments…there are many things I am not good at in our marriage but I think Wendy would agree…being positive is not something I struggle with!

We worked on our office all day, something I find can be very stressful…BUT – I really think that because this love dare is so fresh and on our minds often, we are being more gentle and kind with each other…I like what it is doing in our home!!

I surprised Wendy…while she is out right now i had our new automatic door lock installed…before some of my friends have a heart attack – my neighbor helped me!!!

Anyway…packing it in for the day…looking forward to Wendy’s surprise! Talk soon…will video blog tomorrow!

Day 6 “Love is not irritable”

Our youngest child, Jordan, decided he wanted to be in the background on this one. He must need attention…(like his father ha ha)
This dare is more of a “planning ahead” dare than a “do today” dare. But I’m sure over the course of the 40 days we’ll have opportunities to put it to the test.

Here’s my profound summary: It’s easy to not be irritated when you’re not irritated. But what will happen on “one of those days”?? Let’s hope our learning from today will make a difference!