Have you ever gone on a date that ended up being a meeting about the kids, money problems, in-laws, work, chores, etc.?

Next time you go on a date, pull up this article on your smart phone and take the conversation in a totally different direction. Take turns answering the questions first. There are no wrong answers. Make it a night of discovery!

Rediscover your spouse and all the reasons you truly love them. Enjoy humor and discussion about things that have no emotional negativity. Take your date night to a whole other level!

Conversation Starters (adapted from Love Talk Starters by Les and Leslie Parrott)

Broken promises cause a lot of pain in our lives.

“He promised to take out the kitchen trash every day.”

“She said she was done with stopping for a drink with coworkers on the way home.”

“He told me he would take care of paying that bill.”

“I promised myself I would exercise daily, but I’ve done it but once in the last three weeks.”

Not Keeping Promises Hurts

According to author Malcolm Gladwell (Outliers: The Story of Success), whatever you practice for 10,000 hours will cause you to become an expert in it.

Most of us who are older understand this. When we first began our careers, we learned how to do a task. Over the years, as we performed the task over and over, we became one of the best.

In the break room, we sometimes hear someone say, “I could never do what you do.” We can do it quicker and better than anyone at our company. We get so good at it, we can do it when we are tired or sleepy. It is as if it happens naturally, by default. We know it is not true, because we have spent thousands and thousands of hours doing it.

How To Become An Expert

“The emerging picture from studies is that ten thousand hours of practice is required to achieve the level of mastery associated with being a world-class expert- in anything,” writes the neurologist Daniel Levetin.

The more we do something, the better we get at it. Take your hobby, for example. The more you do it, the better you become. If you enjoy golf, tennis, scrapbooking, pinteresting, photography, or anything else, the more of it you do, the better you become. And the theory says that if you do it long enough, you will get to expert status.

Becoming An Expert In Our Relationship

We hear it so often in different ways from spouses of all ages and lengths of marriages.

“My wife loves her phone more than she loves me. I want to grab it away from her and chunk it in the toilet.”

“I wish my husband spent half the time with me that he spends on his smart phone. I’m as lonely as I was before I ever met him.”

“Why am I not good enough to put the phone down? Why does everything have to be more important than me all the time?”

Relational Bankruptcy In The Digital Age

Growing up in Texas, we were taught in school that there are four seasons: Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter. Except for a decade living in the Texas Panhandle, we have lived in parts of Texas that only experienced Spring, Summer, Summer, and Fall.

The things about seasons is that they come whether we are ready for them or not.   We do not have any control about when they start or end or whether they are stormy or pleasant. Our job is to be prepared for them and adjust to them. The longer we live, we see them repeat enough that we learn how to do each of them better.

Families Have Seasons Too

Researchers have discovered through studies of countless families that families have seasons too. Like the annual season of life, there are huge similarities among families in the progression and changes of family seasons. We also have a great amount of choice in how we prepare for and adjust to each season.

But unlike the annual seasons of life, we have many choices in our family season development. Our choices influence when, where and with whom we begin our family seasons. Our choices influence how we get through the different family seasons and whether we experience seasons full of story drama, or pleasant peace and joy.

The Seasons of Family