We are well into this season of Lent, remembering the love of God that was poured out through Jesus with his death and celebrating his resurrection. Through that, we truly learn how to love like Jesus — selfless and with humility.

Although the “season” of Lent is broadly considered just that — a brief time set aside for holy reverence and reflection — it should yield positive, long-term results. In fact, Fr. Mike Schmitz just put out this great video: “Lent is a Process—Not an Event.”

As many of us are avoiding carnal indulgences, allowing us to focus on improving our spirituality in a deeply profound way, additionally I encourage you and your beloved to focus on enriching your marriage for Lent.

Loving Your Spouse Through the Lens of Jesus

Being a son or a daughter of God means so much more than wearing our faith on our sleeve as some sort of badge of honor. Our faith empowers us to live more like Jesus, and this becomes more evident in every area of our lives — especially marriage.

How did Jesus live his life? Through humility and with a servant’s heart.

That is how we lead — loving our spouse through humility and with a servant’s heart. Marriage is referred to as a “mystery” in Ephesians, and also gives us a glimpse into what that means. “For this reason a man shall leave [his] father and [his] mother
and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” (5:31)

Marriage is the complete giving of one’s self to another and becoming one flesh.

To put this into simple terms, before marriage, I was Gordon and my wife was Regina. Over a decade ago, we became “the marriage of Gordon and Regina.” We are individual human beings, but unified as one, under the bond of our marriage.

But developing our marriage did not stop the second we said, “I do.” We weren’t magically made perfect as a married couple that day. We quickly learned that continued effort and hard, but rewarding work was to begin right away — if we truly believed in our vows for each other… and we certainly did.

So how do we work on this, practically speaking?

Dropping Negative Tendencies and Strengthening Positive Temperaments

Spoiler alert: this won’t be easy. But as I mentioned before, working hard on improving your marriage is so rewarding.

We all approach life and its nuances in different ways. How we interact with each other and the react to things that directly or indirectly affect us is what makes up our temperaments. In very simple terms, we can refer to this our prevailing “mood” or “mood patterns.”

It is vitally important to, at the very least, have a general idea of “what makes us tick.” In my opinion, it is also just as important to develop a deeper understanding of the innermost parts of our being by learning more about our temperaments. In marriage, it becomes even more important to learn about each other’s temperament.

Think about it this way: wondering why there is tension in your marriage when you haven’t learned how to speak your spouse’s language (empowering them within their temperament) is like getting frustrated that your microwave hasn’t filed your taxes. All of us have a unique set of wires that make up who we are, and if we use the wrong tools on each other, we lose our functionality. We end up destroying the beautiful creature that we fell in love with.

So how do we put this into practice within our marriage?

1 . Talk about everything.

And I mean everything.

The good, the bad, the ugly. Even the things we feel might be irrational fears, everything.

Lack of communication is the very withholding of one’s self to the other. When that happens, we lose the very Christlike nature within the foundation of our marriage. We can and should be excited to share everything with each other. Lack of communication leads to so many negative results, the chief among them is the compromising of trust and integrity within your marriage. None of us are mind-readers, so the guessing game cannot be a part of a healthy marriage.

If being an open book with your spouse isn’t your M.O., my friend, you are backpedaling on your vows. Really, at the end of the day, what are you trying to hide? If fear of looking weak in front of your spouse is holding you back from sharing, well then, start there. Tell your spouse that you are afraid to share with them. Have a conversation about it. Open communication will undoubtedly unlock deeper levels of intimacy with your spouse.

Communication is also equal parts talking and listening. We’ll talk more about being a steamroller later on, but make sure that when you communicate or have a conversation, it isn’t a one-sided event. Your spouse needs to be actively listened to just as much as you do — remember that.

Listening to your spouse is also not just a passive stance to take — merely “putting in your time” while your spouse drones on. We all have a desire to be heard, but not many of us develop the desire to hear. We can and should be excited to listen to each other.

Set aside time every single day to have uninterrupted conversation. If you need a milestone to get you started, set aside fifteen minutes every single day of intentional, uninterrupted conversation. Phones on silent, on the chargers in the other room.

2. Learn more about each other.

I always cringe a little when couples indicate that they “know everything about each other.” While this may seem like an excellent goal, I feel like life together as a married couple becomes quite boring if there isn’t anything new and exciting to learn about each other.

When someone passes away, we usually say “rest in peace” — insinuating that the afterlife is the ultimate peace to attain. Ergo, if we achieve this “ultimate peace” of knowing everything about each other, is it safe to say that part of our marriage is kind of… dead?

Setting that aside, I would go further to say that I don’t necessarily believe that husband and wife can ever truly “know everything about each other,” especially just after a few years of marriage. We all change as time goes on, even if they are slight changes. The beauty of marriage is growing in love, together. Going through changes, together. The only danger is not allowing the other person “in” on that growth. Again, see: “Talk about everything.”

In one of our other articles, we wrote about having a jar filled with conversation prompts, and I can’t begin to express enough how powerful that tool can be. Load it with questions like, what was it like for you the first time we met?, what is your ultimate dream for us as a couple?, what is your ultimate dream for yourself as an individual?, what does true happiness look like to you?, how do I make you feel like you are my priority?, what are things that could be better for us?

Get creative and specific for you and your marriage with these questions. This is a beautiful exercise and can yield very profound results — you may be surprised at each other’s answers, and that rules.

3. Do not be a steamroller.

Using your temperament as a weapon of self-indulgence completely invalidates your spouse’s needs, wants, and desires. This can destroy any and all possibility of thriving together as a couple if it is not brought to your attention, or if left unresolved. Did you catch that?

One part is the awareness that steamrolling may be happening, and the other part is to resolve it.

Our temperaments are unique, beautiful and individualistic, but also complimentary as husband and wife. Marriage is a dance. It is all about give and take. If you notice your spouse needs to express their temperament a little more on a given day, it might mean that you yourself need to take a step back and allow for them to feel loved and listened to in a meaningful way.

If you feel like your spouse may be steamrolling a bit, it can be easy to get frustrated. In fact, I’d say that you may be justified in your frustration if you feel like you hardly have a chance to express your temperament, your emotions, your thoughts, so… talk about it! If you haven’t noticed already, the common theme throughout this article is all about communication.

During those times of uninterrupted conversation mentioned above, bring up the fact that you feel a bit steamrolled at times if that is the case. Or, if you are on the other side — doing the steamrolling — if your spouse makes you aware of this, respond with humility and with a soft demeanor. When your spouse is justifiably upset, it isn’t time to double down and make excuses for hurting him/her.

In short…

I’ll leave you with three very practical ways to help with enriching your marriage for Lent. Bonus points and ten gold stars if you do all three:

1. You may already have a general idea of what your temperament is, but if you would like to go deeper into the inner-workings of who you are, there are plenty of assessments you can take online to find out. This assessment from the study “I Said This, You Heard That” is really well done. This isn’t an official endorsement by any means, but my wife and I took this course with the assessment and it really improved our way of communicating and interacting with each other.
2. Regardless of if you take the assessment or not, as I mentioned above, set aside that time every day to have your uninterrupted conversation with your spouse. It’s easy, and we all have time, so don’t make excuses — put it into practice! I believe in you.
3. Use the conversation prompts to learn more about each other.

At the very least, the takeaway here is the awareness of how we are built and wired as human beings. Through this knowledge of ourselves, we then continually work toward becoming better versions of ourselves for our spouse.

Jump to:

• Get Started
• Review, Refocus, and Reenergize Your Marriage
• Romancing and Pursuing Each Other
• Growing in Love — Practically and Spiritually
• Put it in Action

It’s the beginning of the year, and for most, that means that it’s time to outline the plan for the next 12 months!

Normally that can generally include things like a review of finances, planning for purchases both big and small, home projects and renovations that need to happen, and perhaps a nice vacation.

You may be thinking — that covers all the bases!

But as a married couple, we feel like there is something that often gets overlooked amidst the review and planning of all of the day-to-day, logistical items — and that is a review of the relationship.

First Things First…

We highly recommend working on your beginning of the year plan (including but not limited to the things we mentioned above) together, as a couple.

While this may seem obvious, there may be some out there who feel like they have to tackle the everyday challenges of running the household alone.

We understand that there may be dedicated “managers” of certain aspects (finances, for example), but there is a huge difference between a mutual understanding that someone may be gifted more in areas, and an attitude of, “You’re better at this, so YOU handle it.”

To clarify, one is a partnership, while the other is demanding and setting unhealthy expectations.

Roles within your marriage certainly change as time goes on, and you gain new experiences in life together. However, although as roles are defined, they should always be cooperative and complimentary with and of each other. Regardless of who is doing what, it is important to remain on the same page, and for both to have an understanding of the overall, broad objectives. Otherwise, you can become glorified roommates.

How to Review Refocus and Reenergize Your Relationship

As we mentioned before, it is absolutely important to approach the beginning of the year planning with practicality and from a bird’s eye view. Equally as important is putting your relationship under that same new year review.

Why is that important, and what does it mean?

Reviewing your relationship together at the start of the year helps to establish your roadmap, and helps to set expectations for you as a couple. This includes your romance, your family spirituality, your pursuit of each other, your intentionality to grow in your love for one another, your scheduled date nights for times of reconnecting and fun, for instance.

So let’s talk about that!

Romancing and Pursuing Each Other

Romance within marriage can often be perceived as, “the longer you are married, the less you feel ‘in love.'”

But it doesn’t actually have to be that way. In fact, according to Today, in a new national survey of married Americans, 40 percent of those who’d been married at least 10 years said they remained “very intensely” in love with their partner. So you may be asking, “how is that attainable?”

Although we never claim to have all the answers, we do have some suggestions to keep that spark alive and well.

We have all heard that real, long-term love is a choice, not a feeling. However, we believe that the more you choose to invest in the romance of your marriage, the more you begin to feel in love.

What do we mean by that?

It’s quite simple, really.

You can choose to hold your spouse’s hand when you’re in the car together or walking through the store together.

Start small. This will help to give you and your spouse a sense of connectedness and comfort — especially if either of your primary love languages is physical touch (we have more to say about love languages later in this section).

You can choose to put your phones on their chargers (in the other room, of course) when you are spending time together in your home.

Yes, in the other room — we were sure to cover that loophole! Look, we don’t make many definitive statements here, but we are fairly confident that if you constantly check your phones while you’re spending time together, you’re not actually spending time together. The act of removing that distraction from your immediate access tells your spouse that they are your priority, and they have your full attention. You then become intentional about the quality time you have with your spouse. Checking Facebook and your Cryptocurrency can wait.

You can choose to learn what your spouse’s primary love language is, and become masterfully fluent in it.

We all have a primary love language. It’s the thing that makes us feel most loved when when communicated effectively. For some, a bouquet of flowers as a “I was just thinking of you” gift is most meaningful. For others, quality time like we mentioned in the previous point fills the love tank. When those needs to feel desired are not met, husband and wife begin to feel disconnected from each other. If you haven’t checked out the Five Love Languages yet, or if it has been a while, they have an online quiz to help you determine which love language is your primary.

Growing in Love — Practically and Spiritually

It’s one thing to surprise your spouse with any of the tips mentioned above, but it has to be put into practice in order to keep the fire burning. Trust us when we say that the longer you implement those practices within your marriage, the more natural it feels. It shouldn’t get “easier” because the things worth fighting for involve effort. Hopefully you believe that your marriage is worth it.

Growing in love is how you and your spouse tread the path toward remaining “intensely in love” like we mentioned before. Growing in love is truly living out what it means to cherish your spouse. Every choice you make should have your spouse’s best interests in mind. Every word you utter to your spouse should be that of unconditional love and respect — especially in times of disagreement or conflict.

Cherishing your spouse also involves your intent to invest in your marriage. If you are experiencing difficulties, seeking council and attending couples therapy is always recommended by the leading experts. But you shouldn’t only invest in your marriage when the rough waters begin to rise. When it comes to finances, you generally invest when times are good and when money is flowing. The same goes for your marriage — invest while your marriage is hitting its high notes. If your church or parish offers marriage enrichment classes, attend them! Find programs within your community or purchase programs to do together, at home.

Growing in love also includes the spiritual health of your marriage. Are you praying with and for each other with regularity? Do you attend church together, as a family, with regularity? Do you volunteer to serve your community? Practicing any of what we mentioned helps to develop your family spirituality, bringing the two of you closer together on a tremendously deep level.

Reconnecting by Scheduling Date Nights

Schedule your date nights. Plan them out. Even if your plans include pajamas and unhealthy, delicious snacks while you binge watch The Office, plan it out! The act of planning out and scheduling your date nights will get you both excited at the prospect of spending time together.

We even have an article on Affordable Out of the Box Date Ideas to help get you started.

Your Call to Action (In Conclusion)

As you are planning your year out, have a meeting with your spouse to review your relationship. Put it on the calendar, even. Be deliberate with the meeting. It is vital to review your marriage from time to time if you both intend to be in this for the long haul.

So that’s your homework.

Be renewed by this exercise. Pray together as you meet about this, and have fun!

Fall in love… Ha! See what I did there?

Fall, or Autumn, is a beautiful time of year for most of the area significantly north of the equator. It happens to be my favorite time of year as well! I may be a little biased, but Michigan has some of the most beautiful explosions of color as soon as it consistently dips below fifty degrees.

Fall is a great time for those of us who love anything pumpkin-flavored, cooler weather, and apple orchards. It’s also a great time to reflect on the past several months since the calendar year is winding down.

Being Comfortable vs. Complacent

You may have been married a few years, a few months, or maybe you’re in the middle of preparing for your marriage.

Regardless, any married person will be the first to tell you how easy it is to start to sway to the rhythm of the day-to-day symphony of wedlock. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, either! Routine and rhythm just means you’re getting more and more comfortable with each other. You are getting more and more comfortable with the idea and practice of actually being married. It’s pretty cool!

The challenge is to not allow yourselves to become complacent. Complacency happens when comfort turns into a desire to stay the same at all costs. It worsens when couples begin ignoring opportunities for growth in their marriage. It can even be rooted in pride, a mindset that your marriage is fail-proof, and there’s no need for improvement. Couples who choose not to grow may end up unhappy in their marriages, or they may simply become glorified roommates as time goes on.

How to Overcome Complacency in Marriage

If you want avoid complacency, here are some suggestions for growing closer to your partner.

1. Remember the Magic

It’s probably safe to say you both had butterflies at even the thought of your partner at some point in your relationship. Reminisce with each other. Talk about your first few dates. Talk about the moments when you knew you were falling in love. Life may have turned out differently than your daydreams at the start of your relationship, but that doesn’t mean excitement and anticipation are totally gone.

It may seem easier said than done, but making this part of your “reconnecting routine” will begin to feel natural over time. You’ll even add new memories as you go through life together, accumulating more stories that remind you why you’re together.

Honestly? What has worked for my wife and me is sharing our favorite memories over a rousing game of Uno. In the middle of getting bombarded with 30 “Draw Two” cards, the fond memories are a nice buffer.

Which is a GREAT segue into…

2. Do Things Together

Please excuse the broad brush here, but really think about it — how many things have you done with each other lately? No, scrolling through your phone in the same room doesn’t count.

When is the last time you really connected with each other?

We’re not saying you need to go to a five-star restaurant or spend a weekend at a fancy hotel. Those things are great when you can do them, but there are a multitude of ways to connect with your partner that don’t require a lot of money or planning. In fact, we recently published another article with some great, affordable, out-of-the-box date ideas to help you get started.

It’s also important to be intentional about the time you spend together. If you your date night conversation only centers around home and work projects and what’s on the grocery list, you may need to set aside time to have those conversations other times.

It’s okay to end up at the grocery store at the end of a successful date night, I’d just encourage you to spend a good portion of the night talking about more than just running out of toilet paper.

Find that spark again. Have fun together. Turn on some smooth jazz and wash the dishes together in a dimly lit kitchen. Do things together.

3. Talk About It

Simply bring it up in conversation. Some of the most damaging things that happen in a marriage are the things left unsaid. I may sound like a broken record here, but slipping into the monotony of everyday married life is easy — and most of the time you don’t realize it has happened. Identify that elephant in the room and embrace the conversation together.

Is it scary to be vulnerable? Of course!

We’re taught from a very young age to bottle things up, and some of us are pros at it (talking to myself here… I’m a textbook recovering bottler).

This might be the simplest yet most difficult suggestion on this list.

It can also be the most profound, if you let it.

Ask your spouse these questions:

Are you happy? What does that mean to you?
Are we on the same page on X, Y, and Z?
Is there anything weighing heavily on your mind?
Are you bored? If so, why? How can I help you to feel alive in our marriage again?

Those are just some suggestions for sparking conversation. Use your own words if it makes you more comfortable — but have these conversations. You don’t know what you don’t know, so talk about it. Bring the answers to these questions out into the light.

How Do We Start?

To summarize, start small, but start somewhere.

If you noticed, all three suggestions work very well together, and they don’t have to be done in order.

Here are some action items to get you started:

Schedule a date night (do things together).

On that date night, ask those questions, especially if you don’t want to (talk about it).

And finally, reminisce about your life together so far — the times where you were your happiest (remember the magic).

Once these things become part of your rhythm as a couple, you’ll truly find yourself falling in love all over again.

Whether you just started your adventure together, or you are seasoned veterans when it comes to marriage, we all know how important it is to maintain consistent and intentional date nights. It may actually be more important once you start having children together.

One issue that may come up is financing regularly scheduled date nights. I believe the misconception here is that you have to break the bank in order to have a meaningful experience. Dating your spouse doesn’t necessarily mean a trip to Disney World (I mean, that would be pretty awesome, but unrealistic for the vast majority).

On the contrary, dating your spouse simply requires a deep, intentional connection, or reconnection in some cases, with each other — again, with regularity.

We’ve put together a list of affordable, out-of-the-box date ideas that work for any budget.

Affordable Out of the Box Date Ideas:

Department Store Date Challenge

You’ve most likely witnessed this trend over the past few years. Here’s how it works:

• You pick your favorite department store (my wife’s and mine just happens to be Target), and set a budget for each person ($15-$20 each is usually enough).
• Head to the bargain movie bin (movies are usually about five bucks), and dig in. No peeking, just grab one random movie each and see what you both picked. If it happens to be the live action Avatar: The Last Airbender, you have our permission to pick a new movie.
• Then you split up and pick out your spouse’s favorite drink, candy and/or snack.
• You head to the register when you’re done, and wait to reveal your treasures for until you get home.
• Once you get home, it’s time for pjs, movies, snacks and snuggles. Bonus points for voting on which movie was the best out of the two.

Get Thrifty and Head to Dinner

• Head to your local thrift shop, and pick out some outfits for each other.
• Head home and toss them in the washer and dryer.
• Once they’re ready, it’s time to get dolled up for your big night. Bonus points here are if you can find anything close to Harry and Lloyd’s ensemble.
• Head to a restaurant of your choice. You can also significantly cut the cost of this date night by cooking with each other at home. Plus, it’s more fun. Unless you’re a terrible cook. Oh, and get dessert. You have our permission.

Date Ideas that Virtually Cost Nothing:

Flip a Coin and Take a Drive

This one’s fun.

• Pick two locations within a reasonable driving distance. Determine which side of the coin is which location.
• Flip a coin, and have your spouse “call” it.
• Get in the car and drive. Hold hands on the drive if that’s your M.O…
• Walk around your newly discovered favorite spot when you get there. Hold hands here, too.
• Maybe pick up some cool-looking rocks as a memento from your romantic getaway.

Window Shopping in Your Local Downtown

If you don’t have a downtown with mom & pop shops, then your local mall will suffice. The concept is pretty simple:

• Head downtown, walk around, and head into the shops.
• Window shop. Try on new outfits. Talk to the store owners and hear their story of how they got started. Get creative!
• Grab some cheap tacos for lunch, or pack some PB&Js ahead of time, and find a great picnic area.
• Our recommendation is to check-in at the shops on social media, especially if they’re locally owned. That costs nothing, and it helps spread the word about that cool store you found.

The beauty of this is that there is no pressure to buy anything. You can look at all of the cool, super expensive stuff you normally don’t look at. This helps you to slow down and discover new things about your downtown or your local mall.

Love Letters and Sticky Notes

Again, this costs just about zero dollars to do. Write love letters to your spouse and hide them around the house. I’ve even dropped 49 cents on a stamp and bought envelopes from the dollar store to physically mail a letter to my wife… to our own house. Who doesn’t like getting fun mail? I even like to doodle all over the note with a bunch of hearts, kissy faces and other mushy stuff like that.
Get a pack of sticky notes and write up a few short love messages to your spouse every morning before you head to work. Stick them on things your spouse uses or sees daily so they can find them easily. Send them on a wild and crazy treasure hunt, Nicolas Cage style.

Here’s Your Homework:

Okay, so we know that we loaded you with a lot of affordable out of the box date ideas. You may be wondering, where do we start? 

In short? You start simple.

Our homework for you and your spouse is to start by writing down some “cue questions” for each other.

Questions like:

• When did you know I was “the one?”
• What was it like for you when you fell in love with me?
• What is your favorite memory of us?
• What is your favorite memory as a child?
• What is your favorite movie that you could watch over and over again, and it would never get old?
• What are your dreams and goals for the next 5 years?

…to name a few. This list could go on forever.

If you don’t know the answer to the questions, great! That will help you to learn new things about your spouse. If you already know the answer to the questions, that’s great, too! My wife and I have found that with these questions, after over a decade of being married, we hear new things in stories that we’ve heard and told each other several times. Little details we never heard before start popping up, and it’s exciting.

Play some cards or a few board games with each other and ask each other these questions while you’re hanging out. You’ll be surprised to see hours of meaningful conversation pass by in what feels like minutes.

Steer clear of Monopoly, though. That game makes people see “the real you,” and your spouse isn’t ready for that yet.