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Help Heal My Marriage - 15. Love is a Choice
Daniel Crosby • February 3, 2025
15. Love is a Choice
Our culture has distorted the idea of LOVE. How’s that for directness?
Hollywood’s idea of love…Tik Tok’s idea of love…Our neighbor’s idea of love…
So what is love anyway?!
Love is the choice to seek only the best. It’s not just a feeling in the moment. It’s not just a logical thought either. It’s all of it wrapped up together.
Jesus said, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
See where he said it takes the “heart, soul, and mind?” That’s complex!
This means that I should seek the best relationship with God, the best relationship with others, and the best relationship with myself.
Sometimes choosing what is best turns out to be what is the most difficult.
So what can help us choose love? Here are 3 ideas from Robert Sternberg, a psychologist that studied love.
1. Intimacy – Do you have fun together? Would you rather spend the day with your spouse or with anyone but your spouse? Do you play, tease, joke, talk, and dream together? Can you have conversations about hard things?
2. Passion – How’s your sex life? Is it growing and deepening or is it on the back burner and just a chore to check off the list? Do you kiss? Do you really kiss, like more than a peck on the cheek while walking out the door? Do you admire your spouse. Do you check them out when they walk away? Do you hug long and often?
3. Commitment – How strong is your trust in your marriage? Do you feel secure? Can you talk to your spouse about it if you don’t feel secure? Do you believe that you’d stay married even through a miscarriage, a life changing medical crisis, financial ruin, or an affair?
It’s Go Time:
Are your answers mostly positive to the above or do you need to get to work and begin making your love foundation a bit more solid? Maybe talk to your spouse about these big 3. Maybe call and set up an appointment with a counselor.
Every day I help hurting frazzled people by walking with them as they get back on the path toward becoming who God created them to be. Shoot me an email if there’s anything I can do to help you or someone you know. daniel@danielcrosbycounseling.com
17. Call a Cease Fire The problem with retaliation and revenge is that it becomes perpetual. My attack causes your counterattack causes my sneak attack causes you to launch your nukes and so on. This cycle only stops when one of two things happens. Either one of us destroys the other and the marriage or one of us decides to stop retaliating. I’m challenging you, the one hearing this, to be the one to choose to stop. Here are three ways to stop the ongoing attacks: 1. Put down your gun – This means taking a deep breath, lowering your voice, and sitting down if you’re standing or pacing. In essence, become less of a threat. 2. Surrender…sort of – Waving the white flag isn’t necessarily defeat if you think of it as living to fight another day. Say things like, “I’m tired of fighting.” “I need to stop talking about this for now.” “We can’t keep doing this.” (Refer back to our timeout topic earlier) 3. Begin peace talks – State what’s true like: “I know we love each other AND I also know that we totally disagree about this AND I know there’s a place we can come to an agreement on AND I know right now is not the time to keep going in circles AND I want to talk about it tonight when I get home around 6:30 if you’re willing.” Go Time: Which one of you is the more mature one that is going to choose to stop the cycle? Trick Question! No one wants to be the less mature one. If you’re both trying to be the mature one then this thing might just work out ok! Every day I help hurting frazzled people by walking with them as they get back on the path toward becoming who God created them to be. Shoot me an email if there’s anything I can do to help you or someone you know. daniel@danielcrosbycounseling.com
16. Go All In One of the most challenging things I see in my office with couples is a hesitancy to really go all-in on their marriage. If your marriage has gone through some difficulty lately, it’s hard to be all-in. We’re fearful and we want to protect ourselves from being hurt even more. Staying limbo doesn’t make for a good relationship. A contractor wouldn’t start building you a house until you’re all in and have signed the contract. A doctor won’t operate until you’re signed the paperwork saying you agree to the procedure. So how can you go all in? Here are 3 ideas: 1. Recognize the risks – Let’s apply some logic to this and admit that it could crash and burn. Just say that aloud! Now, write down worst case scenario and tell yourself what you would do if that happened. Chances are this is not a life ending decision to go all-in. 2. Clearly communicate deal breakers – Don’t tolerate the intolerable. If there’s a deal breaking behavior occurring, then break the deal. If an affair happens again, and again, and again, it’s probably time to stop kicking the can down the road and hit the eject button. 3. Choose to see the good – I know there WAS hurt in the past, but I want you to try to see the possible good in the future that will only come with being all-in. Is the good, good enough to justify taking the risk of going all-in. It’s Go Time: If you’re still wavering on going all-in, there may be more going on beneath the surface. Go talk to a good pastor or counselor who can help you dig and give you a different perspective on why you’re struggling to take that big step IN or OUT. Every day I help hurting frazzled people by walking with them as they get back on the path toward becoming who God created them to be. Shoot me an email if there’s anything I can do to help you or someone you know. daniel@danielcrosbycounseling.com
“Tuesdays with Morrie” by Mitch Albom is one of those must-read classics. It’s a hard read at times and it’ll have you tearing up. It’s a true story, a memoir of sorts, written by Albom. His favorite college professor Morrie develops the disease ALS and the book walks us through several week’s worth of conversations the two had together. Albom would go to Morrie’s house every Tuesday and visit with him as the disease progressed. The two move from student and pupil to close intimate friends as Morrie shares his thoughts on living life, ending life, and everything in between. There’s so much wisdom packed into this little book that you can’t read it without realizing some things in your own life that are poorly prioritized. It made me take stock of what is really important and ask the question, “Why do I stress about the things I do?” Relationships are more important than money, sex, and power. It’s more about how we live our lives and the legacy we leave behind than what we accomplished and what we can accumulate while we’re here. If you’re ready for a reset then start with “Tuesdays with Morrie” by Mitch Albom.
