Reignite the Spark By Flirting With Your Spouse

Insights:

Over the course of our marriage, Nancy and I have tried many things to make our marriage better. Some were okay, some helped, some didn’t and a few were game changers. Here are three that will have a big positive impact on your marriage if you do them consistently.

  • Show appreciation: It's important for couples to show appreciation for each other and express gratitude for the things they do. This can be as simple as saying thank you, acknowledging their efforts, or giving compliments. Feeling appreciated can help your spouse feel valued and loved, and can strengthen the emotional bond between the two of you.

  • Maintain intimacy: Intimacy is an important aspect of marriage, and many couples don't put in the effort to maintain it. Intentionally making intimacy a priority will grow you closer to each other. This can involve physical intimacy such as holding hands, hugging, and kissing, as well as emotional intimacy such as sharing thoughts, feelings, and dreams. Making time for each other, being present in the moment, and creating opportunities for connection can help keep the spark alive in your marriage.

  • Respect boundaries: It's important for couples to respect each other's boundaries and individuality. This means allowing each other to have personal space, pursuing individual interests and hobbies, and respecting each other's opinions and decisions. Allowing for individuality can help each spouse feel respected and empowered, and can prevent feelings of resentment and frustration from building up in the marriage.

The cool thing about these three is that they are easy to do. Those few words of appreciation every day coupled with the non-sexual part of physical intimacy and going a little deeper in your conversations and then respecting each other's boundaries will take your marriage up a level.  

Think about this. What if you both committed to do each of those three things every day for the next forty days? Where do you think your marriage could be? Are you all in?

Our new Awesome Marriage Sex Course is live at Awesome Marriage University! Use the special discount code SEXLAUNCH through March for 20% off.  

Things For You To Think About:

  • How would you rate the flirting in your marriage today, using the 1-10 scale where 10 is amazing?

  • How have you flirted with each other in the past?

  • Be intentional about adding flirting into your marriage.

2 Minute Drill

Chris and Jenni Graebe talk with Dr. Kim about navigating marriage with five kids at home.

Quick Hits:

This Week’s Quote:  Charley Pride was born on March 18, 1934. He was an African American singer, guitarist, and professional baseball player. His greatest musical success came in the early to mid-1970s, when he was the best-selling performer for RCA Records since Elvis Presley. Charley died in 2020 from COVID complications.

  • I don't care what the religion is called; as far as I'm concerned, one God, the God I adhere to, is in charge of all of them.

  • What qualifies me to tell people how to act or what to think? I'm Charley Pride, country singer. Period.

This Week’s Trivia Question:

Who was the first author to use a "typemachine" or typewriter in writing a manuscript?

This Week’s “Did You Know?”

7% of American adults believe that chocolate milk comes from brown cows. Seven percent doesn’t sound like a lot, but it actually works out to be 16.4 million American adults.

Something To Talk About

Would you rather be stranded on a deserted island for the rest of your life or live in a bustling city you could never leave?

This Week’s Trivia Answer:

  • Mark Twain

Kim KimberlingComment
3 Simple Ways to Step Up Your Marriage Game

Insights:

Over the course of our marriage, Nancy and I have tried many things to make our marriage better. Some were okay, some helped, some didn’t and a few were game changers. Here are three that will have a big positive impact on your marriage if you do them consistently.

  • Show appreciation: It's important for couples to show appreciation for each other and express gratitude for the things they do. This can be as simple as saying thank you, acknowledging their efforts, or giving compliments. Feeling appreciated can help your spouse feel valued and loved, and can strengthen the emotional bond between the two of you.

  • Maintain intimacy: Intimacy is an important aspect of marriage, and many couples don't put in the effort to maintain it. Intentionally making intimacy a priority will grow you closer to each other. This can involve physical intimacy such as holding hands, hugging, and kissing, as well as emotional intimacy such as sharing thoughts, feelings, and dreams. Making time for each other, being present in the moment, and creating opportunities for connection can help keep the spark alive in your marriage.

  • Respect boundaries: It's important for couples to respect each other's boundaries and individuality. This means allowing each other to have personal space, pursuing individual interests and hobbies, and respecting each other's opinions and decisions. Allowing for individuality can help each spouse feel respected and empowered, and can prevent feelings of resentment and frustration from building up in the marriage.

The cool thing about these three is that they are easy to do. Those few words of appreciation every day coupled with the non-sexual part of physical intimacy and going a little deeper in your conversations and then respecting each other's boundaries will take your marriage up a level.  

Think about this. What if you both committed to do each of those three things every day for the next forty days? Where do you think your marriage could be? Are you all in?

Our new Awesome Marriage Sex Course is coming to Awesome Marriage University soon! Watch for our announcement!

Things For You To Think About:

  • Share with each other the things that make you feel most appreciated.

  • When in your day can you be intentional with each other in maintaining intimacy?

  • Share with each other the boundary that is most important to you.

2 Minute Drill

A clip on 4 Principles of Peacemaking from my interview with Mark Batterson.

Quick Hits:

This Week’s Quote:  Carrie Underwood

Born on March 10, 1983 in Muskogee, Oklahoma, Carrie won Season 4 of American Idol. She has sold over 70 million records, and won 8 Grammys along with many other music awards.

After I released 'Jesus, Take the Wheel,' people started saying, Oh, it's kind of risky. You're coming out with a religious song. And I was thinking, Really? I grew up in Oklahoma; I always had a close relationship with God. I never thought it was risky in the least. If anything, I thought it was the safest thing I could do.

This Week’s Trivia Question:

In the 1800s, before the phrase “cheese,” said the name of dried fruit was used to induce people to smile before a photograph?

This Week’s “Did You Know?”

A giraffe cleans its ears with its tongue, which is over a foot and a half long or 21 inches.

Something To Talk About

Would you rather have the ability to mute people at will or pause people for five seconds at a time, but only once an hour?

Awesome Marriage This week

AM Podcast: Boundaries Within Your Marriage | Ep. 546

AM YouTube Channel:  3 Unhealthy Things I See In Most Marriages

AM YouVersion Plan: 7 Day Couple's Connection Challenge

This Week’s Trivia Answer:

  • Prunes

Kim KimberlingComment
Do You Know These 5 Stats On Marriage?

Insights:

Do You Know These 5 Stats On Marriage?

I love marriage. I love being married. Sure, marriage is hard but all great things require hard work! Marriage teaches us so much about ourselves, about being in a close relationship, and about how God always has answers for us. 

So when I came across an article in The Hill Online about marriage in America, it caught my attention. This is a sampling of what I read: 

  • Since the U.S. government began keeping marriage records in 1867, the current marriage rate is the lowest its been 

  • 70 years ago, 80% of U.S. households were made up of married couples. 

  • In 2020, that number fell to 49%

  • Record proportions of young U.S. adults are expected to never marry

  • The institution of marriage in America appears to have become increasingly inconsequential for growing numbers of young men and women, including couples having children together

Why? What happened? Why is the option of marriage so far down the list of priorities for so many people today? Is marriage going the way of other things that were once a real part of our lives but are no longer around today?

Are there any positive stats about marriage today? If there are, do we tend to ignore them as a culture? 

Consider these stats: 

  • On average, married couples have better physical health, more financial stability, and greater social mobility than unmarried people. 

  • The children of those couples are more likely to experience higher academic performance, emotional maturity, and financial stability than children who don’t have both parents in the home. 

  • Studies show divorce and unwed childbearing cost taxpayers over $110 billion each year. 

  • Children raised in single-parent homes are statistically more likely to abuse drugs and alcohol, exhibit poor social behaviors, commit violent crimes and are more likely to drop out of school. 

  • Marriage also reduces the probability of child poverty by 80%.

I wish I had the answer but I don’t. So what do we do? We strengthen our marriages. We show the world that it is possible to have good marriages. We encourage the world to look at our marriages and see that there is something very special there. We fight back by example and love. It begins with your marriage. It is the only marriage you have agency over. What if each of us committed to work on our marriages day after day and then someone sees our marriage and decides they can do the same thing in theirs? I believe we really can have a world full of awesome marriages and that will literally change the world!

Our new Awesome Marriage Sex Course is coming to Awesome Marriage University soon! Watch for our announcement!

Things For You To Think About:

  • Pick one thing you can work on together to strengthen your marriage.

  • When the world looks at your marriage what do they see?

  • What do you want them to see?

2 Minute Drill

Nancy and I answer a question we get asked a lot!

Quick Hits:

This Week’s Quote: Theodore Seuss Geisel, "Dr. Seuss"

Children’s book author and cartoonist Theodore Geisel was born on March 2, 1904. He wrote over 60 books as Dr. Suess. Dr. Seuss's honors include two Academy Awards, two Emmy Awards, a Peabody Award, the Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal, the Inkpot Award and the Pulitzer Prize.

  • Sometimes, when I see my granddaughters make small discoveries of their own, I wish I were a child.

  • Think left and think right and think low and think high. Oh, the thinks you can think up if only you try!

This Week’s Trivia Question:

Which country artist threw javelin while attending Oklahoma State University?

This Week’s “Did You Know?”

There are actually two Air Force Ones. So when Air Force One's SAM 28000 Boeing 747-200B plane is getting a tune-up, there's an identical SAM 29000 standing by. One plane is always ready for the president's use whenever needed.

Something To Talk About

  • Would you rather never get tired or never have to go to the bathroom?

Awesome Marriage This week

AM Podcast: 5 Rhythms of a Healthy Marriage with Chris & Jennie Graebe | Ep. 545

The co-hosts of the Rhythm Of Us podcast and the authors of The Rhythm of Us: Create the Thriving Marriage You Long For join me as we look at how to build healthy rhythms in your marriage.

AM YouTube Channel:  How To Take Control Of Your Day

What would your day look like if there was balance? Let’s look at how to make that happen.

AM YouVersion Plan: Traffic Signs and Your Marriage Part 2

What would it look like if we took these common signs and applied them to our marriage? Let’s look at 4 more signs this week.

This Week’s Trivia Answer:

  • Garth Brooks

Kim KimberlingComment