Category Archives: Uncategorized

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How to Make Your Marriage More Successful

Are you trying at your marriage or are you committed in your marriage? Those that “try” at anything are usually not committed. They will stay with something until it gets hard. Committed means you do what ever it takes to make something work.  Those that commit generally succeed, while those that try will generally fail.

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A deep level of commitment in a marriage can lead to a lower divorce rate. According to Thomas Bradbury, Benjamin Karney and Dominik Schoebi from the Relationship Institute at UCLA couples that both people were willing to make sacrifices for the sake of the marriage were significantly more likely to have lasting and happy marriages. Of the  172 couples in the study, 78.5% were still married after 11 years and 21.5% were divorced.  This is significantly better than the average divorce rate.

Ways to make your marriage more successful:

  • Compromise.  Good marriages are not based on I win or you win.  It is not a winning or losing proposition. Commit to the relationship rather than committing to your own immediate needs and agenda. Sometimes you need to sacrifice your needs and wants.
  • Communicate. When you don’t see things eye to eye talk to your spouse. There is a good chance that your spouse can not read your mind.
  • Pray together and for each other.  Pray for strength and unity in your marriage. Pray for others and their needs on a daily basis. Men, here is a prayer for your wife.
  • Commit with actions. Let your actions reflect your commitment. Make yourself available when your spouse wants to talk. Spend time alone with your spouse. Laugh together. Have date moments. Plan for your future together.
  • Commit with words. Tell your spouse that you are committed to your marriage for the rest of your life. Tell your spouse you love them in front of your kids. Let your kids know that you and your spouse are committed to each other through thick and thin. This will put your kids at ease. They see a lot of divorce through their friends.
  • Learn your spouse’s Love Language.  There are only 5 to learn. Here is a post I did on The Language of Love.
  • Be Grateful for your spouse. What are you thankful for? Ask God to bring these things to mind. Make a list and review it often.
  • Do a check up. Ask your spouse how you are doing for him or her every 6 months. Ask what you can do to improve the relationship. 
  • Model other couples that have successful marriages. Ask a couple that has been successfully married a long time to mentor you.
  •  Renew your wedding vows every 5 – 10 years. Recommit to each other. My wife and I did this the last time, in Cana, for our 25th wedding anniversary.

These are just a few ideas to make a marriage more successful. Please feel free to share this with others.

Be Great!

 

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How To Not Lose An Idea

7 Ways to Record Your Ideas

Have you ever had a great idea and later when you are trying to figure out what that great idea was you have forgot the idea? I think this has happened to everyone at some time or another.

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Here are 7 ways to record your ideas so you don’t forget them:

  1. Record your ideas in a journal. Set aside time to think every day. Pick a time of day that works best for you. Record your thoughts and ideas in the Idea Journal. You can record on a paper or electronic journal.
  2. Carry a small pad of paper and pen or pencil. A small notebook like a Moleskin or a spiral notebook is perfect for this. There is even an app for Moleskin so you can use your phone or tablet.
  3. Use the voice memos app on your iPhone or Android phone. Most cells phones have a voice recording app. A nice option if you use Dropbox and want to share your messages is to use DropVox. This is a recording tool that will drop your message right in to DropBox.
  4. Carry a small voice recorder. I have used a small voice recorder like the one in the picture above for years. I have it in my car so as I am driving I can just hit the record button to capture thoughts, ideas and to dos.
  5. Call yourself and leave a voice mail. This is a trick I learned a long time ago. If you have an idea while you are away from your office  call yourself on your cell or office phone and leave a message.
  6. Use notes on your phone. Most cell phones have some sort of messaging app or notes app that you can record notes.
  7.  Text or email yourself. Many cell phones have voice texting.  Most vehicles have the capabilty to do voice texting as well when they are in sync with your phone. An email provides you with a written record.

Be Great!

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How to Put Discipline in Your Life

We all want to do so many things in our lives, but we are limited by time. How we schedule our day and discipline ourselves has a big impact on whether we accomplish what we set out to do each day.

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Self discipline is hard and is something you can train yourself to get better at. Much of it is sticking to your plan and not letting others or your own self talk convince you to not get done what you want to get accomplished.

6 Areas to Commit Time and Create More Discipline

  • Faith – Commit time to prayer and go to church. Set aside time each day to pray. How many minutes/hours would you like to pray each day?  I have found early mornings and night time work best for me. Figure out your best prayer time. Don’t skip church because you want to sleep in or have other things to do on Sunday. Plan on which mass or service you attend each week.
  • Fitness – Commit time to workout. How many times per week do you want to workout? How long do you want your workouts to be? What kind of workouts do you want to do? Start with an easy workout just a few minutes per day and work your way up to longer and harder workouts.
  • Friends – Commit to spending time with friends. How often do you want to spend time with friends? Who do you want to spend time with? Set a goal of how many times per week or month you want to spend with your friends.
  • Finances – Commit time to working on your finances. The easiest thing to do is set your monthly bills on autopay. Set up your investments with monthly deductions. Most employers offer a 401k plan. This is an easy way to set aside monies for retirement and comes out of your pay pretax. Review your investment statements monthly.  Set up a quarterly and  an annual review with a financial planner.
  • Family – Commit time to your spouse and children. Plan to spend time with your family each day. Have family dinners.  Have date time or date moments with your spouse. Take time to talk to your kids and play with them.
  • Fun – Commit time to doing something fun. Get vacation and fun time planned and put in your calendar. Where would you like to go on vacation? What weekend trips would you like to go on? What fun things have you not done in a while that you would like to do?

After answering these questions for each category pull out your calendar. Block time in your calendar for each of these 6 areas. Tell your spouse or a friend what you have scheduled and what your goals are. You will have a greater chance of hitting them if you have accountability to someone other than yourself.

Be Great! 

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How to Read More Books Every Year

I love to read and to learn. I generally read between 24 – 40 books per year. I skim or reads chapters of another 50+ books per year.

I usually read books based on recommendations. The recommendation may come from a friend, business associate, priest, blog or business magazine. I have found I don’t want to waste time reading something that may not be good.

 

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Reading for learning. When I read to learn I choose nonfiction books. They are usually business related or based on a certain topic to learn about. Here is how to read a nonfiction book.

  • Read the cover flap and about author. This gives a good synopsis of the book and you learn about what other books the author has written.
  • Skip the endorsements.
  • Review the table of contents to see what topics interest you.
  • Read the 1st and last chapter first. You can learn about most of the book in these two chapters.
  • Go back and read the chapters on the topics you want to learn or interest you.
  • You do not have to read the whole book. Read only what you want to read.

Reading for Entertainment.

Fiction books are great for entertainment and to escape. Pick a genre that interests you and find authors that are good in that genre. If don’t like the book stop reading it and pick a different book. There are so many books available that there is no need to finish a book you don’t enjoy just to say you finished it.

There are fiction books that have great research and historical information. You can learn as you read.

Listening to Books.

Some people don’t like to read books. I highly recommend Audible.com for those of you who do not like to read books.  It is also a great way to get more books read in a year. You can listen while you are traveling or while working out.

Paper books versus ebooks

  • It is easy to get to different parts of the book
  • You can mark the book up and write in the margins
  • There is just something about having the book with turnable pages in your hands

Ebooks versus paper books

  • You never loose your place in an ebook. The book automatically syncs on your device
  • You can use multiple devices to read a book like a Ipad, Iphone or Android device. The book syncs across your devices
  • With ebooks you save space. When traveling you can take multiple ebooks to read without the space a paper copy takes.
  • If you have books on Audible.com and on Kindle Reader you can use Whispersync. This is a really cool function. If you are listening to a book it will automatically sync with the book you are reading on your Kindle app and vice versa.

Create a reading program.

  • Set a goal to read 1 chapter or set a time frame to read per day. An example would be to read 15 minutes per day.
  • Create a book list of books on subjects you would like to learn
  • Read several books at a time to have variety in what you can choose to read. I tend to read 4 -5 books at a time so I have choices on what I feel like reading.

Be Great!

 

 

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7 Easy Ways to Improve Your Personal Relationships

Is Your Cell Phone Harming Your Relationships?

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Are you the spouse or friend that is sitting at the restaurant watching your spouse or friend text or tweet while sitting across from you? Is your husband checking his email, Facebook or talking with his friends via Whatsapp while you are trying to have a conversation with him?

I recently heard a woman say that she felt like she was not good enough or there must be something wrong with her because her husband is always on his phone when they are together. She wondered why he finds that his friends are so much more important and interesting than her.

Here are 7 Easy Ways to improve your marriage and relationships:

1) Turn off your cell phone at mealtime. Meal times should be conversations with people at the table. It is a great time to spend talking to your family and guests.

2) Turn off noise reminders for texts and social media sites. You will not be interrupted.  You will not be tempted to answer them immediately.

3) If you are with your spouse or friends don’t take your cell phone in to the restaurant or turn it off. There are a couple of reasons to have the phone on, either you are on call or you have small children at home.

Next time you are at a restaurant take time to look around. How many people are texting, on social media or talking on the phone? This may surprise you.

4) Don’t text or use Snapchat, Whatsapp, Twitter or other communication when you are talking with your friends or spouse. How do you think your spouse or friends feel while you are typing away as they are trying to talk to you? Or when you answer that Whatsapp text right when you get the beep while they are in mid sentence.

5) Don’t take the phone to bed. This is bad on a couple of levels. It will definitely reduce or eliminate intimacy. It will also reduce your sleep quality, especially if you leave the notifications on.

6) Don’t text your spouse or friends when they are in the same house, apartment or room as you. Talk to them.

7) Check email, texts and social media before you get home from work. Don’t get home and then immediately pull your phone out and start checking social media. Give your best to your best when you get home.

Be Great!

 

 

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How to Protect Your Marriage in Today’s World

30753393_mMy personal experience is from protecting my own marriage. I am by no means in expert in this. I have experience observing coworkers, friends and acquaintances face these challenges. It is extremely sad to see a divorce, especially when children are involved. I will show you things you can do to protect and improve your marriage.  I will also show you some things to avoid.

According to the Austin Institute for The Study of Family and Culture, the divorce rate has hovered between 40 and 50% since the 1970’s. Sixty-six (66) percent of those divorcees who wanted the divorce as much as or more than their spouse listed more than one reason for the divorce, while one in four offered 5 or more reasons. The most-cited reason for wanting a divorce was infidelity by either party at 37%. Pornography accounted for 5%.

Nearly 50% of all divorces start by a man or a woman meeting someone in a work or similar environment and becoming attracted to them. It starts out as a friendship and then the friendship develops into something more. In some cases it remains just a friendship.

In many others, the friendship starts to grow and keeps you excited and hoping to see or talk to that person. You begin to look at them differently. Like all new relationships it is fresh and can be exciting. The other person might even be speaking your love language to you in a way you do not get at home. You start to get attracted to this person more and more and trust builds. Over a period of time there becomes a mutual liking of each other at a deeper level and you start to feel connected intellectually, emotionally, spiritually and start to appreciate your mutual likenesses. You begin to trust this person and start to share intimate information. You may begin to think this person is better than your spouse in ways you appreciate. You talk more frequently by phone, text, social media and seek to find ways to meet in person. At this point you have crossed to the “danger zone” and are headed for much more than being just friends. You are headed for an affair if you are not there already.

Many people think that adultery is when you actually have intimacy with someone other than your spouse. Adultery can also occur in your thoughts and fantasies. If you daydream of having intimacy with someone other than your spouse you are in an adulterous situation.  This is one reason pornography is so dangerous.

So what do you to avoid this happening to you in your marriage? You proactively protect yourself and your marriage. I know that in today’s business world some of the ideas I provide can be very challenging. Strive to do the best you can. Here are some things to do and some things to avoid.

To Do’s

  • Keep date nights every week with your spouse.
  • Create date moments.
  • Learn your love languages. See my blog on this.
  • Take time to talk about each others day without interruptions.
  • Touch base during the day with a text or phone call.
  • Go on getaway weekends.
  • Eat dinner as a family.
  • Spend time together as a family doing fun things.
  • Attend your children or grandchildren’s events together.
  • Men watch your eyes. It is easy to let them wander. That lady you are looking at is somebody else’s wife, girlfriend or daughter.
  • Women I know that you look at men too. Watch your eyes.
  • Attend church together as a family.
  • Pray together. Couples that pray together stay together.
  • Call your spouse nightly or more frequently if you are on business travel.
  • Plan intimacy with frequency.
  • Visit your spouses office so they know who you are.
  • Get an accountability partner if you are struggling in a situation.

To Avoid

  • Meet with someone of the opposite sex in a closed door office if the office does not have windows to the interior. Leave the door open or have someone else in the office if there is no interior window.
  • Go out to lunch or dinner with another man or woman you are not married to alone. Take another man or woman with you.
  • Avoid pornography at all costs. This can be addictive and lead to other problems in a marriage.
  • Avoid drinking to excess. When people drink too much they will do things they would not do when they are in control. I have witnessed situations where married men or women have gotten in situations they should not have been in thought, word or action.
  • Fantasizing about someone while having intimacy with your spouse.
  • Day dream about having intimacy with a person other than your spouse.
  • Saying the name of a person other than your spouse during intimacy
  • Flirting. All men and women do this to a degree. We were built to be attracted to the opposite sex, but these are when it goes too far.
    • Gaze into anothers eyes longer 3 or 4 seconds too long
    • Touch of the hands for a few seconds too long
    • Rub up against the person in a provocative way
    • Put your hand on their shoulder or somewhere else and keep it there
    • Put your arm around the person and leave it there for an extended time
    • Playfully continue to punch on the shoulder or somewhere else as you talk to them
    • A kiss on the cheek that is longer than a peck
    • A kiss on the lips or an open mouthed kiss
  • Tell another man or woman how much better they are than your spouse.
  • Tell someone of the opposite sex that is not your spouse how much you are looking forward to seeing them or spending time together.
  • Tell someone that is not your spouse that you have been dreaming about them.
  • Putting your spouse down in front of others with friends, in public or online in social media.
  • Alienating your spouse by excessively complimenting another person of the opposite sex in front of them or friends.
  • When you are on Business Travel
    • Try not to travel with someone of the opposite sex alone in the car.
    • Stay away from Hotel Bars. Many of these are where people try to “hook up”.
    • Never have someone of the opposite sex in your hotel room alone with you.
    • Avoid the adult TV movies. Ask the hotel to disconnect these if they are a temptation for you.

These are just a few ideas to try to keep your marriage protected. Please add comments with any ideas you use to protect your marriage.

Feel free to share this with someone that you might feel this would benefit.

Be Great!

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Good Questions to Ask to Have Conversations with Your Teens

Great Places to Have Conversations with your teens

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A friend of mine told me that when you have teenagers you have to get a hot tub. I asked him why. He said they will talk to you in the hot tub.

So I bought a hot tub and found out that he was absolutely correct. Over the years we have had great conversations in the hot tub. My wife and I have learned about school, their teams, their friends and what was going on in their lives. We talked about religion, politics and lots of sports depending on the season. Now when they come home to visit we spend a little time in the hot tub at night.

The dinner table is another great place to have discussions. It is important to have family dinners. It is a place to discuss how the day went and hear what they learned during the day.

Time in the SUV was another place that my wife and I have had great conversations with the kids. Growing up my kids were involved in a lot of activities and drive time gave us time to talk one on one with them or as a family. It was also interesting to have or listen to conversations when their teammates or friends were in the SUV.

We also had boats as the kids grew up and we would spend weekend time in the boat. Sometimes we would just float and swim off the boat. My wife and I would engage the kids in conversations on a wide variety of topics.

What do these all have in common? They all are confined spaces. Sure they can get up and leave the dinner table or they can get out of the hot tub. It is kind of hard to get out of a moving vehicle or a boat in the middle of the lake. They are also spaces where everyone tends to be relaxed.

Now once you are in one of these places the next question is, what do you ask them? I can tell you that you do not want to ask the question, “How was your day?”. You will get a one word answer and the conversation is over. I know this from experience. Ask questions that require more than a one word response. It is also important that you share about what is going on in your work and life as well.

Here are some good questions.

What did you learn today?
What was the best thing that happened today?
What did you do at practice? This can be for a sport or activity.
What are you going to do this weekend?
Tell me about how it is going at school.
How are your friends? What are they doing this summer? (Ask about them by name so they know you know who their friends are and that you truly care)
What do you want to do when you get out of high school or college? Why?
What do you think of …….?
What is your toughest class in school?
Tell me how your calculus class is going? What are you learning? (Or any other subject)

Always come back to the things you talked about previously so they know you listened and that you are engaged in the conversations.

Be Great!

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Building Stronger Relationships

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How many strong relationships do you have? British anthropologist Robin Dunbar found that we could only comfortably maintain about 150 stable relationships. We certainly can’t have 150 strong relationships, but we can all get better at developing relationships with friends and people we want to get to know better.

Today we seem to be so busy that we don’t make time to develop strong relationships. We have work, kids activities, outside interests and other things that take our time and attention.

We can all get better at building stronger relationships. To build strong relationships we need to know about the person and we need to maintain contact.

How many of these can you answer about your close friends?

  • What are the names of their kids?
  • Where do they go to school?
  • How old are they?
  • What activities are they involved in?
  • What is the name and occupation of their Spouse/Significant Other?
  • What hobbies do they have?
  • What they do for fun?
  • What they do on their job?
  • Where are they from?
  • What college did they attend?
  • What are their favorite foods?
  • What do they like to drink?
  • What is their favorite restaurant?

This is just a starter list. The more you know about someone the stronger the relationship.

To develop and maintain close relationships with friends we also need to stay connected. How often do you reach out to connect to your close friends? Do you contact them or do they contact you? Friendships where one person is always making the contact tend to diminish over time. Make sure that you reach out to connect as often as the other person to maintain your close friendships.

Ways to connect with your relationships

  • Send a handwritten note in the mail. Hand written notes are a lost art. They are very powerful. People will tend to save a handwritten note.
  • Go to lunch or coffee. Face to face connection is the best way to connect and spend time.
  • Call on the phone. A phone call is a great way to talk when you are unable to meet face to face.
  • Send a text. Texts are good to just ask “how are you” or “I was just thinking about you today”
  • Send a card in the mail. Let them know you were thinking about them. People still like to get cards in the mail.
  • Send an email to check in. A quick email can be used like a text.

Today there are social media ways to connect too, but they are not as personal as the list of ways to connect above. Social media can be used when you are both online.

One of the keys to strong relationships and friendships is being there when a friend needs someone to talk to or just to be with. Everyone goes through things in life like illness, divorce, death and loss of jobs. It is during these times that people learn who their friends are. Be there for your friends.

Compliment your friends often and lift them up when you can. Really good friends bring out the best in each other and challenge each other to be their best.

Be Great!

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Welcome to Living Life Intentionally

This is the introductory blog for Living Life Intentionally.  I have coached for many years on 6 basic areas in life. I call these areas the 6 F’s. They are Faith, Family, Fitness, Finances, Friends and Fun.

I have found that everything we do in life falls in to one of these 6 categories. As I go forward with these posts I will be covering topics in each of these areas in life and business.

Be Great!