I Dont Want to be Controlling// Hump Day Q&A

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You know what time it is, sweetie?

It's hump day Q and A time.

Hump day Q and A. Hump day Q and A. Welcome to the Naked Marriage Podcast. Hump day Q and A. We love answering your questions. So every Wednesday we're dropping a special podcast episode focused on one of your questions. You can submit your own marriage related question online@nakedmarriagepodcast.com or by sending us a message on Instagram. Aveandashleywillis. We've got a great question today, so let's dive in. Today's question goes like this. It says, after making goals together as a couple, how do you have conversations throughout the year without coming across as being controlling or bossy? Especially when your spouse doesn't initiate these kinds of conversations. So essentially this is about accountability, but without coming across as being a boss or a nag or whatever negative word you want to plug in there or.

Falling into like a parent child dynamic.

Yes. Like now you said you were gonna do this and I thought you said you were on a diet.

I love your church lady.

Yeah. All of a sudden I go into the church lady.

Isn't that special? It sounds just like it.

Want to do like a whole podcast series where I just do different accents.

I think it'd be awesome.

Every episode.

Yes.

I'm going to see if we can work that in for maybe this fall. Stay tuned. We'll see. The producers are shaking their heads. No, they're like, it's probably, probably not going to happen, but we'll sprinkle it.

In here and then.

Right. I might start a separate podcast that literally no one will listen to.

Oh, Dave's accents.

Yeah, that I'll go back and listen to and laugh. It'll be just kind of a sad one audience member show.

Oh, my goodness.

Wasted too much time on that already. So, goals, goals. And this quick follow up. This is kind of tied to what we talked about all spring with the Naked and Healthy series. We've got a new book. If you haven't listened to the audiobook or read the Naked and Healthy book. Check that out on Amazon or@xomarriage.com and it's about health. Mentally, physically and spiritually. And in your marriage, setting goals, working toward those goals, being healthy in all parts of life. But it brings about questions like this. When you make those goals, like we're gonna get healthier physically in these specific ways or, you know, in one part of our life. And then that spouse kind of falls off the wagon, so to speak. Like, how do you encourage. How do you check in? How do you have some accountability without being like a parent, a boss? Why are you laughing? It's because.

Look at the look on your face. If you all are watching on YouTube, he got this little, like, little sl. Like your eyes. It was kind of like down, like falling off the wagon, you know, and.

It'S because I've kind of fallen off the wagon. It was a laugh of it hit close to home. So we wrote the book Naked and Healthy. And then, you know, I went to the doctor recently.

No. Then the pandemic happened.

Basically told that I'm not healthy, that I'm a giant hypocrite for writing a book about health.

That is not what I said.

Wait, you know, I'm a little chubby according to BMI chart. According to the Japanese BMI chart. Full fledged obese.

How would you know about the Japanese bi.

I am full of random, trivial knowledge. They use a separate chart. And I'm obese in Japan and I'm overweight in America. But my doctor, who was, you know, I'm not going to make this like my own therapy. But he was telling me, like, oh, yeah, you know, you're bmi, you're a little high. You're high, you're moving the wrong direction. And, you know, so you got to do this and this. But it was kind of in a judgy way. And listen, I'm all about receiving correction, but he was significantly in worse shape than me. Doc, if you're listening, I love you, you're a great physician, but I just. Can we acknowledge this?

It's hard to deliver those news.

Right. It was coming across as kind of judgy from a guy who's noticeably chubbier than me.

But now that we're saying this, those who listen to Naked and Healthy are like Dave and Ashley. What the heck? Right?

Right.

No. So here's the deal.

I've had a relaxing summer.

It's really not bad. He tends to be. Let me say this. And then we're Gonna get into the goals. No, like, and we have shared this. If you listen to any of our talks about naked and healthy, if you wanna listen, you can go to exonow.com Am I saying that right? Okay.

Yes.

And you can actually go and listen to that. If you become a member, you can listen to it.

We don't claim to be free trial@exomo.com the best selection of on demand marriage content on the planet.

It's amazing. Okay, so you can listen to it. We don't claim to be experts in this area, but we are talking about how it affects your marriage. And in our marriage, we do tend to fluctuate. Right. We've had seasons of very good discipline.

In thickness and in health is a chapter in the book.

It's literally a chapter.

We've been thick, we've been healthy. We have, we've been.

We've been happy being thick. We've been in the middle, and then we've been unhappy. So. Yes. But, you know, as far as goals, like in our marriage, I totally get what this person is saying. Because we, like, throughout our marriage, we've asked for accountability, but then when you actually wanna bring it up and hold the other accountable, it doesn't always land on the best.

Judging me when I'm eating my chips.

Right, Right. Cause I said that to you. I've been like, I love Cape Cod Kettle cook chips, but they're kind of like crack to me. And when Dave buys them, I'm like, I'm excited, but then I'm really mad at you.

And the look on her face is both excitement and disappointment all in one. It is. But if you work for the Cape Cod Chips organization and would like to become an official sponsor of the Naked Marriage podcast, let us know.

Let us know. But I do. I've told Dave before, I'm like, sweetie, why did you bring this into the house? Or Chex Mix? That's become our family fights over Chex Mix. We literally fight over it.

It's like, we do. And, yeah, this is why the other woman in my life is little Debbie. And I've talked about this unhealthy relationship that's gone on. And then the oatmeal cream pies come into the house. And, you know, I'm glad they're there.

I'm not glad they're there.

But then I, you know, then I'm not glad they're there. Right. And so how do you kind of keep each other in check once you've made a shared goal that, like, we're gonna get healthy.

We're gonna get financially.

We're gonna get financially healthy, physically healthy, whatever it is. We're gonna get spiritually healthy. We're gonna start reading the Bible daily or going to church every week or whatever that goal is to create marked improvement in some part of your life, and then one spouse just doesn't follow through. How do you encourage that? How do you kind of shine the light of accountability on that without being naggy or bossy?

I think it really starts with yourself first, because if you can talk about yourself, here's a goal I would really like to set and not necessarily force your spouse to do the same, because we talk about that a lot. That's not necessarily gonna go well. Sometimes they're like, yes, I have that shared goal. Sometimes they're like, I'm not quite there yet. Maybe my goal could be moving in the same direction as your goal, but not quite to that extent. Right. Okay. And I think that if you start with yourself and then ask your spouse to hold you accountable, okay, Then there's not so much of a fight. But if you are constantly the one who's like, hmm, but what if they.

Do hold you accountable, but then when you. When you hold them accountable, they get offended, Right. What if you say, hold me accountable, and then they do. They're like, you told me to, and then all of a sudden, you try to do the same to them and they get offended, Say, I didn't ask for that.

Well, you could say, listen, I want us both to be the best versions of ourself, and I'm only, I love you no matter what, but I want us both to live a long time and be healthier. I want us both to financially be in a good place. I don't want to, you know, end up bankrupt or whatever it is. You know, I really just. This is only because it's for both of us. It's for our family.

Yeah, makes sense.

I think you have to go back to that. It's not your worst.

It makes me feel loved and respected and secure. When you're making these decisions for your own health and for our collective health as a family, and.

And it's not tied to your worth as a person.

No, not at all.

And it's not tied to, you know, you desiring your spouse or wanting to be with your spouse or your commitment to the marriage. I think we just. I think that's where it feels bossy, and it feels like a cut. And whenever we are trying to remind our spouse of goals that we Set, it can't be in a critical way. And I think too depending on the personalities, like we know couples where they are planners and they do put a thing on the calendar and they sit down and they go over their finances. But like, for some people, and like, I'm probably more that way, like I want to set a meeting. Literally, if I said that to Dave, he's going to start sweating and he's going to literally, like not have words.

I was glazing over. Even with just the hypothetical.

No, I can see it on you. And it's really funny because one of his strengths. There's a book called Strengths Finder. Am I saying that right? Is it Strengths Finder? Yes. It's amazing. I believe they can get it@xomarriage.com no, maybe not. Go on Amazon.

If you're thinking of Strengths Based Marriage with.

Okay, sorry, we'll look up StrengthsFinder, go to Amazon. But also look up Strengths Based Marriage, which is awesome. And that's@xomarriage.com but when we did the Strengths Finder test, one of Dave's number one strengths is being strategic.

That's right.

So you would think that dude likes a meeting captain Strategy, but he doesn't.

Most meetings are so terribly unstrategic that I find myself just really distracted by the lack of strategy in the meeting.

I think that's what it is.

This could have been an email. This whole meeting could have been an email. And so it's not that all meetings.

Are bad, but it's kind of how you're wired. And so in that same kind of vein of way of thinking, I just think we have to know our spouse enough to know what delivery method is best.

Right. What's gonna work with them? Like for us just going on a walk, being engaged in activity and having a conversation organically about goals and about things we wanna do, that brings out the best in both of us.

You don't feel pressure, you don't feel put on the spot. I think sometimes when people feel put on the spot, men or women, this isn't just like a male, female thing. That's when they're like, they're going to not take your advice and they're not going to take it as good. They're not going to be like, oh, they're just holding me accountable. They're going to think they just think I'm fat or they think I can't manage money or, you know, they don't think I'm a good parent or whatever it is that's how we take it. So we want to be disarming.

Disarming. And the best way to be disarming is always, always get a lot more encouragement than criticism in marriage. Like, be your spouse's biggest encourager, not their biggest critic. The Bible gives a list of spiritual gifts. Encouragement is one. Critic is nowhere on the list. But some people in our world act like they have the spiritual gift. A God given, you know, mandate to be the critic of everybody and everything. And don't do that. That will kill your marriage. Be your spouse's biggest encourager. Tell them everything they're doing right. Brag about them, thank them, praise them, celebrate them, respect them so much that when you have to, you know, slip in a little bit of constructive criticism or accountability, it's really, it's concern. It's concern that they know your heart is coming from a place of loving them so much, respecting them so much, believing in them so much that certainly this little bit of concern they're bringing to you is motivated by all those good things. But if you're always leading with the negative, if it's always, oh, gosh, you're always doing this, you're never doing that, or you never follow through, they're just gonna shut down and quit trying and everybody loses at that point. So just to make it as practical as we can, be your spouse's biggest encourager, celebrate what they're doing right. I'm telling you, celebrating and thanking your spouse for what they do right works 100 times better than nagging them for what they're doing wrong. But if you'll celebrate, encourage over and over and over again, then in those moments when you do have to kind of strategically insert some concern and criticism, they're going to be much more likely to receive it the way that it should be received.

They will. And I want to give you guys one more resource. I know we mentioned exomarriage.com where we have all of our resources not just authored by us. There's many more authors with all kinds of wisdom that you can find there. And one that is a newer resource that just came out is the Vision Retreat Guide, I believe guidebook. Am I saying that correctly? Okay, the Vision Retreat Guidebook. It actually a vision retreat is something here at XO Marriage that we've talked about for years that was put together by Jimmy and Karen Evans, but now we actually have it in book form where you can walk through and take this beautiful book, by the way, it's so pretty, and really go and take it with you and Set a time where you and your spouse get away and you set these goals, and you set a vision for your marriage. And so you can make it fun. Like, make it not all about the goals, but make sure that on this Vision Retreat, you do set some goals, and you do celebrate the wins. Like, really take time to celebrate. And so if you want to get that, if you're like, you know, Dave and Ashley, I hear what you're saying, but I need to have more structure. I really think the Vision Retreat Guidebook would be a great place to start, and then it would be something to look forward to on the calendar as well. And so definitely, if you go to vision retreat.com, you can get your book right there. So go to visionretreat.com you'll be so glad you did. And again, it's such a pretty cover. Like, I just. Like, I'm just enticed by the COVID It's awesome, but really, what's inside it is gold. Jimmy and Karen, they've been doing this for years. They are the experts on this, and they just. Literally, it's like two marriage mentors kind of guiding you through this. And then you'll leave that retreat, not only having some time together and feeling refreshed, but also, you know, having just some. Some specific goals for your marriage that are attainable. And then if you make this a yearly habit, you can celebrate those wins each year, and your marriage will grow from it year by year.