My Spouse is Different than Me

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Welcome to the Naked Marriage podcast. We are Dave and Ashley Willis, and on this podcast, we undress the truth about sex, intimacy and lifelong love. So excited about today's episode. We're actually kicking off a four part series beginning today on opposites in marriage. And opposites do indeed often attract. And what do we do when your spouse is wired up differently than you in one or more areas of life?

That's right.

Every couple can deal with this in some ways or has to in some ways. And so we're gonna, we're gonna talk today about what that looks like when one of you is an introvert and one of you is an extrovert. But even if you're both introverts or both extroverts, I think there's a lot you can learn in this episode about what exactly that means and how to bring out the best in each other. Before we dive in, quick announcement, you guys, if you're not already, can be part of our premium podcast subscription. Just go to nakedmarriage.supercast.com and for five bucks a month you get ad free episodes, bonus content, and that five bucks price of less than the price of a latte a month. You're actually supporting this ministry and helping us create more resources to help more people. So thank you for your partnership.

Yes, thank you guys so much. And I'm so excited about this episode. We're going to talk about being an introvert and an extrovert and married to your opposite. So let's dive in. Well, I'm excited about this episode. We are starting a new series called Opposites in Marriage. And the first episode is all about a introverts and extroverts. Meaning like if you are an introvert and you are married to an extrovert or vice versa, how do we navigate that? Because those are two very different kinds of personalities. And I think that the first thing we need to do out of the gate is to really help people understand what an introvert is and what an extrovert is. Because I do think there's a lot of misunderstanding around this, yes, there certainly is.

And we're not these like psychological experts here, but we've done a little bit of research on this and some of the misconceptions around introverts, extroverts is that extroverts love people and introverts don't love people. And that's not at all. No, not at all what it is. You could have an introvert that loves people and an extrovert that really hates people, but it's really about what recharges us. And that's part of it, at least in that an introvert tends to be recharged with less stimulating environments and being alone. An extrovert tends to be recharged with more stimulating environments. And more stimulating environments usually have people like a lot of people around. And less stimulating is usually being alone. But even alone, you could do stuff that's stimulating and exhausting. An introvert needs that time more. Everybody's on a spectrum somewhere. I don't think there's just true. All the way extrovert, all the way introvert. Because we all need some stimulating environments in people and we all need time alone.

But it's the extent of.

It's kind of where you are on the spectrum. And there are certainly people much farther on the extroverted side and much farther on the introverted side. And sometimes when those two people marry one another, it takes a lot of understanding because that one spouse is going to need a lot more time alone and the other spouse is going to need a lot more stimulation and time around groups of people. And. And you've gotta figure out how to navigate that together.

You do. And it can sometimes be complicated because again, we've talked about this before in marriage. Sometimes without even realizing it, we really expect our spouse to be like us and we think how we see things is how they should see things. But we don't marry our perfect clone, you guys. Like we marry people that are at least a little bit different than us. And that's a good thing. I mean, it'd be weird to marry someone just like you. And in our marriage, I am more introverted than Dave. I think that Dave's not an all the way. He really honestly actually been tested in this before Dave accepted one of his ministry positions. One of the stipulations was that both of us talked to a Christian psychologist and we took various personality tests and we're asked all these different questions. And one of those was her determining if we were introverts or extroverts or something she called an Ambivert.

Ambivert.

And Dave ended up getting ambivert, meaning like he's a little bit extrovert, a little bit introvert. Which really helps when you're a pastor because, you know, you gotta be somewhat extroverted, I guess, at times. And for me, I got introvert. Now I'm not saying like I'm an extreme introvert. I'm not, but I definitely am introverted. I knew that about myself. And when I actually told my family about this, and this was probably more than a decade ago that we took this, this test and she kind of evaluated us. But I remember talking to my mom about this and she was like, sad. And whenever I honestly, not even just my mom, but like anyone, I would say, yeah, I was evaluated and took these tests and stuff. And they said I'm an introvert. And I would have to agree with that. And they would look at me with the sadd.

Like, you don't like people. You don't like people.

I thought you loved me. I'm serious.

Yeah, there's such misconceptions.

And my mom said, but Ashley, your whole life you've always loved people. I just, I don't know what's happening. And I was like, mom, this has nothing to do with loving people. I love people. I mean, I wouldn't be doing what I'm doing if I didn't love people, right? And I said, it's where I get my energy. And I said, remember growing up, I would come home from school and I'm not even exaggerating, you guys. I usually had band practice after school. So I would get home around like 4:30 or something. And I would get home and, and I would get in some comfortable clothes and I would go in my room and shut the door for hours. Like hours. And it wasn't just to do my homework. My mom even teased and called it my little apartment. But I needed to decompress because it was as if like the life was sucked out of me. I mean, that's all I can say. And I was just refueling like in my room and I wouldn't talk to anyone. I mean, my mom would ask how my day was at that time and my parents gave me that time, like, thank God, because my dad's very introverted and he gets sad.

But they could have made the mistake that even spouses sometimes make of saying like, no, you don't get. I don't need that time. So you shouldn't need that time. And you need to get out here, young lady, and you need To.

And it just wears them out.

Oh, my gosh. Yeah.

You know, and so, like, even taking that. And then when I explained it to my mom, a light bulb went off and she was like, oh, my gosh. It completely explains, like, I totally understand. And I just wanna. Just for those of you listening and watching, I wanna ask you kind of a little series of questions. And I'll do the questions, and I'll do the same thing for the extrovert part, because you may be listening to this and watching this and thinking, I don't really know if I'm an introvert or an extrovert. So, like, some of the things that.

At the end of your questions, I have one from a little research I did that is gonna be. It was so new to me. I think it's gonna be new to you. And it's really. I don't know. It made me think about all this in a new way. So I'm excited to share it.

I love it. I cannot wait. Well, let me share these couple questions real quick. So one question she asked me. She said, you are at a party gathering, something in a big gymnasium. There's lots of people sitting at tables. Okay? People milling about. You know, it's a big gathering with, like, 100 people. And she said, what do you do? Do you work the room and have, like, small conversations with a lot of different people and just trying to work the room? Or do you go and find a couple of people sitting together and sit down with them the whole time and get to know them? And immediately I was like, oh, I'm finding the people, and I'm sitting down and getting to know them. I said, I hate small talk. And she goes, okay. And she. She marks her little chart, and I'm like, okay. And then the second question she asked me was, do you. When you think about where you'd like to be the most, like, when you visualize a peaceful place, a place where you want to go, is it an ocean or is it in the mountains among trees? And I said, 100% in the mountains among trees. And she smiled real big, and she checked it, and I was like, okay. And I think she asked me a couple other questions. And by the end of it, she was like, you are totally an introvert. And I was like, what do you mean? She said, every time an introvert answers how you did, they hate small talk. Like, literally hate it. Which I do. I just. It feels so unnatural to me. I want to get to know people, you know, And I want it to be. I'D rather get to know a couple people than work the room and just have small talk, you know? And neither one of those is wrong or right or anything like that. And then the whole ocean and tree. She said, there's been all this research done, and they have found that an overwhelming majority of people who prefer the ocean are extroverted, and an overwhelming majority of people who prefer the mountains and trees around them are introverted. Isn't that. Yes.

That's fascinating. And both of us, I mean, we appreciate the ocean.

Oh, we love it. Yeah, definitely.

But, like, our, like, happy place is the mountains. Yeah.

Yeah. So maybe that's you. And so on the flip side of that. And then I'll let Dave get to his thing for extroverts. It's kind of what I talked about. Like, if you really don't mind small talk and you enjoy it. And when you go to a party, you're like, I want to meet as many people as possible. So when I go home, I'm going to talk about all these new people I met. Like, I just want to. I want to network. Like, you're really good at networking. And when you go to parties, you're energized by it. Like, that's kind of another gauge is, like, when you go to a party, first of all, number one, do you look forward to it? Okay. Because you're like, cannot wait to be with people. And number two, by the time you leave that party, are you energized or are you tired? Because if you're energized, you're more than likely an extrovert because you're being energized by being around all the stimulus and all the people. If you feel exhausted, like, you need to go take a nap, you're probably energized because you've pushed out all this. You've been around all this stimulus, been around all these people, and you need to go kind of refill yourself by being alone. So there's a lot of different things with that. And if you like ocean, more than likely, I mean, I'm serious. Like, if that's your happy place, you're probably an extrovert. That is fascinating. I'm not saying it's 100% the ocean trees thing.

That's fascinating. So talk to your spouse about, like, if one of you, like, loves the beach vacation and one of you wants, like, a little mountain quiet getaway, instead of one of you being right, one of you being wrong, you both realize, like, hey, this is how we're both Fired up. And so, you know, the person that's not as into the beach, learn to appreciate and love the beach. The person that's not as into the quiet, secluded getaway, learn to love and appreciate that and support each other in that way instead of just saying, no, that's lame. We're not doing that.

Right.

That's so cool. So I was doing a little research and I found this author named Holly Girth. G E R T H. I've heard of her. Yes, of course you have.

I heard an interview on another podcast.

You're always. You're just always ahead. But she was fascinating. I actually listened to an interview, probably the same thing you listened to, probably. And she was talking about these things. She's done a lot of research on introverts and extroverts and in that conversation a lot stood out to me. But one thing I really took note of is that in her research she said that introverts and extroverts actually experience happiness in different ways. Like when you ask them, Ray Ban.

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Describe the feeling of happiness. It's a totally different experience for an introvert and extrovert. And I'm going to tell you the difference here in just a second. But I think this is so fascinating in marriage because, right. You and your spouse could both be experiencing happiness and it look and feel completely different for each of you. And without a mutual understanding, you might think, well, you're not even happy about this because you're acting differently when really they're experiencing happiness the way that they're wired to do it. And so here's what she said in her research.

And.

Okay, let me see. Yes, this is based on the neurotransmitters and how we're wired in our brains as introverts and extroverts. Extroverts experience happiness as a high Energy, emotion filled with enthusiasm. When you ask an extrovert what's happiness? They picture themselves cheering, clapping, huge, high energy feel. Introverts experience happiness as a calm and quiet contentment. They're happy, you know, like to be, you know, sitting by a, like deep in your deep, just reflective contentment and embracing a moment, seizing a moment and just embracing it. And so you ask them both, what's happiness? And an extrovert might picture themselves in the middle of a stadium with all these people cheering at the top of their lungs for this goal that just got scored. And the introvert is, you know, picturing like listening to their favorite song, you know, alone, just having a moment in nature and just content with gratitude for, you know, for life. And it looks.

And both are good.

Both are good. And you should learn to appreciate both. You know, the introvert. Go to that sports game and learn to appreciate it. The extrovert, you know, learn to have that time of quiet, reflective contentment. But know that you and your spouse are wired up differently. And just because you express happiness in different ways, or sadness in different ways, or joy or whatever in different ways, it doesn't mean one of you is right, one of you is wrong. This is how God wired you. Learn to appreciate those differences and understand those differences and look for the cues to know how to read when your spouse is actually happy or when they're sad.

Definitely. And I think too, be your spouse's advocate. I mean, first of all, be your own advocate. Know who you are. You know, we gotta know ourselves because then if we don't know ourselves, we can't advocate for ourselves. And in the same way, if we don't know our spouse and who we're married to, then we can't advocate for them and also try to see the best in them. Because, you know, there are strengths in both being an introvert and being an extrovert. Like, it's not that one's better than the other at all. Because there are times in my life where I wish I was more extroverted. You know what I'm saying? And I wish it gave me more energy because I'm like, this would be more convenient to be around people and feel energized. And that's not the case. I need to go sometimes take a nap or have a moment. And I'm like, man, it's just so inconvenient for that now. In a lot of ways too, I think extroverts, when they get very lonely and sad not being around people all the time, you Know, maybe during COVID it was like torture for them. I bet it was torturous because, you know, there's been a lot of memes going around about this, but extroverts are like, oh, my gosh, everything's shut down. Whereas the introverts like holding their coffee and their blanket. Yes, finally, I feel seen, you know, and so there's definitely. There's strengths in both of these, and it's not that one's better, and I just think we need to make that very clear. But we've seen this play out different ways. Like, I think about this couple at church that the wife, she is so extroverted. She's a huge leader by nature. She literally, like, just watching her, she has energy for days. And she's always been extremely involved at church. She started a business. She's raised awesome kids alongside her husband. And then her husband on the other side, he's been really successful in his own way, but he's been kind of an introvert the whole time. And I remember we counseled with them. We've counseled with them several times over the years. But I know that for her, she just needs a lot of time around people. And she's always kind of filled a little bit of the void that she feel like she can't fill at home, you know, and necessarily with her husband by being involved in stuff. But I remember it kind of came to a head when they were switching. I think they were switching activities they were involved in. She felt misunderstood, and then she was needing to get some of that fulfillment from her husband. And you kind of saw him glaze over, like, I don't know, like, I can't be the one to fulfill all this.

Sure.

Because he is so introverted. And it's not that he doesn't want to spend time with her, but they had kind of gotten into a groove where he was feeling like he was getting enough alone time and she was getting, you know, they were spending a lot of time together, but she was getting a lot of that extrovert, you.

Know, and love each other very much.

Love each other so much. Married a very long time, but you could tell this was causing some friction because she didn't feel like she was getting enough time, you know, to be fulfilled by being around people and also sharing her gifts and, like, being engaged with people and that he didn't seem to want to help that, you know, in her eyes. And she just really. She was kind of up in arms and feeling very lost and misunderstood. And so we kind of had to walk them, you know, through that and encourage them in that. Because I think that we do need to know who our spouse is. And when we do come to kind of that crossroads, we can't just throw up our hands and be like, well, this is who I am. That's who you are. And you guys, you just figure it out. Because for a time he was doing that, and it was driving her crazy. And she also felt, you know, she had kind of been misunderstood by these people that she had done life with for a while. And so then when he acted that way towards her, she felt like, well, I can't even be understood or seen at home. And so we need to be able again to know our spouse well enough to help them know that they're seen and understood. And. And then if they are, like, if we're very different from them, and in this particular scenario, you know, she was very extroverted. It would have really helped for her husband to help her find those places where she can get involved and find those places where, you know, she can serve and really fill her tank, so to speak. And they're doing a lot better now. I mean, that's kind of the path they've taken. But it's been hard because they're so different. And that's why we're talking about opposites, because it can be a beautiful thing. I mean, both of us have parents who are. They married their opposite.

Yeah, Yeah. I mean, seriously, they've made it work.

They made it work for years and years, 40 plus years.

And they're best friends, and they complement each other's strengths. But their personalities, both sets are different.

Yes.

And I think a lot of couples are that way. I mean, it is true that in many ways, opposites can attract, but in doing that, you have to. What attracted you to your spouse. You have to realize that that very thing that attracted you is also going to cause a lot of efforts to have to work through. Because those places where they're strong and you're weak, those places where they're different, that's gonna cause both of you to have to just work through things and have mutual understanding and patience.

And I think, too, we need to know our spouse's cues. You know, like I said, I'm more introverted than Dave. He's a little bit of a mix of both. And he kind of knows, like, you know, my cues when I'm glazing over. And I also know his, too. I can tell. We call it ansi in our house. I'm like, he's like, if I have to be in this house one more minute, I'm going to go crazy, you know? Like, yeah, I can tell when you're antsy. You're like, I need to get out and be with people. I need to go do something. Whereas I. I really like being at home. Like, I do. I mean, I can spend a lot more time there than you can, Right? I mean, you. You like, and it's not even a lot.

I enjoy doing stuff. I love our home and our. Yeah, but I also. I think I. I need to get out more. Right?

And I get out, too. I mean, obviously we work from home, but I'm doing stuff at home. I'm not just laying around, but I love the quiet. Like, I can just be there and just in my zone doing stuff. And there comes a time in the day where Dave is like, you know, we just kind of look at each other. We know the cues. And I'm like, go on. It's good. We're good, you know, and we'll work it out.

But, I mean, help each other. Be at your best. Or if Ashley just needs to lay down and just take a break, sometimes.

I need to be in the room.

By herself and watch a show, be.

In a room by myself.

I'm like, you need that? And she'll apologize for it. And I'm like, don't feel guilty. This is just how you're wired. You're gonna be at your best if you take this time. And. And so in your marriage, never get into the trap of saying, well, I don't need that, so you shouldn't either, because that's just toxic and prideful and it's gonna backfire. But instead, say, this is something you need to be at your best, so don't apologize for it.

And I want you to be at your best.

I want you to be at your best. And so take that time or go do that thing, and you're gonna be better for it.

Right? And, you know, even though, like, let's say you do have a spouse that does need to spend more time with people and in activities, I think when you can join them, do it like, you know. Cause there's times where it may not. Like, there have been times where even though I love the people that I am, like, I've been maybe invited to a party or gathering or something, I probably love all those people. But the thought of that, you know, especially if it's in the afternoon or, like, early evening or something, it's literally, I'm like, oh, My gosh, after a whole day's work, I'm like, I don't know if I can do it. And I will tell you, I'm like, I've got to go, kind of have a moment. That's usually the language we use. I'm like, I need a moment. I just need a moment. But there's times when I do push through that I'll try to get a little bit of a moment. I'll push through it. I'd push through it quite often, to be really honest. And I'll go. And what you'll find, though, is you end up being so glad you're there. You end up being so glad you're with the people you love and that you are celebrating that thing. So sometimes we do need to push through. But I think that when we feel forced and disrespected and weird, you know, if we're made to feel like there's something wrong with us, that's when you see resentment really build up and you start having fights because you're like, this is just not. I'm not wired this way. I can't just jump from one thing to another with people because I've been overstimulated all day and I feel like I'm depleted. You know, it's really like you feel literally depleted. I mean, even there's a physical. Those of you who are introverts, you get me. Like, there's a physical feeling of depletion, you know, and like, I physically shut down. I mean, I remember in high school, my senior year, I took an AP Language arts class. And my professor, I guess she was an introvert too. She was actually a professor. Like, it was really cool. We had a professor even in high school. I thought that was so cool. But her name was Doc Selley. And she would look at me and she'd say. She called me McCrae is my maiden name. She'd say, mccrae, go get a Coke. And I'm like, what? We can't have soda in class? She's like, you're fading on me. You're fading. She's like, go get a Coke.

She knew what you needed.

Cause she knew. It was like 2 o' clock and she knew. I mean, I really wanted to make a good grade in that class.

But even still. That's your downtime.

It's still my downtime till this day. Like, I mean, we've worked all day, even in recording, and I have to give myself some caffeine to will myself to kind of stay alert. But at the same time. I love it. Like, I'm loving being with people and doing what I'm doing the whole time. It's just kind of where you get your energy and when you have energy, you know.

Yeah, Totally get it.

Yeah.

So, again, guys, learn each other's differences, learn your own rhythms, and do the things to help both you and your spouse be at your best, whether you're both introverts, both extroverts, or you're total opposites. And over these next few episodes, we're going to continue with more examples of opposites in marriage and how to help bring out the best in one another. However, God wired you celebrating your uniqueness and bringing out the best in each other. I hope this has been meaningful to you guys. Don't forget to tune in on Wednesday for a new episode of Hump Day Q and A where we answer one of your questions on air. You can submit questions@nakedmarriagepodcast.com or write us on Instagram at daveandashleywillis. We'll see you next time.