Summer Quickies: Can I have close friends of the opposite sex?

Hey, guys. Welcome back 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. And I hope you are loving our Q and A Quickies, as we call them this summer, as much as we love presenting them to you. We have a great question for you today.

That's right. This question was asked at one of our XO conferences. You can learn more about those live events@xomarriage.com we just have so much fun at these events, and we'd love to see you at one of the future ones.

So.

So this is a hot button question, and I'm glad that it was asked, and we're gonna have a lot of time discussing it today in great detail. The question is, is it appropriate to have close friends of the opposite sex when you're married?

We're gonna dive into it. Let's go.

Is it appropriate to have close friends of the opposite sex when you're married?

Man, it's a loaded question.

That's a good one.

We get this a lot, and it's one we like to talk about because it is something that I think you wouldn't think this would be controversial, but it kind of is. And every time we shared anything on Facebook about this or talked about it at conferences, we get people on both sides of it. But I think that, honestly, when you have close friends of the opposite sex, it can really be easy to cross some boundaries that need to be in place to protect your marriage. Because what we can find, because I think people fall into this innocently. I don't think anybody sets out to end up having an affair with a friend, you know, at work or a neighbor or things like that. But I think what happens is we start sharing our hearts with this friend, and before you know it, we're sharing more with this friend than we are with our spouse. And we're becoming more emotionally naked with this friend than we are with our spouse. And then you sometimes even find, like, a codependency forming, and it just can lead to some really unhealthy decisions and behaviors, and, you know, ultimately can end up in an affair. And so we just really. We truly believe that your best friend should be your spouse. Like, the best marriages have a husband and wife who are also best friends. And I feel like when you're putting this friend of the opposite sex ahead, if that's more important to you than being best friends with your spouse, then that's way out of balance, and it's not gonna end up in anything good.

Well, there's nowhere that relationship can really go. You can't go deep in intimacy with a friendship of the opposite sex. And so we've got a lot of pretty hardcore boundaries in place in our own marriage. We don't even text people of the opposite sex without the other. Our other spouse, you know, being in kind of on the conversation. We don't meet alone with people of the opposite sex. And some people look at it like, oh, that's. That's like archaic, and that's not practical. But I think you got to be willing to look weird in a world where messed up marriages seem normal.

Yeah, it's the truth.

I mean, so if you want your marriage to look like everybody else's that don't have any boundaries, then play by the world's rules. But I think sometimes we've got to be willing to stand out. And this is one of those areas that I think is it's kind of worth making a stand and maybe being countercultural enough to say, look, it's out of respect for my spouse. We have certain boundaries in place to really safeguard our marriage. And this is some of them.

And it's not only out of respect for your spouse, which that is the number one reason, but it's also out of respect for that person and if they're married, their spouse. And so it really is. It might seem weird. And I know sometimes this is kind of hard to hear and it does go against kind of the grain, but I'm telling you, it will protect your marriage and your marriage will be better for it.

Hopefully you got some good takeaways from. From that answer. And again, I know this is kind of countercultural. I know it's a little bit controversial, but your marriage is going to be stronger. Your bond with your spouse is going to be stronger if they are your friend of the opposite sex and you give all your best energy and conversation to your spouse, and then you have very, very specific and guarded boundaries with everyone else of the opposite sex out in there, out there in the world. It is for your good. It is for the good of your marriage. And so give it a try. Thank you. Thank you guys for listening. Thank you for being a part of this, and we will see you next time.

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