Ron + Hope: Unfiltered - How to Fall In Love Again

Foreign.

Hey, everybody, it's Ron and Hope. Unfiltered, real raw and relevant.

We're coming, Dr. Pepper. Be one of our sponsors.

Ron, what about Fiji? Because we have it on here.

We advertise for them all the time. I don't know why they wouldn't want to be.

You do love a good old Dr. Pepper.

You know what? I really. You ought to be honest. I don't drink them much, but sometime I get what we call the south of hankering. I get a hankering for just soda. Please don't write me and tell me how bad they are for.

Because we know how bad they are.

I know it. And I don't ever hardly drink. I drink them after I get through preaching. And I've been talking a lot yesterday and I've been talking a lot today. And I told her, I said, I need some carbon, I need some oxygen, vocal cords. So I'm not trying to tell you to go out and drink, Dr. Paper. There's no subliminal messages right here. But we are running Hope real raw and relevant. My voice is. All right.

Your beard's growing. Yeah.

Like it?

Not sure. I'm not sure if I like it. It's different.

I have to be different.

Do you?

It's.

It's very different.

I'm apostolic. I have to be first.

And I'm trying to get a vision for where we're going.

I'm trying to be. We're talking about, can you fall in love again? I'm trying to. Oh, to be irresistible again.

Oh, God. Well, you are already irresistible. You didn't need the hair on the face to do it. You know, everybody likes different things, and we're going to talk about that today. You know, like, you don't dress for what other people like. You dress for what your spouse likes. You, you know, you got to do what your spouse likes. Okay. But, you know, marriage in general. Ron, we've been married how long? You better answer correctly.

We've been married 32 years. We got married June 23, 1990. So this June 23 will be 32 years. We dated a little over three, so we've been together 35 years. That's a long time.

It is.

That's a long time.

A real long time.

Seen a lot, been through a lot, Seen God do a lot.

It feels like yesterday.

I'm sure it does, baby. So what are you wanting? I don't know.

My anniversary's coming up.

You know, there's always a reason. It's always a reason.

You said. Hmm. Okay. So we're going to talk a little bit about marriage. And it really. What we want to talk about today is. Okay. Because we've been married 32 years and we know a lot of people in our age group who've been married a long time who seem to have lost that love and feeling. They seem to just be together, you know, just sheerly out of commitment, out of the vows they made. They have no butterfly.

That sounds awful to me.

I know. Isn't that terrible? It's a terrible way to live. But you know what? It happens. And I believe that it's a natural process that happens. And we're going to talk about that today. Because when you're dating, you do everything that you know they like. You do everything that you know they want. If I knew you like to set my hair a certain way, I would wear it a certain way. If I knew that you liked a certain perfume, I'd wear the perfume. If I knew you wanted to go to a football game, I was like, yes, yes, let's go to a football game. Knowing I didn't care anything about football. But I wanted to go just to be with him, you know?

You always, always loved your hair. You had a bunch of blonde hair. And I love it when you pull it and drape it down one side because you had a freckle on the back of that ear. Remember that? You still got it, by the way.

So I made you.

I did. I went to opera's help. I gotta be honest. That was miserable.

But you wanted to be with me.

Do you remember? I did, but, God, that was awful.

Ron.

Do you remember how hot it was?

Ron.

The air conditioner didn't work in the building. And what, the opera, like five hours.

Ron, why are you such an exaggerator?

I sat there in that building, I couldn't breathe. I had on a suit, I was sweating and this woman was screaming in another language.

Ron, you are so extra right now. So dramatic.

That was one of my greatest acts of the world. It was a three hour Madam Butterfly.

Madam Butterfly.

Madam Butterfly.

We were in the Augusta Opera House and the AC happened to be just down. It was broke in the summer. Yes. And so it was hot. It was hot.

It wasn't hot. It was.

Well, the opera was so good, you didn't think about it. If you could see his face right now.

It was awful. It was awful.

It was not.

I remember sitting there like, God, if you ever.

But we did things for each other.

You went to a South Carolina football game with me, and at that Time you had to be delivered. But you were a Clemson fan. And so I took you to a real game, a South Carolina game. And what did we do? We walked around and did this.

That means you need two tickets.

I took her all the way from Georgia to Columbia, South Carolina.

We didn't have any tickets.

So we stood out in the rain. Unbeknownst to me, we stood out in the rain and held up two. And sat where?

At the tip top, the furthest seat from the field.

In between two wonderful drunk men who kept high fiving me every time.

They weren't just screaming in half five in them and they were just spraying their breath on me. But I did it because I loved wrong.

But now you love the team.

Yes, I did.

It's growing. You love the team.

Love the team. But still, the whole point is we did things on purpose in the early years of dating and had no problem with it because we wanted to make the other person happy. We wanted to. Did you hear me? We wanted to make the other person happy. And we inconvenienced ourself so that we could make the other person happy. Now here's the problem in marriage that stops selfishness.

Selfishness creeps in.

Selfishness creeps in. Over time. We start wanting to make sure you're making me happy instead of me making me happy.

Let me interject something. Now, I do know that there are people mistreated. I do know that there are people that it's not. Both sides are not giving properly. I want you to know I get that. I'm not being cruel. But you have to really be careful when that what about me thing starts coming up in your head. Well, what about me? Well, what about when that thing starts happening? Sometimes it can take you to a healthy place if you're in an unhealthy one. But sometimes it can take you somewhere you really don't want to go. Because what happens is you become the center of your universe. And like Hope just said, instead of understanding that you're in the relationship for the other person, you're in it for what you get out of it. And you start judging every day, not what can I give, but what is being given to me.

Yeah. And then you start judging what you give based on what was given to you or what was not given to you. And so just think about when you first fell in love with your husband, with your wife, and, and the ways you did go out of your way and the. And the investment that you poured into it and that you would. You'd Give up dinner, you'd give up class. You'd make a bad grade to skip a class, to go be with that person. You would do whatever it took to be together, to be happy, to make the other person happy. And over time, for whatever reason, that importance just seems to, like, fall by the wayside.

Well, sometimes it's our own issues. Sometimes it's life. Sometime it's life. You know, we were starting a church. We had very little resources. We had three children back to back to back. And you don't have to have a devil. That scenario is just hard. You don't need any satanic attack. You don't need any opposition from darkness demons. That scenario is greatly challenged. And I think what it is, we begin to be depleted because our life is out of balance. And when you have kids, I don't know that you can always balance it. I think the nature of kids keep things out of balance, but somehow or another, it's in that right there that that special sauce gets lost. So if I'm understanding you right, I always ask you to say, where are we going, baby? You want to talk? Okay, you're already there, you're committed, you're hanging. But the special sauce is gone. How do you bring that back?

Absolutely. And you know, we've seen so many marriages of our friends. You know, our marriage was hit hard, you know, almost 20 years ago.

Yeah, we almost lost it.

And so. So we've seen so many people go through such hard times. I mean, people just recently, the last few years, so many of our friends.

Have divorced through Covid. I think everybody got locked up in the house together and looked at each other and said, I don't know if I like you.

Right. And that's got. We've got to find the answer for that, because that cannot be God's best, you know, for our Christian marriages and for Christian homes. And. And I do believe. I don't believe we know everything, but I do believe we've survived and we are now thriving.

We have a story to tell on.

The other side of the.

We have things to say. Not because we read it in a book, but because we walked through it. Absolutely, we walked through it. And honestly, we took the road less traveled.

Yeah, it was tough.

We took the road. It was awful. It was the toughest thing to this date, probably I've ever done. I think you would share that and say the same thing about you. But we're here to tell you that you can fall in love deeply again. Even not when the love is just when the Feelings are gone, but even after tragedy. But right now, I think we got something else important.

Yeah, we got some exciting news. We have some sponsors. Listen, one thing that can bring stress to a marriage is money. Correct? I think money, it affects everything. Money and sex or the lack of.

Let me tell you something. What do I always start our marriage conference off with? A lot of people in the marriage conference, it's a lot more crass than in other places. I said there's two things everybody wants more of but don't want to say it. They want more sex and they want more money. And the fact is, where people don't speak, you know, usually I always say, well, the preacher don't speak. The pulpit will struggle. So what we've come in right here is we know people struggle monetarily and monetarily can affect every other aspect of your life.

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This will help too.

Thank you so much. I mean, who hates cooking?

Baby, you kind of gotten back into a little cooking thing.

Yeah, well, this has helped me.

Yeah. And we have been taking part in this every week.

It's called Green Chef dinner time for us. And for any mom who has kids, who's busy, it's stressful. It's so stressful. And then the thoughts of, okay, what can I cook that actually tastes good, but that's healthy.

And then I gotta clean it up.

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It's been amazing. It's been so good. You haven't cooked one of these meals where I haven't sat down and said, baby, that was amazing.

Yeah.

And it's. And I have watched you. You got there for a while where you just didn't want to cook at all. And I've seen lately, okay, baby, where we gonna meet for dinner? I'm gonna cook tonight. And it's been.

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Well, if you've already got your meals prepped and planned and you got your finances fixed, that's a lot of hurdles. You're halfway there.

That's a lot of hurdles. Then there's the sex.

Are we going to talk about that?

Then there's the sex.

That's a series of podcasts, you know, right there. Let me get back to this idea. Number one, love is not feelings. But it sucks to be in love and have none.

Well, I don't think people say they're in love unless they have a feeling. They'll say, I've heard this so much. I love you, but I'm not in love with you.

Okay, let me Destroy that. Okay, First Corinthians 13. Love is patient. Love is kind. Love does not boast. It is not rude. It is not proud. It is not easily provoked. It believes all things, suffers all things, hopes all things. It does not rejoice in iniquity. It rejoices in the truth. Where have you heard a feeling anywhere in that?

None. No feeling.

The definition of love as defined by God in his word, in First Corinthians 13, not defined by pop culture, not defined by Netflix, not defined as defined by God. There is not one feeling or emotion listed. It is a commitment. A commitment to bear all things to hope, all things to believe.

And the love. Responsibility is on you.

Exactly.

It's on you.

And listen, that love is my standard, no matter what, absent of her behavior.

Say it again for the people in the back.

Yes, it's my standard. This is how I love you. Because this is my standard of love.

Because this is what kind of Christian I am.

It doesn't tell me how good you've been to me. It tells me what's going on in me. Yes. So people got to say, like, well, I'll honor them when they turn their life around. No, honor has to become your standard. And you honor all people. Why? Because whether or not they're honorable doesn't matter. You are a person that gives honor, and honor calls the best out of everybody. You can take people who haven't done anything good in years, and you begin to honor them, and all of a sudden something else will come out of them because you've created a culture for the best to happen. Well, love. People say, I'm not in love. I say, that's bull crap. The fact is, love is a commitment. And then I mess their mind up. I say, you stay in love till the feelings come back.

What does that mean, stay in love. Stay doing what love says to do. Stay doing what you're commanded to do.

I'm hanging in. Me and hope. Know what it is to take 1 thread on 1st Corinthians 13 and dangle over fire and just hang on to that. When everything else had been obliterated, we had First Corinthians 13. You know what? I got in my vows before God and said, for better, for worse. You know what people need to start doing in their marriage? You know, it says, speak now, forever hold your peace. When they say, for better fortune, they say, stop, Pastor, how much worse is it going to get? For richer, for poorer. How poorer? I'm being facetious. I'm being sarcastic. The fact is, when you make a vow, you don't know how high it's going to go. You don't know how low it's going to go. But you're promising to be there for the trip. And the vow is not made in a church service. The vow is made unto the Lord. And so me and Hope, you know, if you want to run on and Find your next. We're probably not the people to talk to because we had friends encouraging us to run on and do that. But we looked and said, you know what? We're in a terrible place. I mean, it was awful. But we both made a commitment that we have got to give love a shot and we've got to give God a shot because we promised and made a vow before God to be in this thing for the long haul. Now, love is like the stock market. Stocks go up.

The stock market's not too good right now, right?

Stocks go up, stocks go down. But unless you're a day trader, which I wouldn't advise, unless you're very good and you've got a very strong stomach, you're there for the long haul. I've been putting in my 401k since I was 23. I mean, if I don't even check.

It, we don't look at it.

Because I know it's going to go down, and I know it's going to go back up, and I know it's going to go down. But at the end of it, you will have had more ups than you've had downs. Marriage is much like that. You understand? I'm with you when stocks go up, but I'm not going to leave you when stocks go down, okay?

Because stocks are going to come up again.

I have a thing. I remember in the early days of our church about a lady whose husband was doing very good as an architect. He lost his job when the market kind of changed on him. He lost his job. Bad economy. And I mean, stocks plummeted. She divorced him because he no longer could give her that lifestyle. She moved on to somebody else. Life wasn't great. Well, stocks rose back up again in his life. This guy's blowing and going.

Got a new job.

He went with a new wife on his arm. And I said, I thought to myself, what happened? You left him when stocks are down? She called him when stocks were high. You've got to understand that your worst day is not the only day. It will. The stocks will rise again in your marriage. So I'm looking at it from the long run.

Just give it time.

Right? Which means I anticipate bumps.

Ooh, that's so good.

Why do we act surprised?

I think that's huge. I think that's so huge because we have presented ourselves so perfect in dating. Our. We've sent our representative out. We really haven't shown who we really are and how we can get moody and how we can get angry and how we don't want to wash our hair or shave our legs for four days when we're dating. We shave them every day. But, you know, on into the marriage, we pull our representative back and our real person shows up. So I think there you go.

I let you have your time where it's no makeup mask on your face and soft pajamas. But, you know, I also love. I'm like baby doll, you gotta dolled up. You gotta doll yourself up. And I'll look at you and say, you're too pretty.

Yeah. Well, I think the whole thing is we do send our representative out. We present perfect, and we think that it's always gonna be like that. And that's fake. You know, that's not even real. The dating phase really is not even real.

The real is when the bumps erode. You know what? I agree with you. I agree. I'm not disagreeing with you. I agree with you. But I think it can be if it lasts long enough. And I'm not advocating what we did. We dated over three years. And being at the point where our hormones were at a peak and trying to stay pure, that was awful. It was just awful. We almost couldn't be alone because it was a constant fighting.

I think dating, honestly, I think dating maybe two years is great. Then being engaged a year, that's perfect.

I don't know about the timeline. I don't know. That's the timeline we held to.

I think it's good.

But I tell people, I said, you gotta date long enough to see people in different seasons. You need to see them with a stomach virus. You need to see them with a fever. You need to see them when work. The day at work's been awful. You need to see them when they're on top of the world. You need to see them when they got a pocket full of money. You need to see them when money's.

Tight and family problems.

Yeah. How are they with their family? How are they with them when their family's going rough? You need to be able to get a taste of this is how this person manages life. And am I compatible with that? Because I always tell people the first law is the law of attraction. And people go get married off that one. But they haven't waited until the second one comes in, which is the law of compatibility. And if you're not compatible, you become unattractive very quick.

Very quick. But then we do change and grow. I mean, you get married in your 20s or 30s. I mean, every boy's brain hadn't even developed yet until they're 25, 26. So, I mean, everything changes with the seasons of life. And you just got to be willing to love each other through all those good, all the bad, all the ups, all the down. You know, if you trade this one out when the stocks get low, you're going to get another one and you're going to have four or five years and everything's going to be the representative, and then the poop's going to hit the fan in that one, too. I mean, what you going to do, just keep trading them out?

The grass, you know, we live thinking the grass is greener. I tell a lot of people, sometimes you get the other side and ain't no grass at all.

No.

And so, yeah, the grass is not always greener. So let me say this, Let me put you on the spot. Let's do something. None of this is staged and none of it's scripted. None of it. I mean, she may bring a note or scripture or two in here, but do you. Okay, 30 something years. Do you feel deeply loved by me?

I do. Very loved.

Okay. If you asked your wife tonight, do you feel deeply loved by me?

Wow, that's huge.

Okay. If they can't answer quickly or answer yes, then you got to go next phase and say, why?

Where am I missing the mark?

Why do you feel deeply? If you need to ask him, ladies, do you feel deeply? Deeply. I mean, in a secure way? This guy ain't going anywhere. Deeply loved by me. That is a very hard question that it would be sometimes hard to hear the answer because some of us think we're doing good and we don't want to give.

Let's give some practical. Let's give some practical ways of falling in love again. You say, I hear all that, but we're at the place where it's blah. We're at the place where it's yucky. We're at the place where I don't.

Want even to look at them before we do. The practical, the emotional side, usually in some way or some area over time, your heart has been hardened. That's when the feelings stop. We're chasing the feeling. I want to feel that again. We can. But there is a dynamic spiritually there where over time, without apologies, adverse behavior builds.

Resentment ticked you off and harmed you and offended you because what was cute.

When you're dating is not cute after 10 years of marriage. So you're sitting there and your heart is closed. What are some things we can do practically that make us open our heart again?

So the lack of love, it's the lack of attention, it's the lack of going the extra mile. It's the lack of doing what you know, they need, you know, to make them happy. That's what closes our heart. So it's doing those things again that opens our heart. It is. It's the acts of service. You know, the book, the five love languages, it's so practical, but it's so, so good.

That's why it's been one of the all time bestsellers.

And you've got to know what says I love you to your spouse. And you got to know what says I love you to you. Mine and Ron's love language, totally different, 100%. So what are the love languages? Words of affirmation, acts of service, quality time, gifts and physical touch.

Physical touch. Okay, so Ron, I'm affirmation and physical touch.

Hands down, affirmation, words of affirmations, word.

From affirmations and then physical touch. You, you know, you can come up, put your hand on side of my face, and I melt. I mean, that's just, that's my thing. Your thing is gift giving, not materialism and quality time. Gift giving. You do like quality time. You do like quality time. But gift giving, it is amazing what a gift does for hope. I mean, when I say gift, I'm not talking about all the time.

So y' all can send all gifts to Redemption105.

She loves a mug with her name on it. She loves just dumb stuff, crafty picture. I'm not talking about, you know, it.

Don'T have to be a lot of money.

And I'm just talking about some bubble bath. I've gone to H and M, you know what, $9 for shirts. And I was cold and I'm running here right quick and get a sweatshirt. And I've seen something like, oh, Hope would kill that.

And you did.

And I just pick it up, $22, you know, whatever, and I bring it back, you know, she just go, why? It's not.

How do I do it again?

It's not the pair of shorts.

How do I do it?

It's not the jeans, the pair of shorts. It's not that. But it's the fact that I got you a gift and a spoiler and.

You thought about me.

Do you know, do you even know how your spouse hears I love you? Because just because you're saying it don't mean they're hearing it right.

If I could get Ron gifts after gifts after gifts. Now he likes gifts.

I'm appreciative yeah.

But it doesn't really touch his heart. Like me sitting down, looking him in the eye and telling him how amazing he is to me or telling him how thankful I am that he's a hard worker. And putting my hand in his hair and scratching his. His hair and his new beard. I have to go all the way back now because it's way back here. I don't know what's going on.

I like it, though.

But anyway, so I have to say I love you. The way he hears it. And I have to do it on purpose. I have to do it daily. It takes. You're like, well, that sounds like work at first. It is. It is, because you are. Wasn't it work when you were dating? When you got ready and said, oh, I wonder what he wants me to wear. Oh, I wonder how he wants me. That's work. But you did it, and you did it willfully because you wanted to make them happy. This is what brings back the butterflies. This is what just makes their heart pitter patter. If you could do it, I promise you, if you'd just give it a try. If you would just give it a try, it really, really.

Any action that speaks your mate's love language opens their heart.

Yeah.

I don't care how angry you are. It is hard to be angry when somebody is doing things that say, I love you, I love you. Even if there's something you have to overcome that helps you overcome it. Hope loves a trip.

I do.

Hope loves a trip.

Quality time.

I mean, if I tell Hope. Go ahead. Here's my card. Book us a room. Wherever you want to go. Let's go. Oh, my gosh. I mean, I'm sitting here. She's buzzing like a bee. I have had to take time to learn that. Can I tell them real one funny story before we go into our thing? I will never forget this. This was our first year of marriage. This was our first year of marriage. We lived in Knoxville, Tennessee, at San Souci Apartments, and it wasn't a great place. And we're there, and it's Hope's first birthday. And I learned when we were dating, I made a big mistake. Birthdays were nothing at my house. Christmas was everything. But we just didn't really celebrate birthdays. Hope's birthdays. Oh, it's killed the fatty calf. Well, I didn't know that. So we were dating, and she had her first birthday, and I didn't, you know, happy birthday, babe. Oh.

I was like, excuse me.

Oh, oh, where's my Cake? Yeah. When that tornado stopped, I had a lot of making up that I had to do. So I learned a lesson early. Birthdays to her are big. Okay, so we don't.

January 22nd.

We don't have a lot of money. We don't have what I say with a lot of money. We don't have any money. I made $8,600 that year on my taxes. That was my entire yearly earnings. And so we had this little apartment. So I left the office early and I went and we had this bed that we slept on a lot of times under the couch. We pull it out. So I pulled out that bed and made it.

This is hilarious.

Cheesy candle on the side. I went by the grocery store and I cooked a meal. And she was in school, so she was finishing up her last year of school. I was helping another man plant a church. And so she came home from college. She's there all day, and then had a pretty long drive.

It was my son, seventh year.

She came home two or three majors later, whatever. And I had the jazz music playing. I had the candles burning. I had the bed made. I had the candlelight dinner. And I thought, I've been there working with her.

He was like, oh, I'm going to do so good.

Blow her away. I'm going to blow her away. This is like the greatest. And Hope looked at the bed and the candle and the jazz music. She said, is this my birthday or yours? And I learned another lesson.

That's my gift.

That was not how she heard I love you. Did I do well? Did I have great intentions? Yeah, but that's not her language. That's not her language. She has a couple of ways when she hears it and she hears it loud. Everything else she appreciates, but that's not what says I love you. And so I learned the birthday thing. I learned that, you know what? I went into this night saying I love you your way. My way.

He wanted some physical touch.

Yes, I do.

For my birthday.

I do love you. But I said, I love you the way Ron wants to be loved. What I had to learn was to say, I love you the way she wants to be loved, which may not even be natural for me. So I have to be intentional.

So if you would have given me a gift, you would have gotten physical touch anyway. See? Come on.

I think I had a beard back then. And you gave me physical touch anyway.

Oh, goodness. All right, here we go. Listen, parents, let's just. Let's pull it back before we go too far. It's time to cross off one of the most important things to do on your to do list. Are you ready? It's, it's not.

Stay right here. It's good. Stay here.

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We saw some really, really, really sad situations, y'.

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Yep, we gotta do that. Can I, can I tell you something? That during COVID I don't know how many funerals and things we paid for and was glad to do it, glad to step in at moments of trouble, but the fact is we saw families under extreme duress because there had been no life insurance. Here's the problem with life insurance. It falls into the category of one day. I'll do it one day. No, you need to do it today. You need to do it right now because you don't know what one day is going to bring. And so you know you got two day. And so that's the thing I would highly encourage you to do. So glad they're a sponsor.

So before we leave, I'm going to do a quick little test. What is your love language? You don't have to go read the whole book, but you can and you need to. But quickly. What is your love language? So could it be words of affirmation? And let, let me tell you, words of affirmation is the largest, most comprehensive love language that most people have. So do you really like hearing your partner say I love you? Those three words are particularly meaningful, special and reassuring to hear again and again and again. Do you appreciate when you're being acknowledged and praised and all the men said.

Of course we do.

It's nice to have your efforts recognized with words you feel value when they take the time to thoughtfully reflect and comment on something positive they notice you doing. And when you do something nice for your partner, they say, thank you. Thank you. Which makes you feel recognized and affirmed. Okay.

It's like today when I finished getting ready, you looked at me and said, do I need to call maintenance? Remember? And I said, why do you want to call maintenance, baby? She said, because of your drip baby you told me about.

Basically because he thought he looked so good. He said these words to me. He told me to call the maintenance department to bring towels because he thought he looked good. So he was fishing for words.

She was looking at my information. What? I need to call him, I said, because I dripped all over the phone.

You're an idiot. Okay.

That's not a word of affirmation.

So. Quality time. Quality time. Could this be you? You like to spend uninterrupted time time with your partner. It's critical that you have enough time to hang out, enjoy each other with undivided attention, no distractions. It's meaningful when they make time for you, prioritize you in their schedule, and don't cancel plans. Creating memories and special moments together is super important. Sharing new experiences means the world to you. Time is precious and it's meaningful to soak in every second. Could that be you? Could it? And then acts of service. You feel taken care of when your partner supports you and helps ease your responsibilities when they do little chores or tasks.

That'd be your third.

Love it. It means a lot when someone follows through on something, especially if they were paying attention and stepped in to help. When they do this, you trust your partner to pay attention to the little details. You think talk is cheap? Do you think talk is cheap? And actions mean everything. You need someone to come through and to know that you can rely on them. Show me. Not tell me. That's acts of service. Show me, don't tell me. Okay. Gifts. You feel loved when you receive a gift. The present itself is nice, but it's really the thank you thought behind it that counts. The gift becomes an object that helps you remember that they were thinking of you, which fills you with love. So when they give you something, you have it set out on a dresser or you have it up in the kitchen and you just want to keep looking at those balloons. Okay? After a date or a trip, it's special to take a momento home with you. Don't I always want to buy something from a trip?

You Always want to buy something, period.

Right. Seeing the item reminds you of those sentimental moments. The gifts are the meaningful ones. If it's a surprise gift, even better. It strengthens the bond and builds a deeper connection for you. Okay, what about touch? You look forward to hugs and cuddles and kissing. Nothing beats tactile physical intimacy. You feel grounded in the relationship when physical affection is accessible and often cultivated. Holding hands, embracing kisses are common and welcome. Your game for public displays of affection. That is so you. It helps you feel want. It helps you feel wanted, can't be stopped. And desired. Sexual intimacy makes you feel loved and closer.

I don't like. I'm not. I don't like that. To your partner like that. Just give me a held hand. That's all.

I know that's all you want. Just a little help.

Just hold my hand. Kiss me on the cheek.

Ron hates it when he comes up to hug me and kiss me and I do this and I pat him back.

That means get away, hurry. Yeah.

That means get away, hurry up. So there are things that you can do. There really are. There's hope. There is hope.

All of these things she just read opens a heart back up.

Yes. I've seen marriages turned around when they're willing to do the work to invest in the other person.

Baby, We've been over 40 minutes talking about it.

Yeah, but it was good. So good. Give me five. We helping people today.

I'm starving.

You're always hungry.

Holy.

Anyway, go follow us.

Affirm me.

You got to go follow us.

Affirm me.

Listen. Don't just listen to this on YouTube if you're listening on YouTube. Like it?

We need you to subscribe and subscribe.

I need you. I need you to subscribe to my YouTube Hope Carpenter Ministries subscribe and then his Ron Carpenter Ministries subscribe. But then go to Apple and Spotify where you get these podcasts and subscribe to it so that it's automatically downloaded for you and every Thursday. We need you to help us do that. We love you. I hope it's helped you and I pray that you will put these into action and you will see some butterflies back in your life this week. We love you. See you next time.