Intentionally Listening

About 10 years in, we figured it out, and we wrote Fair Fight Rules.

Now we were learning them all along, but I'll give you the first, just the beginning of the principle. When you're under pressure and you have conflict, you want to be heard. The objective is not to be heard, but to hear.

So my job is to listen, and our rule is I have not listened until she says I have. Welcome to Family Life Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Ann Wilson, and I'm Dave Wilson, and you can find us at familylifetoday.com or on our Family Life app.

This is Family Life Today. So I remember sitting at the Family Life Weekend to Remember marriage getaway two weeks before our wedding, which it was a phenomenal weekend. In fact, I got to say this, you know, before we jump in, if you want to go to a Family Life Weekend to Remember sign up right now because it's half off.

Yeah, they're happening right now. We paid full price in 1980. You can get half off. Yeah, and you can do that at familylifetoday.com. I'm telling you, it'll literally change your marriage. But we were sitting there engaged two weeks from that Saturday, we're going to be getting married. And I'll never forget, Dennis Rainey was on the stage and, you know, at the time president and founder of Family Life. And he said something like this.

And I know exactly because it's in the in the manual and we now teach it. But he says conflict is common to all marriages and all marriages go through. Oh, what do you think? I mean, we're sitting there before we get married and we both thought not our marriage. I really thought there has been no one on the entire planet that has loved and love each other the way we do.

No one. And I think every couple thinks that like nothing compares to our love for one another. I remember sitting around watching all these couples take notes. We didn't take any notes. We're like, in two weeks, we're going to be in this bed. That's all Dave would put in the book.

It's like 14 more days till we can. Anyway, I just remember thinking they don't love Jesus like we do. Yeah, they obviously don't love each other like we do.

They're not going into full time ministry the way we are. Yeah. Yeah. And then we got married. We did. Was it a week? No, I was like we had a great first five months. We did?

Yeah. OK, so we'll tell you five months later. I mean, there were struggles, but we were fighting daily, if not hourly, within five months. And I think many marriages experience that. So I think, too, Dave, I think a lot of couples get into marriage thinking it's gonna be great.

And they don't have a handle on how to deal with conflict. We didn't. And that's what we learned at the weekend to remember marriage getaway. Yeah, we actually pulled that manual out later. And we're going to get some help on conflict today. Yeah, we've got Kevin and Marsha Myers back in the studio with us. They wrote a book called The Second Happy, which is you talk about a great title for a marriage book. It's like there's another happy available to us. You know, we had the first happy, right? Right.

We have a second. But anyway, welcome back to Family Life Today. Thank you.

It's good to see you. You guys are pastoring in the Atlanta area for thirty-three years? Thirty-four, somewhere. Yeah. Have you noticed the longer it goes, the harder it is to keep up with the math? 1987. Yeah, you just do it in fives and tens.

You just round it out. Yeah. And the years go by so fast, it was like, oh, no, that was last year that it was 32, you know? And you've been married 39 years. I got that one down. Okay. You have four kids, four grandkids. Yeah.

Yes. It's pretty fun because your lives are really similar to our lives, you know, in terms of starting a church, 12 Stone in Georgia and pastoring. And, you know, it is interesting.

A lot of people in the church tend to think the pastor's marriages are just wonderful. You're like us. We've said from the stage, we have problems. We struggle.

And they still sort of walk up to you like, yeah, you know, we have a little problem. But nothing like ours, like you have conflict, but nothing like our conflict. And one of the things you talk about in your book is how to do conflict well. So let's talk about that.

Because we were so good at it from the beginning. We could have taught the conference you attended, but we weren't invited. Yeah, you were.

So far from the truth. Well, it's interesting because earlier you've already talked about that, Marcia, you kind of shut down a little more in conflict. Yes.

And then, Kevin, I'm guessing that you're coming in there like pretty. I'm afraid so. Yeah. You're all afraid to deal with conflict. No. So I'm guessing that created some conflict.

You are so discerning. Yes, exactly. So how did that go for you guys? How did you guys fight? Or how do you guys fight? Pretty much what Ann said. Yeah.

He mostly was on the attack. And it's not that I can hold my own, but in my own way. So as I said before, I'm stubborn and also the silent treatment kind of thing, you know, where then I'm going to ignore you. Oh, no. Yes. Dave would do that to me.

And Kevin, that like spurs on this, you know, we're going there. You're probably much better and more mature than I was. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no. You give me the silent treatment. That's a challenge.

Yes. I will steamroll you and then I'll back up. My best attack, I'll have to say, but not really godly, was on Sunday mornings when he was preaching. Oh, no.

Just having like looking at him and staring at him like with the arms folded. Get this, Dave. Come on now. I did this too. One time I sat in the back row and I looked at him like, I don't even like the pastor of this church. And she told me that when I got home. So you're up there preaching and you're in a conflict. And this is the part people don't understand when they say, well, your marriage must be fine.

Listen, we have learned how to look better than we live. And a lot of people have that art. And that's almost part of the pressure in pastoring. But let's not pretend it's limited to that.

People know how to come to church and look better than. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And so gunny sacking conflict or pushing it to the side or just volcanically, which mine would be more volcanic.

I would get pushed to rage and I'm going to be verbally aggressive. Get it off my chest simultaneously. You ought to listen and perhaps agree with me. So my conflict resolution style was I'm right. Listen, and you'll discover that.

Agree with me. And we've resolved conflict for some reason. I know people listening can't understand what I'm talking about because no, no couple has ever done this. Yeah, but I couldn't understand. I just say to her, you know, people will come and counsel with me. They want my advice. They want my advice. And you dismiss it.

Isn't that a clue to you? Because I am smart and godly. And people love me.

And wise and discerning and they love me. And I don't know what's wrong with you. Yes. So what have you learned about conflict? Probably the most helpful thing. I don't know. I'm overstating, perhaps.

One of the most. The most used thing by other people that they say has helped them the most is the Fair Fight Rules. Oh, good. About 10 years in, we figured it out and we wrote Fair Fight Rules. Now, we were learning them all along. I'll give you the first, just the beginning of the principle. When you're under pressure and you have conflict, you want to be heard. And so what's understandably broken all of us is that you think communication requires you being heard. And that conflict resolution begins with them hearing you. And the difficulty is once you've been heard, you're emotionally done. And that's the beginning of real communication and conflict resolution. The objective is not to be heard, but to hear. That has been said through scripture, that has been said in leadership circles, that's been said at marriage conferences. This is easy to say.

It's incredibly complex to do. I'm thinking of James 1. Right? That we should be quick to listen. And I've read that.

And I've black-highlighted that. Exegetically, you've probably torn that apart in the Greek. And do you know what we do? We take scriptures like that and we read them to our spouse. The whole point of it was for you to take that in. But I would read it and say, Marsha, be quick to listen. Slow to speak and slow to anger.

Honey, that's what's broke right here. And so everybody has that challenge on one side or the other. So we set up what we call rules, fair fights. You watch them, used to be boxing. Whatever fighting style you prefer that's in the legal realm.

They set a time, they've got rules. We have pre-fight set up and then we have fair fight rules. And it's three phases. So it's communication and that's four rounds. It's compromise and that's four rounds. And if necessary, counseling four rounds.

It's not overly complicated. If you don't know how to resolve conflict, you have to be mechanical before you're emotional. Or you'll never build the capacity to resolve it. Ooh, that's good and that's hard. And that's what's hard.

Yeah. You get emotional because this is intense and this is a person who's supposed to love you and you don't feel loved. You feel rejected or dismissed or unheard or you don't understand, you don't care. So the first segment of communication, and it's because she's already said I'm forceful and I am. So I talk too much and I know it.

And she talks too little and she knows it. Now listen, if you're a couple and you're listening to this, part of communication is being honest with who you are. We can laugh about it. And you're really, you're looking at your differences and now you're honoring them. You're just different than I am. And that's okay.

God's made you a certain way. And we all have things that have happened in our past that create some wounds that maybe shut us down or make us loud. So I think that's a good thing to note and it's okay.

That's true. For us then the rules and had to be under communication for rounds. First round is she speaks. I listen and you can say nothing. She always speaks first, no matter who calls the fair fight. So if we want to fight on something, we've got conflict.

Somebody has to call a fair fight. They have to explain it in about 60 seconds what it is. We set a date and a time. Okay, give us an example. Show us.

Coming home late. I knew you were going to do it. I knew where this was going. You're starting a fight right now. For all you women out there, this is for you. This is for you.

All right. So what would you say? Kevin, I want to have a fight. And you would be like, what? And I would be like.

I like how you do him. Pretty accurate. Honestly, almost always, whoever calls for the fair fight, the other one does not want to do it. But because it's in the rules, we will. We obey the rules. So you say, I want to have a fair fight. Uh-huh.

The one who wants to fight has to declare what it is. So I would say, you're always coming home late. I have the dinner made, and we're waiting for you. I have children. They need to eat. We need to work this out.

And then we say, okay, instead of going into the fight right then, we decide when we want to fight. That's really important. I cannot respond. That's one of the rules. I don't legitimize or dismiss her request. I even try not to roll my eyes.

Oh, that's good, because body language tells a lot. And so we have to get out the calendar and decide when are we going to fight. I mean, do you try to do it soon instead of wait a week or wait a day?

Yes, but if calendars are heavy and kids' activities, the kids have to be to bed for us at that season of time. We have to be emotionally capable to engage. Sometimes it's days down the road. It has to be concentrated time. One of the things that would be good about this is you have time to pray.

Absolutely. Now, you could go one of two ways. I used to build my case in that time, like, I'm going to say this and he's going to say this, but I'm going to win because I'm going to do this. But what I've learned, and I'm sure you guys, too, that gives you time like, Lord, check my heart. How should I say this?

How should I bring it up? Is there anything I'm missing? So I like that it gives you a little time. That's true. And it requires that of you. And if you follow Christ, the Holy Spirit's going to do that whether you're asking Him to or not.

That's just who He is. Now, is it hard to not go into it right there? Because if Marsha, I mean, Marsha used a word that we said, family life. Always never. Don't use always.

So if Ann would say you're always late, I'd be, you know, we can talk about this tomorrow, but I'm not always late. So do you find yourself like, I have to exercise self-control? I do want to do it right now.

And it's not going to go well if I do it right now. So you learn, you practice, you build the habit. That's mechanical versus emotional.

You have to walk the mechanical process. Not emotional. That's what makes it nearly impossible to resolve conflict. Because when you express your emotions, you are rarely loving. Love is a discipline.

It's not an emotion. To value someone is a discipline. It's a choice you make.

And so I have surrendered that we are one. And therefore I care about this because she cares about this. Therefore, she gets to call the fight.

We set the time. She starts. Even if I call the fight, she starts.

Wait, wait, wait, wait. Why does she start? She always starts because I'm too forceful. Oh, so it's a choice in your marriage.

I truly am. In our marriage, we don't think it's true for everybody, but here's what we've discovered. I cannot start without me solving it while I start. And I have got to learn to shut up and she's got to learn to speak up. And usually in your marriage, if you don't figure out who's who, you might have two people that need to shut up. You might have two people that need to speak up. We had a person that needed to shut up, me, and someone that needed to speak up. We're not going to build resolved conflict, authentic love, true companionship and intimacy if we don't learn to communicate.

And solving conflict is at the heart of communication. I really like that you're even, like it's a good conversation of who would start. I'm thinking about that for us. I'm sure people are listening thinking, hmm, who would start in our relationship? I think you would start. I'm glad you think that.

Because I was thinking the same thing. Congratulations. You just got more out of your own interview. I'll pay you later. Thanks, Kevin and Marcia.

He just slid 20 bucks because it went to his favor. That's all. Okay, so now when you come to the actual fight, walk us through it. So like he said, I would go first no matter what.

I don't understand how you would do that. So if you have an issue, Kevin, you've already stated what it's about. How would Marcia start it if she doesn't really know everything? Nine times out of 10, if you have a conflict in your relationship, you both know it. And you both have a different perspective. So when I call for a fight and I say, I want to talk about finances. I want to talk about your spending. Oh, maybe you would know what to say. She immediately has an opinion.

I want to talk about our parenting of Julissa, our daughter, our second child. And I have to say something about that. So I say, I think we're over disciplining her on this. Or I think we're not addressing this.

Or I think we're over investing in this. Or this is frustrating me. Seems like you're dismissing me. So you've given her enough. So I've given her a statement, but I can't go into. There's a difference between giving context and trying to win. So I have to give context. We already know this is not, oh, we don't know we have conflict. Yeah, we know we have conflict. So even though you brought it up, she's still going to start.

That's how we've done it. And then after the first person gives their perspective, the other person, instead of just automatically rebutting, has to tell you back what they said. So my job is to listen. And our rule is I have not listened until she says I have.

We have literally had fights where it took an hour for us to do round one, for her to speak and me to listen until she said, you have heard me head and heart. You have said what I said, and you said it with the right heart. You stay back and you say, here's what I'm hearing. And you go, no, no, no, no, that's not what I'm saying. Until you get to, yep, you've heard me and you understand me.

Yes. Now you can go to the next round. That process, however long it takes in the early stages of learning how to communicate, always shaves some of the rough edges off from a guy like me. From anyone.

Whoever has this dynamic in them. The Holy Spirit will soften your edges because we can't go on. Now it's at that moment that you just want to be able to say, well, there you go.

You can't. And I want to just run. And when you quit on communication and you let conflict reign in your relationship, you're going to be alone, but you chose it. This is hard work. And we've been doing this for a lot of years.

So we don't have to do it with the mechanics that we're talking about right now, but we did for some years. Right. So then it's my turn. So once she says, I've heard you, well, she sometimes has to write her thoughts out to bring them. I don't have to write mine out. I have them in my head. Let's go.

I'm ready. Yeah. But it's a good idea sometimes, probably, to write it out. Oh, it's very helpful.

Yes. So then I get to share my perspective and she has to respond until I say she's understood me head and heart. And when you have walked through those four, if you will, rounds, you have accomplished communication. Everybody wants to solve a problem before they understand the problem. And so it's often broke because you want to compromise before you communicate. My job is not to say, all right, here's what I think the problem is and here's what we do.

Would you like to do that? Every single time. In fact, sometimes I start with here's what we should do and here's why. I start with the solution. So this discipline of communication before you find a solution.

So the phase two is four rounds of compromise and she has to give a solution. And then I make sure that I understand and then I give a solution and then we negotiate until we find one. And it does kind of help you understand the other person, too, as you're doing it. Because it's something you wouldn't have thought of.

I'm not Kevin and he's not Marsha. You go, oh, well, that's how he thinks. And now you understand how he thinks so that the next time you have a conflict, you have that piece of, oh, he usually thinks this way. So maybe the conflict isn't what I think it is. Yeah. You kind of mix the two. And the beauty is you're really getting to know each other. Exactly what you're saying, Marsha. You're understanding one another so much better.

And you asked her at the beginning to give an example of a fight. Yeah. Let's play this out for people. Remember, you're always home late.

Let's take them to our compromise. So after we went through the rounds of communication and then we went to compromise, he, of course, made his points of the fact that sometimes he has to go. He's a pastor. He has appointments or something, an emergency crops up.

He can't help that. But there are other times when he just needs to finish something, you know, and wants to do it and wants to get it done. So we decided that we would set a specific time for dinner and that he promised he would be home. So I agreed with her.

I said, I agree with you. You make a meal. We're trying to build family. We're in the season of building family.

And we said we value family above the work I do, and I'm valuing my work above our family because we have a very small slot in which to engage in family togetherness. And it's between five thirty and seven and I'm blowing it. So I will get up earlier. I'll get these section of things done for an hour or two at work alone in the office so that by the time I get to the end of the day, I have margin and I'll be home at five thirty and you can count on me.

Now, if I'm not, it's because there's an emergency I'll call. But I'm going to move it from the exception to the rule and vice versa, which means as a rule. I was late. And I made that an exception that honors her, that requires change for me.

That puts our family in the place of valuing that we both said it had. And it literally changed the way I do my calendar in life. It changed the way I think. And I felt like when he was late, there was a good reason.

Yeah. So it didn't create the same conflict or exasperation that it would have. When you solve conflict, you also solve future conflict. When you actually resolve conflict, you set up a marriage where you have less and less conflict over time because you literally build the mutual honoring, mutual understanding and mutual grace. So we have all sorts of grace because we know the other person is committed to one another. Yeah.

And I love the concept you've developed of mechanical before emotional, because we often get in a fight and I've done this, like, forget the mechanical. We need to just... And it's like, no, no, no. You can't forget that. That is critical. It's like, obviously, as a guy that played football and was around the NFL forever, there's out of bounds.

And when you step out of bounds, the play's over. It's like there are rules, mechanical, and they help you get to compromise. They help you get to resolution. And as you said so well, that helps you in the future.

Yeah. I mean, I'm thinking of a couple right now that's not been able to fight well. You have just given them tools to help them fight well. And if you forget, listen to this again, better yet, get the book, The Second Happy, read through the chapters together and say, let's implement this in our marriage.

I think it'll take us to a whole other place because conflicts every day. It's part of every relationship, every church, every team, every business, every family. And we don't get any training on how to do it well. And today's been a training session on how to do it well. Thank you.

That's been awesome. If you take a minute and look back on your life, I'm guessing very few of us had any actual training in conflict and conflict resolution. What you saw in your home growing up may have been a destructive pattern, but it's all you knew.

Or maybe you saw nothing. Maybe mom and dad never modeled for you what healthy conflict resolution looks like. And I'm guessing most of us have never had any kind of actual formal training on resolving conflict at the weekend. Remember, marriage getaways that we host all around the country.

We spend time walking couples through the biblical principles about conflict resolution that can help us get to a place where we actually resolve conflict, where we can be at peace with one another, where we can honor and respect one another. I mention that because right now there's a special offer for Family Life Today listeners. If you'd like to attend an upcoming weekend to remember marriage getaway, you can save 50 percent off the regular registration fee.

We have three or four dozen of these events happening in cities all around the country this spring. So you can go online at family life today dot com. Click the link to find information about when a getaway is being hosted in a city near where you live. Block out that weekend and then register today so you can save 50 percent off the regular registration fee. This offer is good this week and next week only.

So you need to act on this quickly. Go to family life today dot com to find out more about the getaway, find out when it's coming to a city near where you live. You can register online. If you have any questions, call us at 1-800-FL today. We can answer your questions over the phone. Again, make plans to come to a weekend to remember marriage getaway, not just to learn about conflict resolution, but about healthy marital intimacy, about God's purpose and design for marriage, about the roles for husbands and the roles for wives.

All of it is covered at the weekend to remember. And again, you can register right now online at family life today dot com and save 50 percent off the regular registration fee. While you're on our website, check out the book that Kevin and Marsha Myers have written called The Second Happy, Seven Practices to Make Your Marriage Better Than Your Honeymoon, a great book for couples to go through together.

Or if you're in a small group with other couples, this would be a great small group study to go through as well. Again, check out The Second Happy on our website at family life today dot com. You can order from us online or call to order at 1-800-FL today. 1-800-358-6329.

That's 1-800-F as in family, L as in life, and then the word today. Now, tomorrow we're going to hear more about how to address the hard to talk about subjects in marriage, the elephants in the room. How do we wisely bring up important subjects that could be difficult to talk about? Dave and Ann Wilson will talk with Kevin and Marsha Myers about that tomorrow. Hope you can join us. On behalf of our hosts, Dave and Ann Wilson, I'm Bob Lapine. We'll see you back next time for another edition of Family Life Today. Family Life Today is a production of Family Life, a crew ministry helping you pursue the relationships that matter most.