So the first thing that changed in my marriage was believing the best about Ashley, meaning the things that he's doing, he's doing for a reason. I don't need to control him or nag him.
So I started complimenting him. I started anytime he did anything, I would make sure I was admiring and respecting him. And was that like the first year of our marriage? Pretty much after the first year, that changed everything. Dr.
Heather Holliman and her husband Ashley are with us today on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. Thanks for joining us. I'm John Fuller. John, one of our most popular programs from last year was with Heather, and it was fantastic. And people responded, and we are quite confident that today's broadcast will have that same kind of response because she just touches a great nerve when it comes to how to communicate.
And if you're in marriage, you get it.
Sometimes you're doing it well, sometimes you're not doing it well. I remember one time I'm reading the newspaper, watching a Broncos football game, and Jean's talking to me. And I think I've developed a bit of that skill because of this job. And she looked at me and said, what did I just say? And I gave it back to her verbatim.
And she said, I appreciate that, but I need your face. And I thought, uh-oh, I'm in trouble. And yeah, that's part of it. How do we communicate in a deeper way in our marriages to grow that intimacy, not just physically, but Most importantly, emotionally and spiritually. Yeah, there's a yearning for so many of us, and we don't know the path.
This is going to be a great show. Heather's husband, Ashley, is joining her for this conversation. As I said, he's the executive director of Seated and Sent, a ministry he and Heather founded. And Heather has studied and spoken about conversation and relationships. She's an associate teaching professor of advanced writing at Penn State.
And she's a speaker and author. Her book is really the foundation for today's conversation. It's what we talked about last time, in fact.
So it's called The Six Conversations: Pathways to Connecting in an Age of Isolation and Incivility. Get a copy of this book and learn more about our guests. We've got the links in the show notes. Heather and Ashley, welcome. Back to Focus on the Family for you, Heather.
First time for Ashley. Welcome. Thank you so much.
So glad to be here. Good to have you both. Hey, Heather, let me start with you. We did have some discussions previously, and you are. In that university setting, you're teaching, you know, late teen, early 20s somethings, and there seems to be a lot of loneliness expressed from that group when researchers do the studies.
They're saying it's one of the loneliest groups that they've seen at that age for as long as they've done some of the research.
So I guess a basic question before we even apply this to marriage and what's happening there, what's going on in the culture where people that are so connected digitally today feel so alone?
Well, one of the problems is we found just we wrote this book, really talked about writing the six conversations because of what we called the culture of incivility. Just people were really suspicious of each other. They approach each other not believing the best, just feeling like people were enemies coming out of, you know, even from 2016 on. Also, people just have lost the skill of connecting from COVID. We were seeing a lot of research studies coming out about the lack of just people were isolated and they did not know how to re-engage and connect.
And also recently we've been looking at it's a culture of monologuing and not dialoguing.
So think about TikTok and Instagram reels and people on there, they're talking, they're monologuing to an imagined audience, and there's not a lot of just interpersonal connection.
So I tell my students this is the number one professional skill you can develop is the art of forming warm connections.
So this is a bit of the book is a bit of the curriculum. It is. It's a great curriculum. We're going to cover some of that. We won't be able to get to all of it.
Let me ask you, Ashley, I mean, you've been married 25 years. And, you know, the good thing about doing this with students is it does prepare them. Not all people are going to get married. I get that. We're not making an idol out of marriage.
But many will get married. And in doing so, that really is great preparatory work for how to be in an intimate relationship with somebody. Let me ask it this way. The way God wired us, there's that scripture that references that He created us for relationship. And we tend to Ignore that.
I mean, it's like our being is meant to be in relationship, but we are working against that natural God-given bent, it seems like. Yeah, at the core and essence of all of this is what is at the essence of who God is. Even before the world was created, he existed in relationship with himself, Father, Son, Holy Spirit. And he had wonderful conversations with himself, I can only imagine. And then he created a world for us to live in and created us in his image.
And designed us in his image to relate similarly and to have great conversations. And so I'm someone ahead of this comes very naturally to I don't. We can talk about that maybe more, but this is something I've really had to grow and learn in. But what gives me great hope is God has fashioned me in his image. And so I too can have great conversations, meaningful connections.
I've got to work at it maybe more than others, but it's hardwired into who I am. I think that's great, though. And so often, I mean, we tease all the time here, focus on the family, how marriage, you know, you're not always the opposites or attracting, but often they are. It's like introvert and extrovert and those kinds of things. But it is kind of humorous that God puts something in us that we are attracted to the things we don't possess in order to, you know, the scripture talks about it, completing us, right?
That's right. And then we're, then we have a. Challenge. Then it's either going to be a good thing or it's going to be irritating. You guys have been married 25 years.
So what do you when you look at your own marriage not to put you on the spot, but I kind of am. What are those attributes that you look at in your own marriage that make your marriage healthy?
Well, for me, it's we've really developed the conviction to continually be curious about one another and ask really, I mean, being a student of each other. And I love it because I was just thinking about the verse in Colossians about how in Christ are hidden all the riches of wisdom and knowledge. And I think when I'm with Ash, I want to seek out the wisdom of Christ that's in him because he's a believer. You know, like I want to ask him good questions, like, what is God teaching you? What are you learning about him?
That's been a real foundation of our marriage, at least in the last 10 years. And then also this for me, and I don't know if this is the same for you, Ashley, but believing the best about him has changed everything about our marriage. And not just believing it in my heart, but saying positive things to him every day. It changes the communication climate of our home. And that's rooted in even the research we read from the Yale Relationship Lab about, it's called expressing liking.
You have to tell your spouse how much you like him every day.
So, those are the two that have transformed me the most, which are two of the four mindsets of a loving connection. Yeah, I think for me, the whole, just the whole idea of oneness that God has called us to be one, part of the way that that gets worked out for us is just oneness of purpose and our mission and embracing life as being sent ones and living life as those God has sent out to others. But also, I think as part of that is one of the goals we talk, Heather talks about in the book, a meaningful conversation. is sharing their goals, you know, or helping them grow, helping them reach their goals. And I love that about our marriage.
It's like, wait a minute, if God's called us together, and if Ephesians, is it 2.10, you know, he's got good works prepared in advance for us to do, well, then he's got good works prepared in advance for her to do. And for me to do, and for us to do together. And there have been times in our marriage where they kind of tend to bump up against each other. It's like, wait a minute, God's got this worked out. We'll figure this out together.
We don't have to compete about what God has for us for our lives if we really follow this oneness idea. Let me, because you said that so beautifully, both of you. I'm thinking of the listeners that they're not there. They didn't do a PhD in communication.
So they haven't had those milestone breakthroughs yet.
So it was interesting in your answer. You're kind of referencing you learn to. Yes.
So where, you know, where were those milestones for you? Year five, year three, six months. When did it start where you're going, okay, I need to, I need to express that I like you to.
Well, this is embarrassing, but when we got married, I was a terrible wife. I was nagging. I was controlling. I kept a record of wrongs. If he didn't take out the trash, if he didn't do the dishes, if he did, I was terrible.
And I don't know where this came from. I guess I had the expectation of marriage that his entire job was to just make me happy and do whatever I say every day. It was terrible. Jim and John, I am confessing to you now. I was our marriage.
We had a marriage concert. Yeah, yeah. No, but it's good. These are normal things.
Well, and we see marriages that function. that way now where there's a lot of complaining and criticism and The Lord really taught me, he used wise counselors to talk about this idea of believing the best about your spouse. And that's rooted, obviously, in scripture, but it comes from the social science research of just how people grow, how people change. No one wants to be in an environment where you're constantly being criticized or judged.
So the first thing that changed in my marriage was believing the best about. Ashley, meaning the things that he's doing, he's doing for a reason. I don't need to control him or nag him.
So I started complimenting him. I started anytime he did anything, I would make sure I was admiring and respecting him. And was that like the first year of our, pretty much after the first year, that changed everything.
So that was the first milestone. And probably the second. Biggest milestone for our marriage happened when we became involved as graduate students in the ministry of Crew, which was formerly Campus Crusade for Christ, because we learned how to share our faith and we began what we call to this day living a scent life together.
So that changed everything about the purpose of our marriage. The scent life, Ashley, what does that mean? It means believing that evangelism, loving others well, being missional, serving others, however you want to put it, isn't just something that we do, it's who we are. As Jesus said in John 20, 21, as the Father has sent me, He's saying this to His disciples, and by extension to us, so I send you. And so, To our identity as believers is that we're sent ones.
And so this is not something we just do for God, but it's something we do with God. It's not just something we have to do, but it's something we get to do. It's living life in expectation that God is always at work, that He is working around us all the time, that He invites us into that with Him, and we get to do this with Him.
So it's really a mindset shift of. Can I believe that God's involving me in the great work that he's doing in the world? Yeah. Heather, let me ask you: you in the book pointed out a scripture. I think it's Philippians 2, 3 through 7.
Life-changing. It was life-changing for you. And I think, if I may, let me read it. I love Philippians 2. This is such a great passage.
I think it's so critical, and it really does shore it all up. It says, again, Philippians 2, 3 through 7: Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit. This thing, you got to stop and think about it, right? Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Whew, that's a problem in the culture.
It continues: Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself. by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. Kaboom. I love it.
That is so good. How did that speak to your heart and change your attitude?
Well, I believe that Philippians 2, also, if you pair it probably with Romans 12, those two passages of scripture, I feel like, are at the foundation for Christian discipleship and what it means to be a mature believer. And Romans 12, just tell me. Yes.
That's the one that's like, you know, bless those who curse you, you know, show hospitality, weep with those who weep. It also says to value others above yourself. It's a great parallel passage. But what I learned about myself from Philippians 2, what the Holy Spirit was showing me is, Heather, you need to value others above yourself, take on their interests, be curious about them, show positive regard to people, express concern about their life, and then humble yourself. One way to say it is in any situation, instead of taking the highest place, take the lowest place.
And that means that you position yourself to be a servant, even in conversation, that you're not there to get all the attention. You're not there to have everyone focus on you or monologue. And I was someone who talked way too much as a child. And I just read that passage, and I thought, there's a whole different way to live. I can enter a room and be a servant.
I can enter a room and value the person who's in front of me, really value them and honor them above myself. And we do that through conversation. And what happens is, when you live that way, you're going to have warm connections with people. And then you're going to naturally transition to gospel conversations that don't feel awkward or like a pivot in the conversation or a sales pitch because you already have a warm connection because you're living out Philippians 2. What's so interesting about this is how contrary it is to the world, especially right now.
It is. Where it's screaming and shouting at each other and division to show up that way. People are attracted to that. From every quarter of humanity, I mean, there's something they're going, wow, that person really cares about me. Yes.
Who doesn't want somebody to care about them? Right. Which is, you know, it's such the magic of the Holy Spirit, if I could say it in that context. Just love people sincerely, and people's hearts crack open. Let me, you've mentioned a couple times, but I really want the definition when you refer to positive regard.
This is a term that comes out of psychology, but let me put fearful people at ease. Don't be distant from those things. I believe what most psychology is showing us is God's design for humanity. And it's right in there. And sometimes we have to say, wow, what does positive regard, how does that relate to scripture?
Yeah, I love it because it means that you really are believing the best about them, that you are choosing a mindset to choose, I'm going to move towards this person and I'm going to find what's really good. You're not ignoring what might be there. You're just choosing as an attitude of your heart to say, God has built this person in his image to this person has great value. You've never met a nobody, that kind of thing. And can I really search out, being curious, what is really, really great about them?
And can my heart be positively disposed towards them? Heather, some of the practical things we need to apply in the book, you talk about the four L's of a caring bond. Let's cover those.
Well, that was just communication 101. It's listening. And what I mean, well, I'll go through them. It's listening. It's limiting distress.
Distractions, it's letting others talk and loving people through your face. That chapter is really just about if you don't know if you have some basic conversation skills, these are kind of the four ways to make sure you're conversing well with people. No, these are great principles. You also have four, I believe, different mindsets, four different mindsets. Oh, this is the game changer.
Okay, let's change it. The four mindsets will change your life. Do you want to add in anything?
Well, Ash, again, conversations. Comes here today as the introvert, right? The one that's going to be. Oh, yeah, that's the fun thing. We should probably lay that out for you.
Yeah, I lay that out for them. As you can already tell, Heather's like, you know, really good at this and natural at this. I'm not. I'm more of an introvert. I stumble over my words.
I think of the best thing to say like 14 days later. And so the joke that we have, but it's kind of true too, is because I think it helps people imagine, oh, I can do this. I don't have to be Heather or someone like Heather to do this, is I'm proof of concept. You know, if I can do this, anyone can do this. We can all grow in this.
And so, yeah, but the mindsets have been super helpful with that.
So, in order to have a warm connection with anyone, but in this case, your spouse, you need to do four things. And if these four things are happening, you will feel a warm connection.
So, you're going to be curious. You're going to ask really good questions rooted in the six dimensions of what it means to be human. You're going to believe the best. You're going to express concern. And you're going to share your life.
Now, as an introvert, Ash had to grow in curiosity. He just couldn't think of. Of, I don't even know what question to ask. And then I don't know what my next question is.
So we'll tell you how we solved that problem. But expressing concern and me needing to grow and believing the best about people, because as you can imagine, I'm on a college campus, the political climate is very stressful. I had to change my mindset and believe the best about people. And I wasn't good at expressing concern. I didn't know how to ask people the right questions to help them unburden really what's going on in their life.
And you only really need to know a couple things about your spouse: like, what are the major stressors today? Those kind of simple questions. And then being self-aware enough to share my own life with people. Meaning, you have to be someone that you don't have to necessarily keep a journal, but. Are you someone that's self-aware enough that when your spouse says, hey, what have you been thinking about most today?
Or what worries are keeping you up that you would know what to say?
So. Yeah. For me, it was be curious, as Heather mentioned, was the hardest for me to grow in and then share your life. And part of it was the self-aware part of, do I even know how I'd answer those questions? What's really going on in my life?
But the other part that I had to work through was, do I have anything really significant to say? And I really had to work through God with God on that. Like, no, I get to exist. I get to be here. I get to talk.
We want to hear from you. Yeah, I so appreciate that because I think a lot of young people, when you look in that context, they don't feel. Whatever empowered, what I have to say matters much. Who's going to listen to me? And that's not good.
It's not healthy, right?
Well, no. And back to living our scent life, when Ash really believed he had things to share, he's moved out in faith. And two people on our street have prayed to receive Christ recently just because he entered into loving conversation with them and shared his life and got to. That's amazing. I know.
Yeah, it's so good. I think it's an obvious question. I don't know that we all know the answer, but what are the goals in creating conversation? I mean, do you have a goal in mind? Is it better not to have a goal in mind other than to be engaged, to make the eye contact, to ask values-oriented questions?
Well, this is what I loved. A lot of people might be listening and saying, Well, I don't even know where this conversation should end. Why am I even doing this? Why are we doing this? Yes, well, what I learned, and this was so fascinating because the research just was lining right up to what scripture says.
So, in Any conversation, here's where you want to end. You want to end in one of three ways. You want to encourage, help someone with their goals, or lead to a state of marveling. This is a life-changing principle to imagine that every conversation with your spouse could lead you both to a state of awe. The research is astonishing.
When you're in a state of awe, you're actually lowering your cortisol levels. You're doing so many good things for your mental health. But it relates to as you think about the point of our lives as worshiping. Think of the idea of speaking to each other in psalms and spiritual hymns. And the way to lead someone to a state of awe is to look for divine activity.
So even this morning, mentioning someone talking to me in the hotel, and Ash is like, that's amazing. Do you think God sent that person to you? And we're marveling all of a sudden.
So look for divine activity. Talk about the word together. Talk about God together. But in any interaction with anyone, a neighbor, a child, you're thinking, how can Encourage this person? How can I help them with their goals or lead them to a state of marveling?
Hebrews talks about spurring one another on towards love and good deeds. And it's not hard to keep all these things in your mind. People may be listening thinking, this is hard. I have four mindsets. I have six conversational pathways.
I have these three fresh goals. It's actually not that hard to remember when you're with someone. Like, okay, I can encourage this person. I can help them. Yeah.
Yeah. And it's a good reason to get the book. And Jean has devoured this. She's read it seven, eight times and just loves the content. And I would say yes and amen.
I'm getting it vicariously through Jean, and it's really, really awesome. Let's speak right at the end here about conflict in marriage. You had a counselor who once gave you a suggestion for managing concerns. Let me frame this too. And again, I don't want to be stereotypical, but.
Fear is often something that wives feel. Men can feel this too. But my experience has been there's a fear and control battle for wives and moms where fear rises, control rises. But speak to this construct of managing concerns or managing fear if we put even a bigger label on it.
Well, this related to that first year of marriage where I was complaining all the time. A lot of it was rooted in fear. You're absolutely right. But our marriage counselor gave us a life-changing tip, which I'm going to let Ash share because I thought this cannot work, but it really did work and it probably saved our marriage. It's called the Thursday Folder.
Are you ready for this? This is great. It saved our marriage. It really, because at that point in our marriage, we were just fighting about a lot of things, just trying to sort out what life was going to look like. Disagreeing.
Disagreeing. Almost every conversation. We were every conversation was negative. And believing the best. No, we were, we were, maybe not so much, but we were just having a lot of things we had to work out.
And he said, do you guys notice that a lot of your time is spent working on your marriage and in a way of just your Fighting and struggling. He goes, Marriage is designed to be fun and light and enjoyable, but you're spending a lot of your time not doing that. He goes, What if you just set a time? Thursdays, where that would be where you worked on your marriage, and the rest of the week you just enjoyed being married. And he goes, We're like, Well, what do you do about like these things that happen in between?
He goes, Get a notebook, write it down so that you feel like you actually got to capture it, you got to express yourself a little bit, you didn't just lose it. And then Thursday's going to come, don't worry, and you can talk about it when Thursday comes. But then Friday through Wednesday, go enjoy your life. That's great. And you know what happens is by the time you get to Thursday, the things that just seem so huge, you're like, oh, yeah, that was no big deal.
It really helped. Do you guys like that? You like that? I like it. I think it compartmentalizes it.
And the other thing that you mentioned, Ashley, is it gives you time to reduce. The catastrophic nature of it. Yes, everything is so important in that moment. I mean, we used to, Gene and I would do that. We'd, when the, especially when the boys were like in junior high, and you know, I am a go to bed quick.
So by 10 o'clock, my head's on the pillow. I'm ready to go out. And Gene would say, We need to talk about Trent. I'm like, wow. No, I know.
Yes.
But to her credit, she recalibrated and realized when we're having coffee in the morning, Would be a great time to talk about what she wanted. That's a great point. Like choosing the right time. It's so much of it. Yeah, choosing the right time.
Yeah, that was other advice that I was given. It's like nothing good happens after 10 o'clock.
So just like, don't go to bed angry, but just kind of table it to the morning. Let's end right here with this obvious question: the husband and wife, who may not have that warm connection, they've kind of been in that rut for a long time. And it's just habit now that we don't compliment each other, we take each other for granted. What's one thing other than reading the book that they could do like tonight? What could we do differently tonight to help us?
Do we each get to say one thing? Yeah, let's do it differently. I would say, and this is a little trick I learned: to ask your spouse. This is what you say. I want to have a warm connection with you.
What question are you hoping I'll ask you about your life? Oh, Gene would love that. Yeah, I would say go back to the believing the best part. And one of the questions you can ask is, or one of the ways of expressing liking is, do you remember the time we did dot, dot, dot, just a shared memory? And I think being able to go back and reminisce like for about good times, like there were good times.
There are strengths to our marriage. Can we remember those and just kind of believe that good times will come again? Yeah, that's good. You know, we do something, a four-day intensive hope restored for marriages that are in real trouble. It's got a great success rate.
Two years later, we go back and survey those couples. 80%, I think the latest was 81% still married and doing better. But this is core to what they're teaching in that four-day intensive is you once loved each other.
Something happened that was good. How do we get back to that place so that we're not pushing each other's buttons? We're not ignoring the core thing. That makes you you and we show interest. All the things you talked about today, man.
If that's where you're at, or a lighter version of that, you're just kind of going through the motions. It's a business relationship. She's your roommate. That's not what God intended for you. There's so much more.
And Heather's done a great job with Ashley's input, obviously, and life experience in this wonderful book, The Six Conversations: Pathways to Connecting in an Age of Isolation and Incivility. Boom. That kind of is the neon sign today. And what great advice you've given us, Heather and Ashley. Thank you for being with us.
Thank you. Thank you so much.
And man, the best we can do is if you can make a gift monthly or a one-time gift of any amount to focus on the family, we'll send you a copy of this book as our way of saying thank you for being part of the ministry. We believe in the content so much that it's going to help you that if you can't afford it, get in touch with us and we'll trust others will cover the cost of this. Yeah, contact us today. To donate and request that book, 800, the letter A, and the word family. That's 800-232-6459, or we've got the link in the show notes.
And thanks for joining us today for Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. I'm John Fuller, inviting you back next time as we once again help you and your family thrive in Christ. Your marriage can be redeemed even if the fights seem constant, even if there's been an affair, even if you haven't felt close in years. No matter how deep the wounds are, you can take a step toward healing them with a hope-restored marriage-intensive. Our biblically based counseling will help you find the root of your problems and face challenges together.
We'll talk with you, pray with you, and help you find out which program will work best. Call us at 1-866-875-2915.
