Marriage and a New Year…When The 40 Days Are Up

Whether it is a successful marriage or a new diet plan or a wandering in the eternal desert of your social life, what happens when the 40 days are up?
Is that the end of your suffering …the end of your problems…the end of your stress, trials and tribulations?

By no means. You just take it a simple 40 days at a time.
After all, it is a new year and many days are forthcoming for you to make some changes in your marriage as a new life for the better.

This new thought was brought about by reading the newspaper today (yeah I know, pretty archaic in these digital times, but you never know about discovering those little gems or pearls of wisdom you may find when reading newspaper or magazine stories) and came across an article about losing a certain amount of weight in a certain amount of time.
Interestingly the amount of time to lose this weight was listed as 40 days.

That took me back in my thoughts to a certain person we all have know from those childhood stories in the Great Book, who spent 40 years on the back side of the wilderness in the desert having a little time to gather his thoughts, but to his and our utter amazement he found much more to his existence that saved not only his life but ended up saving the lives of many many millions more in the future to come.

But I digress…

In a successful marriage there are far many more than a certain 40 days that seem to plague people and their relationships.
Far be it from me to be a self proclaimed judge of you and your married life.
I am merely stating my story here to perhaps better help you understand and achieve a healthier attitude about that relationship. Sort of helping you clean up the state of obesity in your married life that has become just so much fat.

I would certainly hope that breaking down the healthy attitude of how to be a better person towards your mate in your special marital relationship certainly can be done in less than 40 days… but what happens when the 40 days are up?

I recently heard someone say “never assume or accept motionlessness for inactivity – crocodiles get most of their meals that way.”

If you find yourself becoming too idle in your marriage, sports, exercises or even your business or studies…just commit to take some time out to put together a plan of your own and choose a time best suited for your pace of accomplishment.

40 days, like the years that follow birthdays, is just a number. The 40 day is nothing magical or special, it is just a reference point, a starting gauge for you to spend some quality time and make yours a successful marriage.

We hope you have a wonderful year and that you find your 40 days of bliss. Peace be with you.

 Respectfully Submitted,

-Lon-

If You Do Not Leave, Then You Can Not Come Back

A successful marriage is totally dependent on communication more than anything else.
There are a wealth of things that can be applied to such a statement. So, before we get too far down the road on what could be many many rabbit trails…let me just say what the statement is as opposed to what it is not.

It is a positive assessment about married life and what makes for a successful marriage. It is literally about what I like to call…the spending or giving to get theory in my life.
In order to get something one has to give something. You want a hotdog or sushi roll or an ice cream cone, or a lifelong partner you will have to make or exchange some sort of payment for it. Selling your soul can even made into a fair trade.

The phrase if you do not leave, then you cannot come back in this case refers to getting past something in your life that will cause you to have phenomenal growth in your relationships. Give it up. Leave it behind. Find that something new. Start new and fresh with your best friend and discover a different homecoming.

You make ton of plans to go and do, but life happens and somehow you never get around to it.
I thought of this on my morning walk and it rattled around in my head like a bowling ball rolling down the great gutter of life. (Whoa! Big time rabbit trail!)

If you do not leave then you can not come back. From the realm of who says you can’t go home, you have to leave home in order to be able to go back home. You have to live outside of what you know or are used to. We have talked about that step of faith thing many times before and yet here we are again at it’s doorstep. Sure, to get the most reward for the relationship, you make that a leap of faith. But for those that just need the experience of what a successful marriage can truly be, a step will do just fine.

That’s what all the giving is about…to be able to get all those wonderful experiences that add up to being what makes you successful in your marriage. It’s all about the trying part of anything you do or want to do. You see, if you don’t ever try it, then how can you look back on it as an experience. Yes. Yes, you can go home…many many times over and you get to relish those little experiences over and over again.

If you do not leave (at least give it the old college try) then yes again I say…you can not go back. You are at this point giving up on the great what could have been in your married life…in your life period. So stop with the what if’s and at least give it a try.

Getting out there. Putting yourself out there is what makes the ability to make the go/come home thought work in a successful marriage.

And to top it all off, coming/going home is what it should be all about, right. The homecoming. But if you don’t leave you are going to miss out on a lot of really good stuff!

-Lon-

Faith makes all things possible…love makes all things easy

We live in a day when in the blink of an eye, the success of a marriage can be looked back upon as an almost infinite speck in the grand scheme of life.

Married life begins with a lot of pre-planning for a future that really never comes. It is almost always a day to day adventure of living and sharing a faith of the unknown and looking for a love to make it all easy and worthwhile.

“… A life which is empty of purpose until age 65 will not suddenly become filled upon retirement.”

Faith makes all thins possible and love makes all things easy in a successful marriage.

It is days like this when I just have to scratch my head at the state of the world we now live in by asking myself how can this be true…am I just feeling that the world of relationships stranger than fiction?

When love and marriage transcends the national and geographic borders and boundaries of relationships and the speed of light, everything becomes very different.

Faith is the belief and trust in things unseen, love is what makes it call come together, even in these head scratching times. If you were to look back on your marriage as compared to the state of the world of wars, genocides, the in-humanity of man to man, financial disasters in global economics, storms, floods and other kinds of havoc…you only have to look at and be comforted by the person who has stood by you through all of this and what seems like a lot more.

Consider some of these facts that may or may not affect your relationship.

- There literally hundreds and hundreds of millions of of individual blogs on the internet today.

- There are nearly 150 million Twitter message sent per day.

- Nearly 12% of the world’s population has a Facebook account…and still growing.

- Almost 60 hours of new video content is uploaded to You Tube from around the world every minute.
- …and nearly 9 out of 10 people in the worlds seemingly less than vast expanse have a mobile phone.

Is it any wonder that faith makes all things possible…love makes all things easy. You can’t do a lot about the rest of the world, but for you and yours to have a successful marriage and a long lasting relationship, you have the urgency and opportunity to find the answers to those little problems for yourself (and others) during times of stress to find that faith and enjoy the love that comes from it.

Enjoy yourself.

-Lon-

 The Rings Of The Olympiad Of Love In A Successful Marriage

The Olympics has five rings to contend with but I only have one to deal with. The games began in ancient times and has tested the mettle of many a man since then. It has been 30 plus years for me and my teammate and we are still in first and going for the gold!

The rings that we share were not forged by blacksmiths and tinkerers of old, but the hands that made them were of strong character and heart.

The rings that a couple share are just like those five rings that bond teams together in competition in honesty and fair play for many years. Even though we are going through quite a bit of pomp and circumstance in playing hosts to others in our lives, all the games pale in comparison to the hard work and team trials of a man and a woman in a successful marriage.

I run a pretty good race when it comes to going in circles around that oval track tripping over the hurdles of married life. Man you should see us doing our tandem high dives when it comes to finances and raising kids! 10′s all the way around.

Beach volleyball has nothing on sand in your face when it comes to the grit and sweat that we go through in head to head competition for a high score.
The rings of the Olympiad can bring whole nations and foreign countries together into a stadium full of thousands of cheering and adoring fans as the fire burns brightly from the Olympic torch that emanated from the mother flame in Greece herself. The rings of the Olympiad of love in a successful marriage brought me and my lovely together and the flame of passion (well on most Thursdays when your feet are 45 degrees apart, your finger is in your left ear and if it doesn’t rain) burns just as bright.

So many games, so many athletes, so much competition…that’s what a successful marriage is all about. Sometimes you are in the deep end of the pool of married life and commitment then you have to turn around the very next race and run for your life against what seems like all odds. Your partner and soul mate beside you, there is no greater love that a man has than that of laying down his life for another. It is not the simple points and time trials that you have to contend with in marriage, but what those rings stand for that you place all your values on. The rings of your self made Olympiad.

You could probably come up with some of your own favorite games of the Olympiad and how best they best relate to your life and your marriage in particular. In a successful marriage it takes as much stamina, exercise, fortitude and caring to participate in the sport of married life as it does to participate in the Olympics. After all the real race is always against yourself. Your spouse in this game just happens to be your coach, your most ardent fan and more importantly…your best friend.

The rings of the Olympiad of love in a successful marriage has you always going for the gold each and every day of your married life and forever coming up the champion that you were meant to be.

-Lon-

The 3 P’s Of A Successful Marriage

Coming together in the beginning of the affair that you wanted to make last a lifetime was very easy in those formative years. You just could not do enough to please each other when you were dating and starting to make a serious commitment to spending a life together.

It was a commitment of being together always and that meant doing everything together as a single unit…and we all know all to well just how long that lasted!

But seriously folks, relax, enjoy yourselves, I’ll be here all week!
There is a lot to be said for the path, the place and the pace that you go through to achieve the status of a successful marriage. The three P’s have their place and can do a lot to enhance your togetherness.

The Path: The one direction that is to be the destiny of where you both want to be. The road taken to get there may or may not have been scouted out before your journey, but there was a time that you both did talk about it at some point in the relationship. You even agreed on some of the intricate details that made you both giddy with a purpose for your lives. You had so much in common in your hopes and your dreams.

The Place: Remember when you really got so serious that night that it literally scared you both enough to conjure up to chill bumps and left you with a queasy stomach? It was as if you were indeed being part of a Vulcan mind meld, your thoughts were as one and it was just plain scary. You could see with such exactness as to where you wanted to be and with the person that you wanted to be there with in your relationship. The three P’s of a successful marriage is all about being in that perfect place.

The Pace: Managing to keep up with one another is usually where things begin to take that awkward turn in married life. The dreams and the goals are just as real as they were when you first made them all those many commitments ago. For lack of a better term, the split, happens because of pacing. The pace at which two people tend to travel through life brings about many differences that can cause one to seem to go faster than the other. The old glass half full – half empty theory. It all depends on how you look at things.

In a successful marriage, the three P’s, the path, the place and the pace are the things that must converge in your married life to keep you as that all important one that you started out in your life to be. We all know it is not an easy task.

I have been practicing it for more than 30 plus years and have discovered that it has more twists and turns than that Lombard street in San Francisco! But, then again, when you are standing on the top of the hill looking down (or even standing at the bottom looking up) it is a beautiful sight.
The amazing fact of the matter is that although some of the turns you can see and some of them you cannot, if you have the patience to take the curves in marriage…you will undoubtedly have the ride of your life because the three P’s are what keeps you straight.

The path, the place and the pace can keep you together if you remain ever mindful of the other person and as in my case…I have to remember, her legs are shorter than mine!

-Lon-

The Tongue of A Broken Zipper And A Successful Marriage

They are designed to make things come together. They work in concert to make the face of fashion a world-wide triumph in good looks. They keep us all from suffering a mountain of embarrassment. Zippers!
Who would have thought this little item could mend so many things, including marriages or married life. That is of course… when they work.

The tongue of a zipper – that little flappy part that pulls it all together – that brings both sides together is very much like that of a successful marriage. Like marriage, it rests at the top and the bottom of the garment of life like the ups and downs of married life. When it is down, it exposes a lot things that you may or may not want to come out or be seen. When it is up it keeps things where they are supposed to be and in proper order. It’s not the all important matter in married life that we discuss what those things are right here right now, but rather that they are in fact contained in a working relationship that defines what a successful marriage is all about.

When I originally thought of this concept to write about, I was actually standing in a short line at the dry cleaners with a pair of pants that had a broken zipper. I recently lost a little weight (thank you… thank you, your kind praises are greatly appreciated) and of course that led to the digging out of some of the old wardrobe items.

Wouldn’t you know it, the very pair of pants I pulled out of the set aside to wear later pile had a broken zipper. So I take them in for counseling.

Anyway, as I am waiting my turn to describe my problem and wondering just how the zipper ended up broken in the first place, I started the ramblings in my mind about married life and how it turns out to be, metaphorically speaking of course, like a broken zipper and how that relates to a successful marriage.

The zipper itself was well in place for holding both sides of the affair as it was designed to, it was only the tongue part that you pull on that was causing the problem… it was missing… so often as it is in a marriage.
The marital tongue has a tendency to control the bad side of the relationship more than the good side. So, with a fair warning… you have to remember that when it comes to zippers whether it is the ups or downs in your married life… mind your tongue! After all, when it is working correctly it is the essence of a successful marriage… a perfect fit.

Yes, I did get the zipper in my pants repaired and they look and fit just great. All I have to do now is maintain the weight with proper diet and exercise and the tongue in my head like the one on my zipper will bring both sides of our relationships together, improve my better looks and make a statement for both fashion and morality.

That little flappy thing of a tongue on a broken zipper can make or break the relationship in your wardrobe just like the controlling arm in a successful marriage, you absolutely need it to pull both sides together.

Don’t wait until things get so out of hand and broken that you put the good things of your marriage aside until you have to take them in to be repaired. Check your tongue often and make sure it is doing what it is supposed to be doing.

A Friend in Business and Life… Always,

-Lon-

Every Promise Has A Premise In A Successful Marriage

“…with this ring I thee wed…”
If you have any plans or desires to make that commitment last for a whole bunch of years, then my friend you will find yourself among the ranks of the mighty…those in love!
Every promise has a premise and for you that premise was the beginning of a long and lasting relationship. A successful marriage comes with a rather wide range of territorial grounds to cover.

Take for instance that little plot of the promise land at 123 Elm street. That was to be place for your new dream home, the start of the family heritage where lazy sleep in Saturday mornings and great looking and tasting Sunday dinners were to be the stuff that memories were made of…the only place that would be your very own little piece of heaven. But remember, every promise has a premise.
To do all in your power to make that dream work and to have and all your dreams come true would be based on the premise of hard work on your part as a company man or woman and payment and security of the part of the company.
Well, we all have come to the realization that that plan is not what it used to be and for all practical purposes, will never be had the same way again.

All that being said, that should not really put a damper on your promises to have a successful marriage. I mean, the promises you made came from the most sincere part of your being and you no doubt fully intended/intend to carry them out with all that is sincere within you.

I do not think anyone would be in too much disagreement that the previous generation to ours had some building to do…some dreams to conquer…and they set out on a path that led them to be the greatest discoverers and innovators of our time. That is certainly not to say that great discoveries have not come to being since that time. No no no…on the contrary. It has been a constant building process that has led us to where we are today. What a premise it has been!

Going back to our statement that a promise has a premise, I believe that you will discover in your long and lasting time together that to have a successful marriage, you will be constantly reminded of those promises you made often in your daily marriage routines. When you say the words I love you or I am glad you are here or I need you, that is the constant premise from which your promises will be based. It is those things that you continually build your relationship upon in married life.

Every promise has a premise. The ring that ties you together is but a symbol of all that you will become as you spend time together. The eternal circle of married life.
There are just as many other parts to the bonding and binding process in a successful marriage. Your kisses, your smiles, your touches of comfort at the right moment of needed attention.
Even being quiet and doing absolutely nothing (at the appropriate time) can be a well meaning gesture of affection that surpasses all of the hearts desires in healing and comfort.
Just knowing that you care can be sensed and is accepted and appreciated beyond the measure of any promise or premise.

A Friend in Business and Life…Always,

-Lon-

In A Successful Marriage Love Is What You Do, Not What You feel

There are self-described ways of doing almost anything that comes to your mind to accomplish a particular goal you have set for yourself.
In a successful marriage the unending or undying love that you professed and swore to on your wedding day far outweighed any future circumstance(s) you could have imagined. It was a total registration of the mind, the heart and the soul to the point that love is what you do and not what you feel when you promised to do the other two items in the vow…to cherish and obey.

Married life contains a never ending pool of what if’s to contend with and lucky you get to be an amazing part of each and every one of them…willingly and most of the time…unwillingly. Some things you get to pick and choose from during the course of the relationship and other are just thrust upon you without regard to your feelings whatsoever. To counter the unknown in married life, the simple but elegant task to remember is that true love is what you do, not what you feel.

I remember the first times we would try something new in the marriage trying to forge the bond of forever together (some call it after the fact, creating memories). You know, like cooking together or taking turns doing the laundry…nothing terribly earth shattering like riding a giant roller coaster or snorkeling off the Great Barrier Reef, but those tidy little things that makes others who observe your behavior in public go “aaawwww, look at them…isn’t that cute or aren’t they sweet.”

Remember, love is what you do, not what you feel, and more times than not you would do something without a great deal of fore-thought because that was based on your feelings of the moment. Some would call it spontaneous – some would even call it guilt free love.

Oh, don’t get me wrong…feelings are a true and wonderful item to have in your little bag of goodies of a successful marriage. It is when your feelings are used so spontaneously that they appear to lighten the load of love in your relationship.

Feeling versus doing can be quite the charming effect in a successful marriage; but doing is the horsepower that drives the relationship to new, exciting and everlasting heights that will guarantee and secure the forever kindness and attention you are striving for towards one another.

To have and maintain a successful marriage, it is not what you feel, but what you do that makes those lasting impressions that become your favorite memories. Once you contemplate the what you do part of the relationship, the what you feel part becomes the perfect complement in the list of steps for a successful marriage.

Love is what you do and not what you feel. It is a mindset that causes the heavens to part, the stars to shine brighter and the world as we know it to spin on an axis of great gratitude for your partner.

In life, especially in married life, it is the doing that makes all the difference in the outcome of a successful marriage.
So, just do something neat, fun, exciting or different…it will make their day.

A Friend in Business and Life…Always,
-Lon-

A Successful Marriage Is Like Building A Fire In The Rain

There are a lot of things said in a marriage or during the course of married life that absolutely make no sense. It is in the art of the marriage relationship that a husband and wife grow together in conflict and quiet resolution. It’s kinda like trying to build a fire in the rain…it can be done, but boy it sure takes a lot of extra work.

First comes the realization that you emphatically and without question must understand that the beauty of a woman is not in the clothes she wears – nor is in her face – or even the way she wears her hair. Paying homage to the externals in your relationship is only a very small part of what you need to be doing.
The beauty of a woman resides in her eyes – that is the door to her heart – that is where she lives.

On the other end of the spectrum are the thoughtless thoughts of her male counterpart. (hence the endearing term for a husband given by his adoring wife…he’s way out there.)
We men tend to take a lot of things for granted, among most of which is that we are not always paying attention at the appropriate time and circumstance to the immediate problem or situation that has her attention.
For us, there is not always what appears to be an immediate problem/situation because it is usually preceded by and followed by an I told you so. It would be much easier to build a fire in the rain than to try and solve that riddle!

Regardless of the he said/she said saga, if you do not “listen” to each other, it is going to lead to some disastrous conditions and some very awkward situations. It is not just listening…you see listening is very perceptive art form that is acquired over time and patience. A successful marriage is very much like building a fire in the rain. To listen simply means to talk to the other person. It means to be realistically involved and engaged in each others conversations. Grunting from behind the newspaper at the breakfast table or tossing out the occasion – yes dear – as you are otherwise pre-occupied with your own activity is the most sure way to rain on the fire of the relationship very early in the marriage.

When you take that well deserved and long looked for vacation and go camping (jump head long into marriage and all of it’s responsibilities), the weather will be your best friend or your worst enemy. Just like in a successful marriage, you can count on a rainy day even though the sun was shining brightly when you started out on your road to forever together in your married life.

Building a fire in the rain is not a total impossibility (they do it in the movies all the time). With the right tools and a whole lot of patience, yes…it can be done. The same is true for a building a successful marriage. You are not going to light that magical heartwarming fire on the first try. It will take several and sometimes very frustrating tries to succeed.

Until the next time…keep your powder dry…and always carry a stash of matches to be able to re-kindle the romance and keep the spark in your marriage alive and forever burning brightly. In a good marriage, when you’re hot, you’re hot!

A Friend in Business and Life…Always,

-Lon-

A Moment Of Honest Recognition In A Successful Marriage

What is your name? Do you know who you are? Where did you come from? Where are you going?
If and when you find the answer to these questions in your married life, you will have found yourself in a successful marriage.
You will have discovered a moment of honest recognition in your life.

When you get to the point in your married life to where you can see yourself as you really are, you will have discovered the real goal of a successful marriage. Hear me now and listen to me later when I quote these words to you:
“You don’t drown by falling in the water; you drown by staying there.”  from Edwin Louis Cole.

The goal of a successful marriage is to be yielding to one another in the course of your time together on the road to forever.
There are several things that can do that will always cause interference to those heartfelt plans you make when you enter the holy
bonds of matrimony. Some of the ones that will get you in trouble far more often and faster than you could ever imagine are being prideful, arrogant, vindictive, unforgiving, selfish and consumed with things.
To be yielding is to be open to not only dialogue, but real conversation. A moment of honest recognition.

It is very often stubbornness that has the upper hand in keeping people from a successful marriage. Neither wants to be the bigger person, neither one wants to yield.
No matter the situation, there needs to be a resolution in order for things to move forward in your loving relationship. To be resolved is to
come to a settlement, to be determined to bring the things that are causing the separation to a conclusive end.

When you have that moment of honest recognition, you can clearly see and say…I am not happy with the person I see in the mirror. I
need to change my ways. I need to be the the one who yields. I need to receive a new identity.

You see…in a successful marriage, when you are the one doing the yielding…every one comes out the winner in the relationship.

As I have previously stated in my writings before, I do not profess to be a professional counselor (although it seems like I play one at work almost every day!), I am just offering my rendition of married life as I have lived it here. I started these writings to share with you the good the bad and the ugly sides of my 30 plus years together with my lovely.
And with that being said, I do offer this piece of advice for those of you that are married, contemplating marriage, or have been married for a while.
Do not let the bad things of your past life define you. You are not what you do – you are not your past – you are not your failures nor your stumblings. You just simply need to have a moment of honest recognition to see yourself as you really are and come to that  conclusion that the goal of a successful marriage is to be continually yielding to one another.

Your life becomes a personal weakness reminded. You live everyday to become a better person than you were the day before for the one you love.
Just remember that nothing is over in your marriage and married life until you learn the art of being able to yield.

A Friend in Business and Life… Always,
-Lon-