Monday, March 7, 2011

Are you Nagging your marriage to death?

Have you ever looked at your spouse and could point out a million things wrong with him or her?  You try to point things out or nag him to deaf because you know if he could just let YOU fix HIM the way you want, life would be so much better!  What about when it seems like everyone else around you is driving you nuts!  You see everyone Else's faults and failures, but never take a second to look at yourself.  You think it has to be the everyone else, it couldn't possibly be you!

I have news for you, its called PRIDE!  There was a time in my life when everything and everyone drove me nuts!  I could tell you what was wrong with everyone even our dog, but thought I was doing just fine!  What a JOKE!  I nagged my husband to death and could only focus and only saw the negative.  I couldn't focus on everything awesome he was doing.  There were time I would say to God, I think I made a mistake.  I don't think I was suppose to marry Mark.  I was suppose to marry a man that was more successful, had bigger dreams.  Basically, I was blaming my husband because I was not happy with me. 

Then one day, I was listening to one of my favorite speakers Dani Johnson and what she said smacked me right in my face.  She asked, how would you treat the man of your dreams?  Would you get yourself up in the morning and make yourself look good for him?  Would you cook for him?  Would you ask him how his day was after when he came home from work?  Would you treat him like a King?  All kinds of thoughts entered my head!  She then said, No you wouldn't.  You wouldn't treat him any better than you are treating your husband now. Sooner or later it would get old and you would find something wrong with him too.  Its not about changing him, its about changing you.   The husband you are married to is that man if you would only begin to see him the way God See's him.  If you only knew what God plans for his life.  You need to treat him like the King God has called him to be.

Once I stopped trying to fix everyone else especially my husband and began to focus on me, my life changed and so did my marriage.  We can't fix anyone, we can only love and let God. do the fixing.  We need to love people right where they are in life.  Once you can stop taking everything so personal and realize that we are all hurt and all at different walks in our life, you will begin to be able to love people and accept them for who they are.  (This doesn't mean you will always like everyone or even have to agree with someone.  But I do believe the stronger we build our relationship with God, we begin to see people the way God see's them.)

FYI: The more I nagged Mark the farther apart we became.  Once he started seeing me change and stopped nagging him, he began to open up and let God change him!  God has brought us together now than we ever have been before.  I'm not trying to be his mom or to fix him.  Instead we are best friends walking together hand and hand. 

Pride is a tricky.  You really want to make sure you are asking God to search your heart to make sure pride doesn't sneak in.  Because Pride does come before the fall.  I don't know about you, but I'm tired of falling down!!!  Please know, I don't write these things because I think I'm better than anyone else because I don't.  I only share these things because it is what God placed on my heart.  Trust me, without God I'm a mess and thankful everyday for my savior Jesus Christ because with out him, I'm nothing....

Thursday, March 3, 2011

What does Pride look like and is it killing you?

Pride was one of the major reason that kept me from living the dream God has placed on me on many different levels.  I could never figure out why  certain things kept showing up in my life. Why I couldn't get out of the hole that I was in. It just seemed like it was getting deeper and deeper. Saying you have a dream,  takes more than just waking up and saying I have a dream!  We all have dreams of living a better life but lets face it most of us are not willing to do the work on ourselves.  We would rather complain, blame everyone else, hold grudges or surround ourselves with people who will tell us what we want to hear.  (Those people are telling you what you want to hear because they don't want you to change. They want you to stay the same so they have someone to hang out with!  They don't want you to become better because it will make them feel uncomfortable with themselves. This doesn't just go on in the world, it goes on in the church as well.) 
 Once you realize what Pride is, what it looks like and break free from it, you will see your life change.  God has been working diligently on me these last few years.  It seemed like once one life lesson was learned he had five more waiting in line!  Seriously, I was feeling like I was schizoprhatic at times.  I heard one of my mentors say, "God is trying to refine you, so you won't destroy you."  It is so true! How  awesome is that when you think about it!  He has a huge plan for your life, if you let him do the work on you.  He doesn't want to see you get hurt or burned anymore!

I know many people who have huge dreams and want to do make every second of their life count, but they keep making the same stupid mistakes.  Most of what is holding you back from financial freedom, successful marriage, better relationship with your kids, going after a dream of yours, is PRIDE!

Trust me the reason I can write about this, is because I was very prideful. Just in my every day life there was pride. I cared more about what others thought of me than I did my husband, my kids and most importantly God.  I wanted to be accepted and was looking for approval from man.  (FYI: God already loves you and you are already accepted just the way you are.)  I had to have the latest phone so people thought I was cool, I had to go and spend top dollar on my hair so I could look good,( I couldn't go somewhere and not have my makeup or hair done.  What if someone would see me.  If you want to see if there is any pride in your heart, ask yourself if you could go out in public with no makeup and hair a mess? I think it is important to look good and take care of yourself, but if is to try to impress others, then there is a problem.)  I had to get my nails done, spend money on clothes for the kids and myself that we really didn't need, drive a new car, live in a certain neighbor hood and the list can go on and on.  I wanted others to think I was successful! Yes, Mark made some great money, but it was never enough and we spent more than we had.  Why, because we were caught up in what the world says success looks like!  Maybe we looked like we had it all going on from the outside, but inside was a different story. 

Pride even kept me from stepping out and doing what God has placed on my heart.  What if nobody likes me?  What if I offend someone by what I say?  What if nobody ever buys my book ( BTW the book will be done sooner now than later), what if nobody comes to hear me speak? Take this blog, for an example. If you only knew the head game that went inside my head!  I knew once I starting writing, there would be many people out there laughing and making fun of me!  Guess what, I don't fear man instead I fear God! His opinion is much more important to me than any persons will ever be! So, if you have similar questions going on in your head then you need to ask yourself what and who are you really doing it for? 

I can write on and on about pride, which I will share a few more blogs on in the next couple of weeks.  But if pride is something God is trying to work on you with, just know it is only because he loves you.  The last thing you want to do is get in more debt, or become debt free and get back in debt because you haven't learned the lessons, put in years in your marriage to have your marriage fail,(which BTW marriage takes two. If your spouse isn't willing to work with you and together or your marriage has ended in divorce, just make sure you learn the life lessons so you don't repeat it in your next relationship or pass it down to your children.) or never live with peace, love and joy in your life.  It will take looking at yourself deeper and not caring about the 98% of the population is doing, unless you like being miserable and broke! 

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