Change - The Generous Husband

Farewell to The Generous Husband

by The Generous Husband | Feb 28, 2025 | Change

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On Sunday July 15, 2001, I did the first post for The Generous Husband. Today, some 8,000 posts later, I write this last one. It’s certainly bitter-sweet, but I’m not giving up blogging, so it’s okay. (If you want to follow the new blog it’s https://doingmarriagewell.com – and I start Saturday.) Doing this blog has been a big part of my life for a very long time. I’ve enjoyed getting to know many of you online, and some of you in person. It’s been a blast, and a blessing. My thanks to all of you.

The image here is the original top banner for the blog.

I’ve thought a lot about what I want to leave you with. I’m rerunning the first post about prayer at the bottom, because every marriage needs prayer! Beyond that, I want to talk about getting help.

Lori and I have worked with a great many marriages over the years. We now coach online, if you want to connect with us. We’ve had plenty of couples tell us that third party help has improved or saved their marriage. We’ve also had couples say it made their sex lives better. You have to be willing to do the work, but if you are, a bit of skilled guidance can make a huge difference.

When I was young, Christians didn’t go for help. It was as if seeking help was admitting to a horrible sin. Couples suffered in silence, and marriages died in silence. God is clear that we’re supposed to seek wise counsel, and we’re commanded to help others in the body of Christ.

If you need help, please get it. If you don’t need it, but would benefit from it, please get help.

Do you find it difficult to pray for your wife because you aren’t sure what to pray about? Try praying based on the first letter of the day:

Sunday pray for her Spiritual walk
Monday pray for her Moods and Mental health
Tuesday pray for her Thought life
Wednesday pray for her Weaknesses to be healed
Thursday pray for her Time usage
Friday pray for her Friendships
Saturday pray for her Sexuality

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FF: Applying the S-Curve Model to Strengthen Your Marriage

by The Generous Husband | Feb 21, 2025 | Change, Friday Flashback, Seeing Clearly, YOU4HER

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Whitney Johnson, a Harvard Business Review blogger, has some interesting ideas I think apply to marriage nicely. In Throw Your Life a Curve Johnson talks about the S curve model for understanding how we learn new things.

You start to do something new to improve some aspect of your marriage, or just to make your wife happier. This could be a change of habit, trying to listen better, a new approach to sex, whatever. You start at the lower left of the curve, in the yellow area of the chart above. You are unsure how it’s going to work or exactly what to do. After you struggle for a while, you get the hang of it, and you start to improve rapidly. You get positive feedback from your bride because she is seeing the rapid change; this is the green area. Finally, you have almost mastered what you’re doing, which means there’s not much room to grow or improve. Your wife may stop bragging on you; you may start doing whatever out of habit without much thought, or you may get bored with it. This is the red area.

Each phase has dangers:

YELLOW: The danger here is giving up. This is the most frustrating part of doing something new. There is little growth, plenty of failure, and little or no recognition of what you’re trying to do. The important thing here is to just keep going.
GREEN: The greatest danger here is getting a big head. Don’t let your success or her praise cause you to slack off here or in other areas. You need to add this to the other ways you meet her wants and needs. Another danger is thinking that you’re owed something (see Say no to Quid Pro Quo).
RED: One danger here is backing off just before you master whatever it is you’re doing. Another danger is slipping into autopilot, which means you won’t do as good a job. You might also get so bored you stop doing it, do it less often, or don’t keep doing it as well.

Do you see any of this in your past when you tried to improve your marriage? Do you tend to drop out in the yellow zone? Do you think too much of yourself in the green zone, or think she owes you? Do you get to the red zone and drop what you are doing to start a new curve?

[This post first appeared Nov 29, 2012.]

Image Credit: © Paul H Byerly
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Beyond Average: God’s Plan for Your Marriage

by The Generous Husband | Feb 13, 2025 | Change, Good Marriage

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Some folks worry about what’s average, and if they measure up.

Here’s the thing: the average person is overweight and not getting nearly enough exercise. The average Christian is falling short of what Jesus called us to do. The average number of lifetime sexual partners in the US is 10.7. And the average couple is deep in debt, too busy, too stressed, and has a forty percent chance of ending up divorced.

Most of what is average is unhealthy, wrong, and possibly sin. If nothing else, average is setting the bar way, way too low.

God calls us to be in the world, but not of it. What the world sees as average, acceptable, or even good is irrelevant. God calls us to way more. If your marriage isn’t great or moving that way, it’s not what God wants for you. I say that to challenge you, not shame you. An “okay marriage” is not okay with God.

If your marriage isn’t what it should be, what are you going to do about it? Are you willing to put in the effort to be kinder, more generous, and to give more grace? Are you ready to forgive and move on? Are you ready to seek help? We tend to think of getting help as something we do when it’s horrible. The reality is, improving is way easier than fixing.

Don’t be average, be extraordinary!

Image Credit: © Photo by Ksenia Makagonova on Unsplash
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Letting Go and Moving on… To Something Better!

by The Generous Husband | Feb 11, 2025 | Change

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The end of this month, I will stop doing The Generous Husband blog, after almost 24 years. I know it’s time, but I’ve still had a hard time letting go and moving on. I made plans for the next thing, but didn’t initially feel much passion for it.

Slowly I made peace with the change, grieved, and started to focus on Doing Marriage Well. And as I have done that, have become excited about where I’m going next.

TGH hasn’t been static over the years, but it has remained mostly in the box it was created in. And that has limited me. It’s kept me from reaching out to couples as couples. Adding The XY Code allowed me to speak to wives, but it was still not dealing with couples.

Doing Marriage Well will be sort of coaching via blog. I think it will be more powerful and will bring about far more positive growth and change. And I would have missed that had I been unwilling to let go and move on.

Where in your life, and your marriage, are you missing out on something good because you’ve been unwilling to let go and move on?

If you want to join me on my next venture, you can go to Doing Marriage Well and sign up for emails in the upper right corner. Lori is blogging there till the end of the month, but her stuff is well worth your time!

Image Credit: © Paul H Byerly created with Midjourney 5.2
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Lessons from Coaching: The Importance of Readiness

by The Generous Husband | Feb 6, 2025 | Change, Get Help

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Change is difficult, and it can be costly. It takes a commitment of time and energy.

If you’re not ready to make that commitment, seeking help is a waste of time and money. If you’re too busy to give it the time it will take, that’s also a waste. You also have to be in an emotional space where you can open up and possibly hear difficult things.

Not being ready for help is a real thing, and it’s not always because the person is unwilling to change. Seeking help when you’re not ready is a bad idea. It’s making a promise you can’t keep. It will lead to disappointment and could make things worse.

If your wife is pushing you to go with her for help, and you know you’re not ready, be honest. Tell her you want to do what it will take to have a better marriage, but at the moment you can’t. If you can tell her why you can’t, that will help.

It’s not uncommon for an individual to come for a session or two, and then stop, only to come back months or even years later when they are ready. And that’s just fine.

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FF: The Power of Choice

by The Generous Husband | Jan 10, 2025 | Be a grownup, Change, Friday Flashback

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A full 20% of my posts carry the I_choose tag. Clearly, I see this as a big deal.

Choosing is powerful, and wise use of choice can make your life much better. Some thoughts on choice:

We usually have more choices than we think. For a variety of reasons, we tend to get tunnel vision, seeing only two choices when we have many, or only a few of the many we actually have.
We are often offered less than all the choices. People try to control and manipulate us by offering a limited set of choices; don’t fall for this!
Life is full of false dichotomies. Learning to question two answer choices is one of the smartest things you can do.
Wrong assumptions limit our choices. What we assume can cause us to think a choice is not available, or will be rejected.
Not choosing is actually making a choice, especially if you know what will happen if you don’t choose, or if by not choosing you leave the choice up to someone else. In other words, abdication is a choice, but a very poor one.
Doing nothing is a choice, and sometimes it is a very good choice.
Rushing to choose when choosing right now isn’t necessary often results in poor choices. Taking time to think/pray/sleep on it is always wise. If it is a major decision, seeking the wisdom of others is also a good idea.
What was a great choice in the past can be a poor or bad choice now. Re-examine your choices regularly.
Pride can keep us from changing once we choose. Being able to say “I was wrong” and changing direction is a sign of maturity and self-confidence.
Some choices are beyond our ability, we can’t choose something that requires others to act unless they’re willing to do what we want.
Our choices have profound effects on others, especially those closest to us. What you choose can help or hurt your wife, and can open and close doors for her.

The bottom line is, choice is a very powerful tool for good or harm. Choose often, and choose well.

[This post first appeared Oct 17, 2012.]

Image Credit: © Paul H Byerly created with stockdreams.ai
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When Truth Hurts: Navigating Difficult Conversations in Marriage

by The Generous Husband | Oct 1, 2024 | Change, GRACE

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Last week I did a couple of posts in which I said hurting our wife is always harmful to our marriage. Today the caveat.

Sometimes the truth hurts. And sometimes we need to share a truth that hurts. I think some of us are way too quick to share such truths. It’s far better to make sure God wants us to share it, and to do so at this time. We also need to share with as much love and humility as possible. But even when we do it perfectly, it still hurts.

When we rightly share a truth that hurts, it may do harm to our marriage. If that happens, it is hopefully a temporary harm that leads to change and growth.

Be wise, and don’t rush to do something you know will hurt your wife.

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Transforming Your Marriage One Small Change at a Time

by The Generous Husband | Sep 30, 2024 | Change, Good Marriage, Simple Ideas

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My wife is a big fan of baby steps. Make one small change in the direction you want to go. Then another, and another. Baby steps are a powerful way to change your marriage.

Please note, I said steps, not step. The occasional step in a random direction won’t accomplish much.

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