Connie Durham (00:03.619)
Your phone buzzes. Work demands explode. Bills pile up and suddenly you're snapping at your spouse over nothing. Blame is flying. Defenses are up. Both of you are shutting down. Sound familiar? Well, the damage runs deep. Resentment builds. Physical closeness disappears. You feel alone in your own home. You wonder.
Will we ever get back to the love we once had? You know, when you were dating, that love and attraction that you once had. Well, here's the truth. You are not broken. Thousands of couples are right where you are, stuck and exhausted, wondering if an extraordinary marriage is even real anymore. Let me tell you it is. Well, today we're showing you the exact path of how to stop the blame game.
Own your own power and rebuild intimacy and purpose. Real couples have done it and you can too. This is part one of a power packed five part series using the book, Empowered to Love. Discovering your God given power to create a marriage you both love. I'm your host, Connie Durham. And just over a year ago, my daughter and her husband,
attended one of the wind-shaped marriage retreats here in Rome, Georgia. A couple of years ago, I had started looking at those myself and I was thinking, hey, we ought to do one of those. Well, first of all, it's my business. It's what I'm doing all the time now as I do these podcasts. But also, every marriage and every place in your marriage, you need to continue to grow.
So today I want to welcome my daughter, Melissa. She's going to share with us from those retreats that that retreat that she went to at Winche. Melissa, welcome.
Connie Durham (02:05.873)
All right, so Melissa, as we get started, you know, it's important that people that are listening know that you are just a regular old busy mom. You know, so tell us how long you've been married and a little bit about your family and the things that you like most.
Melissa Burke (02:23.277)
So my husband Michael and I have been married for 16 years. We have four kids. We do have a blended family. That was one of the reasons we ended up going to the marriage intensive last year. Blended families are not easy, but we are making it work now and we communicate well. I have a senior in high school, 18, a 16 year old, a 10 year old and a six year old. So life is very busy, but fun and I try to enjoy it.
Connie Durham (02:54.161)
All right, and so you're also a working mom, so what all do you like to do?
Melissa Burke (02:58.764)
I teach piano and voice from my home and I do a little bit of Mary Kay and that kind of thing on the side. So I do stay busy.
Connie Durham (03:05.713)
All right. And I know you're also very involved in your church.
Melissa Burke (03:10.56)
Yeah, yes, definitely involved in the church choir and the music program at our church, yeah.
Connie Durham (03:17.553)
All right, so as you went to this retreat, had you thought much about marriage retreats and personal growth and that kind of thing before that?
Melissa Burke (03:27.689)
Not really marriage retreats. We had talked about doing some counseling, which we did do some counseling with a counselor one-on-one, but we had not really looked into doing like a week long retreat, mainly because taking off a week of work for both of us, we're both self-employed, that'd be really hard to do, but definitely worth it in the end when we went.
Connie Durham (03:50.245)
Well, I know I have several friends that I have heard, you know, that went to a marriage retreat and or have done it all through the years of their marriage. People who've been married a long time like me, your dad and I, because I'm talking to my daughter, your dad and I, we have really not been to very many retreats. I think that because we both came from, you know, families that
both went to church, godly families, just not a lot of trouble. And then on top of that, our personalities came together easily. Where sometimes people naturally have a little personality challenge in there. But yeah, we just got along. Or let's say, he's super easy going, yeah. He's very easy going. So, but marriage growth is important and people, they...
Melissa Burke (04:39.467)
See ya!
Connie Durham (04:47.835)
They get help in their business to grow. They look at all different areas in their lives and the importance of growth, but they forget about their marriage. And when you don't build that strong foundation at home, it affects everything else in your life.
Melissa Burke (05:04.584)
Yeah, I feel like a lot of people with kids, you are so focused on your kids and your kids are the center of your universe. Your husband sort of gets left out sometimes. So.
Connie Durham (05:15.429)
You know what, I would say that's a definite because actually I didn't experience what you experienced having a couple of kids to start with. But one of your brothers that got married and he had eight kids, had four remarried. She had four, he had four and they had a couple more. I realized that I could never really get to know her because I'm always busy with the kids. I'm always busy with the kids.
So yeah, blended families really have more challenge in that because so much attention goes to the children and you don't get a chance to really build that marital bond together, just being there for each other. And I can say at this point in life, since all my kids are grown and out of the house, it's really different because you get to focus on each other again. That's how it's supposed to be in the beginning. All right, so what are some of the differences when we talk about TV romance?
and real life romance. Do you see some differences in that? Are they the same?
Melissa Burke (06:21.129)
No, I feel like a lot of TV romances, they seem so perfect and they never have problems. Now, some shows are different, everything ends like a happy ending and that's just not life. Like, it's not always a happy ending. It's great when it is, but it's not always a happy ending, so.
Connie Durham (06:37.647)
Yeah, so that's TV romance. How about TV families? How do those appear usually?
Melissa Burke (06:43.298)
well actually a lot of the shows that we've watched, they're legit like modern family. Like there's fighting with the kids and they make them seem pretty real actually. The shows that we watch. Yeah.
Connie Durham (06:55.237)
Yeah, so in every family there is a little conflict, a little this and that. I think sometimes that the family TV shows of today empower children too much to be they talk back and we forget to have respect, right? Yeah. And so I think respect in a family is from the top down. It's from mom and dad, then the kids, then the kids respect others and that kind of thing. So TV romance really is something that, it's beautiful.
Melissa Burke (07:05.985)
yes. Yes, yes.
Connie Durham (07:25.081)
It's great, but it's not always real. All right, so what have you learned about people and how they deal with stress differently?
Melissa Burke (07:35.751)
Well, there's always the person that has explosive anger. When they are stressed out, there's also the person that becomes like a recluse and they just sort of go into their little shell and they just shut down. I'm sort of in the middle of that. Sometimes I can get really loud and not very happy and my kids know when I'm not happy. But then sometimes I can always shut down and I just go to my room and read a book because I just need that quiet time because I'm so stressed out.
Connie Durham (08:05.839)
Now when you think about to the intensive that you went to, think about the people without any names of course, but think about the people and what kind of stress, different stress reactions did you see with them?
Melissa Burke (08:19.398)
a lot of those two actually, some people just get, they don't really shut down. They just become silent and they just don't say anything. those were a lot of the couples that had a lot of problems because they weren't really sharing their feelings with each other and they weren't communicating very well. yeah.
Connie Durham (08:39.941)
And once they opened up, because they opened up probably at least by the middle of the towards the end, what could you see happening when they actually opened up with each other?
Melissa Burke (08:46.404)
Yeah.
Melissa Burke (08:50.814)
was like a flower that was blooming slowly. It was really cool because these couples that were just hardly even like holding hands or like close sitting close to each other and you could see their body language. They were like sitting opposite facing totally different directions. And then by the middle of the week, you slowly they're like knees sort of coming into each other and like they would like just be touching each other's knees. That's it. And then by the end of the week, they were holding hands and it was a really cool experience.
Connie Durham (09:20.229)
I love that. And you know, everybody should know the love languages. And we're not going to go into that today, but you know, you should know your spouse's love language and they should know yours. Maybe the top two love languages. There are a lot of different concepts that when you know just that concept, it gives you another edge and you can become closer. And then if you know like motivators, what motivates your spouse, it makes you
you know, come closer. So every little thing that you learn and the growth that you have in your marriage makes a difference. And I love how you describe that as a flower blooming because some people cannot talk about something right off and it takes a little bit to open up. And even for me sometimes if I'm really tired or I'm frustrated about something, I'm super open, super talkative. In fact, today before I got on and I was being kind of silly and I said to my husband, said,
Well, you know, you always know what I'm thinking, don't you? Because I express it verbally and physically. Yeah, a little goofy sometimes, but I express it so he always knows. So he knows if I stop talking and I'm quiet and I won't really speak about it, he knows there's something wrong. And when we first got married, you know, I'd always say, nothing's the matter. He says, what's the matter? Nothing. And I the shorter that nothing was that there was something there, right?
And I bet there's somebody else watching this or listening today that they're like, yeah, that happens with us too. And that could be with the male or the female, right?
Melissa Burke (10:54.101)
Yeah, Michael and I are like that too. Like he always knows when something's wrong and I say nothing. Yeah.
Connie Durham (10:58.993)
Yeah, our body starts to show it. Yeah. We say nothing, though. We mean there's something and you probably better figure it out. Also, I'll add to that going to bed angry. So I know that we would always talk it out and that was a very good habit was to talk it out before you go to bed angry and you might be up later. But boy, buddy, if I go to bed mad, I don't wake up no better.
Melissa Burke (11:05.665)
Yeah.
Melissa Burke (11:11.764)
Mmm.
Connie Durham (11:27.779)
In I'm madder. So don't go to bed angry. Okay, with all of this, as we're talking about this intensive and the importance of opening up and talking and listening with one another, why do couples procrastinate? Why do they wait when they know they really need help? What do you think?
Melissa Burke (11:29.889)
Yeah, let's take a-
Melissa Burke (11:51.137)
I think a lot of people are very private and they don't like to share. like going to a counselor or something is like airing out their dirty laundry and they don't want people to know their problems and they can just fix it themselves. But that is a huge problem. I saw that in our marriage intensive that people didn't want to go to counseling and get the help, but then the other spouse did. So definitely procrastinating in that area can hurt your marriage a lot.
Connie Durham (12:17.161)
And what happens that I've seen is that people procrastinate and they wait until one day it's too late. Because some people, they don't say anything about it and they don't talk about it and they're quiet and they don't share. And then one day they just decide, I'm done. And I've seen that and I've worked with people where they waited too late and it's so sad.
Melissa Burke (12:25.792)
Mm.
Connie Durham (12:47.291)
to see that maybe that marriage could have been saved and they waited too late. And there's different personality styles and a particular personality style, once they decide, they're pretty much done and there's hardly any hope. So I would say don't procrastinate. Figure out whether it's a church pastor, a counselor, a coach, a-
a good, wise friend, somebody who's gone before you. That's why, you know, older folks, they've been through a lot. And marriages that look good, they still been through some things and they learn how to work it out. even if you don't have money to do anything, you can find somebody to confide in. But when you find somebody to confide in, they should always listen carefully, offer a little advice, maybe ask you questions to help pull out the challenges that are being had. That's like a coach. And
Find somebody that's godly so you aren't misled. These days there's so many things out there and there's a lot of misleading people. So you want to really make sure that you confide in a reliable, godly kind of person on that. But don't procrastinate until it's too late. I like the serenity prayer. It says, God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom.
to know the difference. Because when it comes to our spouses, we cannot change their personality. We can't change whether they're neat or messy. We can't change, hey, if they have a bad temper, we can't change that, but we can figure out how to not ignite it, right? So, yeah, learn not to push their buttons, that's right. All right, so Melissa, what does the reactive cycle look at? Because, you know,
Melissa Burke (14:30.942)
Don't push the buttons.
Connie Durham (14:42.277)
That's something that we all have trouble with.
Melissa Burke (14:44.881)
Yeah, so the reactive cycle, I like to also call it the crazy cycle where you're reacting to something and then it doesn't get fixed and then he's reacting to something and it doesn't get fixed. And then you're just on this like crazy circle and nobody can get off because nobody's really communicating the problem in the first place. there's pushing it down, I guess you could say, and just another one arises and another one arises and nothing ever gets fixed.
Connie Durham (15:10.321)
And when you are communicating, it's like you're impatient with each other. And sometimes when we get irritated, we say things we don't really mean. Yes, or sometimes when we get irritated, it all comes out, right? All right, in the book it has these letters that it stands for, it is ESPM, ESPM, taking personal responsibility, emotional,
Melissa Burke (15:19.29)
Yes.
Melissa Burke (15:24.811)
yeah.
Connie Durham (15:40.273)
spiritual, physical, and mental wellbeing. So what do you remember on that? I was just talking about that. Emotional, spiritual, physical, and mental wellbeing. What is the importance in self-care?
Melissa Burke (15:54.142)
So first off, a lot of people get married and they think that their spouse is supposed to fix all their problems. That if they're upset, their spouse is supposed to fix that. they're like any problem, their spouse is responsible for fixing that and that's not the case. And so one thing we learned in our intensive is that you are responsible for your own self-care. Your spouse cannot fix the problems for you. They can be there to support you, but not fix them.
So it's really important that if you do have emotional, mental, spiritual, any kind of problem that you're working through, that you can go talk to a counselor yourself about those things or have a very close friend to confide in to be able to work through those issues because you have to be a strong person yourself with all four of those things to be a good spouse, in my opinion.
Connie Durham (16:51.737)
And the truth is when we get married, a lot of times we bring in childhood problems, teenage problems, young adult problems, old romance problems, old marriage problems for people who are remarried. And if we don't stop and have self-care and figure out what went wrong or why we're having trouble or why we're frustrated,
then we bring that into that new relationship. Right.
Melissa Burke (17:23.344)
Yeah, one of the questions, which I know we're not doing the whole care cycle today, but one of the questions is, you know, when something's upsetting you and you're like really emotional or like not okay mentally about this, you have to stop and say, Lord, like, why am I feeling this way? Like, what is triggering me to make me react this way? And that's just one of the questions that, you know, you can ask yourself, because usually it's not your spouse and what they did.
It's something else that you're dealing with that you haven't communicated yet.
Connie Durham (17:57.905)
That's exactly right. And a of times it's us. We're frustrated, we're tired, something else is going on, something else has happened in our life. And if we don't take care of ourselves to figure out what those things are, so we have to get to be a healthy human being so that then we can bring that into our marriage and grow and build a wonderful relationship there. All right, I like to use one of those things.
Melissa Burke (18:13.647)
Yeah.
Connie Durham (18:25.997)
deposits and withdrawals. And in every relationship, I think when you have good self-care, you're all put together, you got it going on, you are able to respect your spouse and you do feel their couple a little bit with love and thoughtfulness and kindness, speaking good to each other. But if you're married to somebody and you're having a super challenge and there's a lot of friction in the house, then there are withdrawals.
And literally, if you're screamed at, that's a withdrawal. If somebody's not listening to you, like they're acting like you don't count, that's a withdrawal from your love bank. And so some people are dealing with that all the time. And that is a place of, think, do we mention the crazy cycle yet?
Melissa Burke (19:18.264)
Yes, the reactive cycle. We talked about the crazy cycle.
Connie Durham (19:21.743)
Yeah, that puts you in that crazy cycle and sometimes you don't know how to get out of it. But self-care is so very important. Depositing into yourself sometimes instead of, I talk about love deposits into your spouse and the same for them with you and the withdrawals. But the truth is you first have to be healthy yourself and that means self-care.
So tell me some of the things that you do as a busy mom and a working mom that help keep your, you know, self-care, help keep your bucket full, your cup full.
Melissa Burke (19:58.53)
Yeah, well, I do a lot with my kids. And so I like to do play dates with other families that have kids same age. And that way I can fill my cup by talking to the mom and just, you know, chatting about life and the fun things we've done. I also try to meet friends, just one on one friends for breakfast or lunch. I'm very social. And so my cup definitely gets filled when I am with my friends and
Just talking about life and the good things. Also reading. Reading is a really big one for me. So like I need to like just get away. I just go pick up my book and I read for like 30 minutes and escape into my little story and then come back to real life.
Connie Durham (20:41.445)
And so it's finding those things that you enjoy. Now you are very much a people person, Melissa. And so there are people out there that are the opposite of that. You you're an extrovert. Yep. And then there's those introverts. And I think when people are introverted to fill their cup and to deposit into their own self-care, they need a hot bath by theirself. You know, they got to close the door. Yes, reading a book, that works.
Melissa Burke (20:54.048)
Yeah.
Connie Durham (21:10.107)
taking time by yourself and even introverts may have a great friend that they like to have lunch with or do something with. But it's important for people to figure out what they need because first you got to be healthy in mind and spirit before you can pour in and have a great marriage. This is true. All right. So I have in Mark 12 it says from 30 and 31 verses it says, love the Lord your God with all your heart.
and with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is this, love your neighbors as yourself. There is no command greater than these, Mark 12, 33, 31. And love really comes from God. Originally, God loves, right? And we live in a hectic, crazy world these days where we see lots of, I'm sorry, but hateful people out there.
and hateful people spread hateful stuff they hate on everybody. They're like so not happy. But you know, when you are loving and kind and you have, you know, God's heart, a loving heart, you see everyone in a positive, happy perspective, it makes a lot of difference. Everyone though in a relationship coming into marriage or forever in marriage is not a responsible, empowered adult.
Why do you think this is? Why does that happen?
Melissa Burke (22:37.949)
you're asking why they don't think they're a what again?
Connie Durham (22:42.501)
Yeah, why does this happen where every man and woman going into marriage is not an empowered, responsible adult?
Melissa Burke (22:53.289)
Well, let's see. I think a lot of times when you come into marriage, you think that you're going to become like one with your spouse. And so now you don't have to worry about just being your own little person. Now you're one person, but that's not true. So like when you're coming into marriage, you're your own responsible adult, but then God is the center. And so, that's really important for people to understand that you're not melding into this one person.
Connie Durham (23:17.361)
That's right.
Melissa Burke (23:23.304)
You are still your own individual responsible adult self, but God is now the center of your relationship.
Connie Durham (23:31.269)
I like that. That was very good. I'm also thinking about you're raising kids. have your two teenagers, but then you have your two younger kids. What are you doing to pour into the kids that will help them be a responsible adult?
Melissa Burke (23:48.074)
I asked my kids a lot of questions actually. so when they're upset or something, I always like, if my youngest is upset about something, I'm like, okay, now is this really helping you by acting this way? And like, she always responds, no, not really. And then I'm like, what can we do to change this? Like, how can we change this circumstance right now to make it better? Like I ask a lot of questions. So
I think asking your kids questions makes them think through the situation instead of fixing it and telling them the answers constantly because that's not helping them think. And they need to do that as they get older. So it's important. Yes.
Connie Durham (24:28.241)
Thinking, thinking, what a novel idea. I think you also hold your kids accountable. No, accountable. And that comes also by being consistent and deciding what's most important. sometimes as parents, I mean, I remember whenever I became a parent, all I could do was pass along what my mom taught me.
Melissa Burke (24:31.842)
Yeah.
Melissa Burke (24:36.615)
Yes.
Melissa Burke (24:58.181)
Yes.
Connie Durham (24:58.737)
No, that's all I could do is pass along what my mom taught me. you know, it turns out she was pretty good, I think. So hopefully I did a good job with you too, right? But it's but you know, everybody doesn't get that. they sometimes people come from families where I don't know, there is an angry parent. I was listening to another podcast yesterday and, know, sometimes there's an angry parent, an irresponsible parent.
Melissa Burke (25:08.687)
Yes.
Connie Durham (25:26.361)
a drinking parent, a parent on drugs. mean, a parent who's having to do it all, they don't have a spouse. There's so many instances these days where people come from such great, great hardship and they even more need to, I don't know, read a book, find a friend, get some wisdom, counseling or whatever, so that they can figure it out. This goes back to that self-care, doesn't it?
Melissa Burke (25:53.029)
Yeah. Yeah.
Connie Durham (25:55.033)
Yeah, it goes back to the self-care. All right, so let's define a healthy marriage. What does a healthy marriage look like?
Melissa Burke (26:03.121)
In my opinion, a healthy marriage is first and foremost keeping God the center and communication. Communication is key. If you are not communicating with your spouse, your spouse doesn't know when you're upset. Your spouse doesn't know if something's even wrong or if something bothered you. So it's really important to have a strong relationship with God first, but then also the communication is definitely second, in my opinion.
Connie Durham (26:32.613)
If you look it up on Google, you're gonna find that communication and money are your top two challenges in just about every marriage. And that's because people communicate differently or don't communicate. People spend their money differently. And whatever we believe, we believe it strongly usually, don't we?
Melissa Burke (26:46.137)
Yeah.
Melissa Burke (26:51.523)
Yeah, one thing that we learned at the intensive, which we don't always do now, but was checking in with your spouse. So like when there's something wrong that you need to talk to your spouse about, hey, babe, I, or is this a good time to talk about this? Like, and if it's not, then, you know, they can go have their care cycle or, you know, just to sort of check themselves, make sure they're mentally okay. And then they can talk to you about whatever the important issue is. Cause sometimes when you're
Connie Durham (27:19.067)
Don't try it.
Melissa Burke (27:20.217)
Sometimes when you're in a bad mood and your spouse comes to you and they're like, I need to talk to you about this. That is not the time to talk about it.
Connie Durham (27:27.227)
That's about what I was gonna say. there's times, a lot of times your dad asked me to make decisions at like 930 at night. He goes, we need to talk about this and decide on this. I'm like, I'm tired. I can't make a decision on that. He's gotten used to it by now. But if we're not feeling well or we're already feeling frustrated, we know it's not a good time to talk about something, right?
Melissa Burke (27:50.36)
Yeah.
Connie Durham (27:51.781)
But a healthy marriage is being kind and loving and thoughtful. It's really treating your spouse, I'm adding to what you said, treating your spouse in the same way that you treat that most respected person that you see out. know, like it might be the church pastor or a teacher that you had or your best friend. It's like, we teach? Do we teach? Do we treat?
everyone with the respect that we like to get, do right? Do we, you know, how do we respect people? All right, so defining healthy marriage, Ephesians 5, 31 through 32. Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife and the two shall become one flesh. That is one of the big things when we get married is, hey, we get to be out on our own, right?
Melissa Burke (28:48.471)
Yeah.
Connie Durham (28:49.839)
Yeah, make our own decisions, decide we want to live, how we want our life to be. But one of the big things in getting married is confiding in each other and sharing our burdens, sharing the things that are exciting. And the more that you do that and the more that you do things together, all these things come together to make a healthy marriage.
Melissa Burke (29:16.801)
Yeah, I think that verse, that's the verse that they were talking about in chapter one, where a lot of people think they take one flesh as becoming one person, but you are still your individual person with God in the center. And so, yeah, so that's one of the verses that I think I had read in there where people confuse it, thinking that you're, I'm just this one person now, me and my husband are one, and we have to think the same, and we have to be the same, and no, that's not how it is.
Connie Durham (29:31.343)
in
Connie Durham (29:46.501)
And the true good part is that you're literally a partnership. A good healthy marriage, there's an awesome partnership. One person's talented at these things, one's good at those. We were booking some airline flights and we have to book our seats together to Europe. And so there's two three or four flights on this trip that are gonna be taken. And I took my ticket. I'm like, honey, I'm sending you my ticket
Melissa Burke (29:50.57)
Yeah.
Connie Durham (30:16.347)
Will you handle that and get our seats together? Because I hate those details. So, you know, it is a partnership and each bringing their talents and these kind of things to that partnership. it's better than two are better than one. That's in the Bible, too. Two are better than one, right? Whenever and when everybody's got self care and it's a good relationship.
All right, so let's talk about some of the reasons that this is important to have a healthy marriage. Coming together. Yeah.
Melissa Burke (30:51.008)
Why is it important?
I mean, your children, if you have kids, they're watching you. And so you are modeling for them what they will have in the future. So if you're modeling a healthy marriage where mom and dad are both communicating, then more than likely your kids are also gonna be in a relationship where they're communicating with their girlfriend or boyfriend or their spouse. That's one really important reason. Yeah, go ahead.
Connie Durham (31:20.305)
call that the trickle-down effect. It is the trickle-down effect. I always say that whenever a kid is having trouble at school and they're a bully and they're being mean and they're not talking nice, trickle-down effect, probably coming from home. Not always, right? Kids have little quirks here and there, but trickle-down effect. So it's important. I mean, it's just important if you want to live a lifetime together. I've been married over 40 years.
Melissa Burke (31:22.153)
Yeah.
Melissa Burke (31:37.375)
Yeah.
Connie Durham (31:49.969)
If you want to live a lifetime together, if you want it to be good, then a healthy marriage is important, right? All right, so the book talks about keeping God at the center of your marriage. And you just talked about that a little bit. So I want everybody to picture three circles, three circles side by side, husbands on one side, wife is on the other with God in the center circle. So why is this important? And you touched on it a little bit earlier.
Melissa Burke (32:19.527)
It's just important to keep God at center of your universe pretty much because if you're making your husband the center of the universe, then you're leaving out the most important aspect and that's God and his leadership that he can have over your life.
Connie Durham (32:34.427)
Because God is the creator of all of us. He created the world, He created the people, He created everything. And so, as far as looking to anybody, He's got it together. He knows everything. Yeah, He's wise. All right, so keeping God as the center. And we can do that by praying together, reading our Bible together, attending church together. And sometimes, you know, one's spouse won't go to church and if they won't go, then...
Melissa Burke (32:36.187)
Yes.
Melissa Burke (32:47.653)
Yeah.
Connie Durham (33:04.165)
go ahead and go yourself. And I like to say even one spouse working on personal growth, trying to understand themselves and their spouse will make a difference in their relationship because it helps you with better attitude, a better outlook, and it helps you keep hope. Because without hope, I mean, like we're done for. It's like hope is the fuel that just keeps you going.
Melissa Burke (33:21.605)
Yeah.
Melissa Burke (33:28.698)
You it's funny you mentioned that my husband and I were talking about that this morning about how even if one spouse is working on the marriage, 50 % better is better than none. So, I mean, it makes a big difference. It's just one spouse is making the difference. And usually I think what happens is when that one spouse is putting in that 50 % of their 100 % kind of thing, then the other spouse tends to start catching on and
Connie Durham (33:40.995)
Absolutely.
Melissa Burke (33:57.434)
starts trickling in his part or her part too.
Connie Durham (34:01.009)
Absolutely, and sometimes that's slow and sometimes it's quicker. Most of the time it's slow. But also that goes back to self-care again. And if you are the spouse that's putting in all the time to keep your marriage afloat, then you really need to have that self-care. It's super, super important to keep your own cup full. All right, some Christians say love is almost mystical.
Melissa Burke (34:06.363)
Yeah.
Melissa Burke (34:22.095)
Yes.
Connie Durham (34:28.143)
The result of a complicated combination of attraction, chemistry, and numerous strategies aimed at keeping love alive and the fires of passion burning. It is said, if the flame goes out, love is dead. Do you think that love is a feeling or a commitment?
Melissa Burke (34:50.141)
most definitely a commitment. Now it can be both. So love is a feeling that I feel towards my husband and my children and my family, but it's also a commitment and a choice. You choose to love somebody. And your wedding vows, for better or for worse. So it's a choice. And I think a lot of people give up on marriage so quickly because you're like, this is just hard. Well, life is hard. And if you want to choose to love this person that you married, then
You're gonna have to do that through better and through worse. So.
Connie Durham (35:23.889)
There again, self-care, keeping your own cup full, right? Okay, so I also would think that this goes back to those extroverts and those introverts. You know, there's this big divide between people who are very people-oriented and love to be out there at the party, at the beach, having a good time, learning something new, adventure, and then the folks that need that quiet time and to be by their self.
Melissa Burke (35:26.81)
Yeah.
Connie Durham (35:50.563)
I think that probably more extroverts are feelers, I'm guessing, more feelers and that more introverts are more on the committed side. Like they don't need much change. Introverts don't need much change. They're happy with kind of status quo, how things are going. But extroverts and introverts, excuse me, extroverts need change. There's two personalities that go into that.
and both those personalities need, they need change. I would say that it is a feeling for them and commitment for the others, although we, like you said, have to have both. So a feeling, what happens when it's feelings? What happens with all the things we've been talking about today if it's a feeling?
Melissa Burke (36:40.287)
feelings come and go. So there's nothing permanent with feelings.
Connie Durham (36:46.257)
And feelings come and go. And if my spouse is yelling at me, my feeling is, right? Yeah. Um, if, uh, my spouse is not home on time or they're not home half the time, or they're not spending that time with me or doing this or this or this, then feelings, like you said, you, you start to feel distant, more distant, you know, from your spouse. But commitment is integrity.
Melissa Burke (36:51.491)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Connie Durham (37:15.705)
honesty, follow through with what you say you'll do, practice. You got to practice the things that you want to see, action, understanding, and I'll add a decision. Say that again. Intentional. Yes. Commitment is intentional. So as we look at those, would say,
Melissa Burke (37:30.089)
It's intentional too. It's intentional.
Yeah.
Connie Durham (37:42.469)
because it's really a thing where half the people say it's a feeling, half of them say it's commitment. I'm kind of like worried if people say, it's a commitment. I tease with my husband sometimes when I say, hey, we have a contract. We have a contract. But I think if it's solely commitment, think you've lost the feeling, right? And if it's solely a feeling, then you may find yourself not committed whenever there's
Melissa Burke (37:55.285)
Ha ha ha ha.
Connie Durham (38:10.769)
troubled water is going on, right?
Melissa Burke (38:12.703)
Yeah, tap, it's important to be in the middle.
Connie Durham (38:17.423)
Well, all right, so this is from Empowered to Love. Understanding God and His love, we like to view the heart as having two doors, a door that connects us to God, our source, and a front door that connects us to other people. Do you remember studying that?
Melissa Burke (38:38.347)
Maybe a little bit. Yeah.
Connie Durham (38:41.253)
You know, so God is love and we like to view the heart as having two doors. The top door connects us to God. you know, that's reading our Bible, praying, going to church, connecting with other couples who are godly. And then the side door or the front door is connected to other people. And if we have a good relationship with God,
then we can have a good relationship with other people. And that's an absolute truth, isn't it? That's an absolute truth. Well, this is the beginning, like I said, of a five part series. And we've gone as far as we can go this week, but next week we will have part two of this series. And if you'll watch the podcast, you'll see, you'll see that. And we're on Apple, Spotify, and at theextraordinarymarriage.com slash
Melissa Burke (39:14.771)
Yes.
Connie Durham (39:38.641)
Melissa, do you have anything else you would like to say today before we finish?
Melissa Burke (39:44.116)
not really. I'm good.
Connie Durham (39:45.745)
Well, I welcome you and I thank you for coming today and sharing from your Wind Shape Intensive. And hopefully there's somebody that heard something from this that makes a difference for them because that's what we're here for at The Extraordinary Marriage. I'm Connie Durham, your host, and I hope to see you next time.
Connie Durham (40:10.491)
And that's it. So that was longer than usual. That was like, I do shorter, but anytime you do an interview, it's going to be a little longer. Yeah. Thank you. And that was different and you're probably more relaxed, right?
Melissa Burke (40:18.196)
Yeah.
You're welcome.
I was, I was getting tired towards the end because we already recorded for like 20 minutes.
Connie Durham (40:29.025)
Yeah, we did. Except we didn't.
Melissa Burke (40:31.37)
But it's okay, it's all good.
Connie Durham (40:33.873)
don't even know why I looked down. All of a sudden it hit me and I looked at that and I'm like, there's a record button and I did it record. So actually I probably could stop it.
