534 | What We Tell Married Couples

Chris LoCurto 0:00
From years of Next-Level Life Events, couples events, and counseling, the top three things that we tell married couples that are coming up next.

Welcome to the Chris LoCurto show where we discuss leadership and life and discover that business is what you do, not who you are. Welcome to the show, folks, I hope you're having a fabulous day, wherever you are. We're gonna have some fun today and talk about the top advice and counsel that we find ourselves giving to married couples now, after more than 10 years, it's crazy to think well over 500 events now, over 10 years of events of Next-Level Life Events, couples, events, counseling, all that kind of fun stuff that we've been doing. Specifically, we can say that most couples tend to wrestle with similar problems in situations. Yes, I know, we have a tendency to think that other people are not experiencing the same stuff that we are, or they just got it together better than we do or nobody's experienced in the junk that we are. But I will be honest, there are three things that I'm going to share with you today, that are the top common things that we talked about. And I'm going to give it to you, believe it or not, I'm gonna give it to you in order. That's actually backward, but will probably make the most sense to you in the order that I give it, right? Because sometimes we hear things and the most important thing, which is the most obvious is the thing that we don't really pay attention to because we think we already understand it.

So instead, I'm going to kind of reverse the order, and give them to you in a way that I think is going to probably set everything up to make the most sense. So the big key is we all have to understand that relationships, no matter what they are, they're tough, right? Relationships can be tough, you can have the greatest person on the planet, as your spouse or a friend, or a parent. And relationships still have a level of difficulty. And sometimes it can be messy, and sometimes it can be really messy. So what do we find ourselves talking about when we sit down with couples that are doing great, couples that are wanting to do better, or couples that are struggling? Well, let's find out the first thing that we talked about, and again, I'm reversing this order, but I think it's gonna make sense. The first thing that we help couples to know is that you don't really know her or them the way you think you do. You know that person a lot. I know my wife, immensely. I feel like I know her better than she knows herself. And of course, I do this for a living. So there are aspects of that, that I believe actually do know her better than I know herself. And yet, my wife continues to surprise me. And there are things I continue to learn about her. You've got to keep learning, you've got to keep learning about your spouse, there are things that you're probably not aware of, there are desires that you're probably not aware of, and there are things that your spouse sees in ways that you most likely do not. And without spending time learning that gaining quality perspective about your spouse, keeps you in a place where you assume that you know your spouse, it keeps you in a place where you believe that you understand what your spouse's Love Languages understand their personality style really well that you understand their habits. But folks, just as you change over time, so does your spouse. And just as you may not want to admit it, hold things back from your spouse. And you probably don't want to hear this, so does your spouse.

Plus, on top of all of that, there are aspects that you or your spouse don't truly understand about yourself. So you don't even know how to communicate it well. So trying to help your spouse to understand these things about you sometimes comes out a little, little messy, a little crazy. So here's what I'm saying. It is great, how much you know your spouse plan on learning about your spouse for the rest of your marriage the rest of your life. Right. The more you do, the better your relationship. There are probably aspects of things and what are some of the big issues communication we obviously know communication is, is a big struggle inside of a relationship. Even if you have a great relationship. There are things we don't communicate well There are aspects of how we want the other spouse to be able to read our mind, well, you should understand what I'm thinking you should know what I'm thinking you've been with me for many years, you should know these things. And, you know, that's obviously impossible. No matter how good you are at it is good, how good you are at assuming what your spouse is going through.

One of the biggest issues is that we don't know what they're thinking at that time. And again, funny as it is doing what I do for a living and helping people to understand themselves and understand processes in their minds, I still can't tell you what you're thinking, you know, a lot of times I can assume it, a lot of times I can be spot on. And then there are plenty of times, I have no clue. You can't possibly know what your spouse is thinking all the time. You know, you may be able to get pretty good at it, you may be able to recognize certain aspects. But instead of just assuming to gain quality perspective, ask some questions, dig in, learn, grow, find out what they're thinking, and find out what their process one of the things that my wife started saying to me years ago was she say, process out loud? Because I have a tendency to process things pretty deeply. I go through a lot of information. That's, that's how I do what I do. I need to see it from many angles. I want to think about, you know, what does this mean? How could it fail as much as I possibly can? And so, one of the things I was not doing was helping her to know what my thoughts were, then when I'm going through a deep processing situation so what's up, I remember just sitting there, and I'm processing something and she goes process out loud. And we I just busted out laughing. And I was like, Yeah, but that would probably help you if I did that.

And so I do There are times I just say well, here's what I'm thinking or, you know, let me just, I'm gonna say this while I'm processing it, to kind of help her get there. Now, why do we not normally do that? Well, we don't normally do that. Because for some people, the fear of sounding stupid is a big fear. Well, my gosh, if you can't sound stupid in front of your spouse, what kind of relationship do you have? Right? I say all kinds of stupid things. Around our place. We you know, our business, we say we're certified dorks. Because we work hard, but we love to play hard. We love to have fun and joke around and be silly, right? Life's too short not to be. But just because, you know, I like to be silly, doesn't mean I like to sound stupid. But if I can't trust my wife, and be stupid in front of her cheese, who cannot be stupid in front of, you know, so you got to get to this place where you're okay. being silly sounding stupid. Get over it. If somebody is going to judge the daylights out of you, then they probably don't need to know your inner thoughts, right? But your spouse is somebody who you need to get as close to as you possibly can help them to know you. And spend time getting to know them. What are their desires? I have a habit from time to time of just saying to my wife would you write down the things that you know, you feel cherished about, you know, that I do or could do or I'm not doing that would help you to feel cherished? That would cause you to feel loved? Right? Because I believe I'm doing amazing things in my mind. I'm, I have so much love for my wife. I have so much love for people. And I'm like geez, I'm I'm giving tons of love. Well, what if it's not speaking into her love language? What if it's not, you know, the thing that she feels cherished about it? Or, more importantly, what if it's changed? What if it's something else, spend time learning and getting to know your spouse. The more you do it, the more you will be blown away on what you learn.

The more you will desire to fulfill those things that you're learning about your spouse. The closer you will get the easier the conversations will be. Every aspect that you learn about your spouse will help you to make quality decisions in your relationship number two, and this again this order makes sense as I'm sharing it in my mind, but I would put this ahead of the last one but I want you to get the Learn your spouse in your head okay, I don't know my spouse well enough, right? That will help you to take number two, to heart. Look for in kill as much selfishness in you as you possibly can.

After communication issues, selfishness is probably the top killer of any relationship. I don't care if it's with your spouse, if it's with your kids with your, your team, your leader,  your God, it doesn't matter. Selfishness is an absolute killer of relationships. So you're gonna have to kill as much of your selfishness as you possibly can. And fast. Selfish people can't love others well, and they can't even love themselves effectively. Selfishness is the slow painful pathway to relationship death. So kill it at all costs. Let me say it again, kill it at all costs. Well, geez, Chris, everybody out there in the world is telling me how I'm supposed to take care of myself and all the self-care and all you know, I'm supposed to focus on me, you're right. There's an incredible amount of selfish people making a lot of money, calling themselves thought leaders and telling you to be selfish about you. I just happen to not be one of them.

Now, I'm not saying you don't need to take care of yourself. I'm saying you don't need to be self-centered and selfish. You don't need to put all this focus on yourself. And listen to me. Whether you're a woman or a man, you know, parent or not, the world is not on your shoulders. Get out of that crappy victim mentality mindset that these supposed thought leaders keep selling. Ladies, there's a whole bunch of crappy messages that are being pointed at you saying, Oh, you take care of the whole world. Therefore, you need to do this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, all these things to take care of yourself, the best thing you can do to take care of the world is to take care of you. Listen to me, especially all of you believers, the more you focus on yourself, the more selfish you become, and the more self-centered you become. The less you care about helping other people, the less you care about taking care of other people.

The more victim mentality you will find, you may not even have a victim mentality right now. start focusing on you, selfishly, I'm not talking again, please do not confuse this with, Hey, listen, if you're working hard, I feel like you need to take some time off and rest. You know, we do it all the time. If you know, if you've been if you're doing a lot of physical work, a massage every now and then is not a bad thing. You know, being able to take time in the tub and, you know, soak and read a book, whatever. Not a bad idea. It's a bad idea when it becomes more important than doing anything else. It's about the idea when it becomes so important that it's taking away time from more important things in your life. It's a bad idea when it creates in your selfishness and self-centeredness, where you're the thing you need to focus on. Well, why is that so bad? Because the more you focus on yourself, the more you gain a victim mentality. The more you see how all the world is just mistreating you and things aren't going your way. And in, in, in, in, in in. The more you're able to focus on others. Serve others and take care of others. Focus on helping others get what they need.

Then you focus less on what you have, what you don't have what you need, you know what you want. It changes the way you look at you. So if you're hearing me say, it's not okay to focus on you, then you're not hearing me correctly. That is not what I'm saying. I need time. My wife and I, our family, we take time. When we are done with our day. We are done with our day we focus on our family, we relax, we enjoy each other's company, and we have long meals together. We take time. In fact, we're probably going to start creating some content in the future. Talking about that what that looks like. But I serve my wife, my wife serves me. We serve our family. Our family understands how to serve. These are things that are vitally important so that we don't become selfish and self-centered human beings. We understand it's okay to take time. Plenty of times we need time. There's quite often my wife is pushing hard on something and I'm like, Hey, babe, why don't you just take some time? Just chill? This isn't There's no hurry here. There's no we don't need to finish something in two seconds. Why don't you just take some time and chill? And the funny thing is, she'll sit there for a second and go nope, I'm good. solve that. You know, many times I will be dealing with something stressful, and it's just like, I just need 30 seconds to get out of my brain, you know, I need to just get, let me solve this and move on. But there are times when man we enjoy just getting away and spending time together, just the two of us are, there are times that we enjoy. You know, we don't do this nearly as often enough, but just going and getting a massage or something or, you know, my wife goes and treats herself to, you know, manicures and pedicures and stuff like that, which is she really enjoys that time. Nothing wrong with that. We like taking a walk together just at the end of the day, grabbing a glass of wine, letting's go walk the farm and enjoy it. Take it in soak in its beauty. You know, just spend time together. No work, no phones, no talk about work, no discussing stressful stuff. Just walking around and talking about what's beautiful, right?

So there is self-care. That is good. It is quality. But if you're following the message that tells you you're the most important thing on the planet, and you should take care of yourself that way, then I'm telling you, it's only going to lead to disaster. It's going to lead to a victim mentality with you, it's going to lead to bad relationships in your life. All right, the third important thing which again, for me, would be the number one thing, after you've learned more about your spouse after you've learned, you're selfish, and you need to work on that. And then this number one thing, which is number three, I'm confusing myself right now. This is really the most important thing. And if you just focus on it, by itself, and you don't do it in a relationship, then you're going to discover you're missing out on what is it grow together in God grow together and God first and serve each other well. Second, so a couple that pursues God, which is definitely you know, someone higher and more important than yourself, right? Well ultimately grow together not further apart. We see it all the time when we help couples to grow in their relationship with God, to understand God more to understand how to study God to understand their worth and God. It is amazing how much stronger the couple becomes. The couple who learns to put God first will eventually serve and love each other better and better as the years go by. Why? Because God's love becomes part of their relationship. Now, let me tell you what I see when it comes to love scripturally if you ask the average person, what is love in the Bible, it's caring for people. It's an emotional state of being. But when you read love through the Scriptures, what you tend to find is that love is selfless sacrifice. Love is sacrificing you for somebody else selflessly. God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.

When you are caring for others when you take a look at our, apostles, when you take a look at Yeshua, when you take a look at how people loved scripturally it tends to involve sacrifice. When you learn God's love and how much he has sacrificed for you and how long-suffering he has for you, and how he continues to pursue your heart. Then you begin to gain more sacrificial love toward God. The more sacrificial love you have for God, the easier and the more sacrificial love you will have for your spouse. The more you can take care of your spouse and serve your spouse and love your spouse, the more your spouse will learn to also do the same for you. So if as a couple we are focusing on God first together, learning to grow our relationship with him together.

Then what we start to do is learn how to serve each other incredibly well. And folks, if you have never had a marriage, where you You and your spouse are serving each other, then you are absolutely missing out. How do you get there? Well, my spouse doesn't want to serve me and my spouse is selfish and stubborn. I'm sure you are not at all. How do you get it going start focusing on your relationship with God? Well, my spouse doesn't want to spend time with me on getting a relationship with God, fine. Start with you. Focus with you helped to get rid of a lot of the bitterness, the anger, the struggles, you may be valid. They may be legit. But what I'm telling you is, the more you focus on growing together in God, even if it has to start with you individually, God will do the rest. God promises that if you're obedient to Him, and you focus on Him, then He will bless you. And He will bless your descendants. So spend time growing together with God, and then learn how to serve each other well.

So listen, couples, you can't afford to ignore these important instructions. You've got to make progress here, you've got to work on these things every day of your life. I know. It sounds daunting, but trust me, it will become easier, it will become something that you desire to do if you need help. We are here for you. Go to Chrislocurto.com. And take a look at the What We Do section. So whether it's Next-Level Life or a couple's Next-Level Life, do whatever it takes to get the information and the help that you need. We know relationships are tough, plain and simple. We're in them. We, struggle with them ourselves. We just follow the stuff that we teach, and we help people with it. No doubt about it. It's tough, it can be a heck of a lot easier. Sometimes you need help to get unstuck, or out of a rut. But make sure that you're pressing into these three things.

Keep learning about each other, kill the selfishness in your own heart, grow together in God, and serve each other well. Maybe you need to learn each other's personality styles first, even if you've been married forever. Don't take it for granted that you know what's always going on in their heads. It's just it's impossible. Be curious, ask questions gain perspective, seek to understand, and most importantly, keep learning. So if you've not done personality styles, are you not done a long time, go to the online store and start learning about that stuff today. Go to Crislocurto.com and click store and start learning the disc and values for you and your spouse or if you're dating. It doesn't matter are your kids. Make sure that you start learning this today. Well, folks, that's all the time we have for today. I hope this information has helped you immensely. It's so vital and so important to your relationships. As always, take this information, change your leadership, change your business, change your life, and join us on the next episode.