On our tenth-anniversary marriage summit, one of the questions we spent time plucking at was: what are our keys to a happy marriage? That might seem like a strange thing to discuss, but when we name what matters, we solidify it – which is the beginning of getting more of it. It was a deeply satisfying conversation, and something I knew I wanted to share in part here.
Of course, sharing feels a little squishy, and I don’t necessarily write to encourage you toward the things that bring us happiness – we are two unique people with unique wiring and a unique history, and what speaks to our deepest needs and desires might not move the needle for you. There are a million ways to have a good marriage. I share in the hopes that it might inspire you to name the keys to your own marriage happiness – to spark a conversation across your dinner table or on your next date night.
And also, selfishly, I’m sharing for my children. I hope they look back one day and think, mom and dad really loved each other, and they enjoyed each other. I hope this post helps them understand why that was so.
Without further ado…
It’s been too long since we looked at some wedding photos, no? I narrowed myself to black and white ceremony photos for today :) All by the inimitable Tanja Lippert!
1. We share a faith that compels us to help each other become more holy. This is the only place to start (and as you can see, the title of this post is a bit of a misnomer). While we desire happiness in our marriage, at our best, we aim for holiness. Happiness, we are believing, will be a byproduct of this pursuit.
From The Meaning of Marriage: “What, then, is marriage for? It is for helping each other to become our future glory-selves, the new creations that God will eventually make us. The common horizon husband and wife look toward is the Throne, and the holy, spotless, and blameless nature we will have. I can think of no more powerful common horizon than that, and that is why putting a Christian friendship at the heart of a marriage relationship can lift it to a level that no other vision for marriage approaches.”
When John and I are each pursuing God, by His grace we will find it easier and easier to love each other well. If we are aiming for a standard of marriage and to treat each other in a way that is not of this world, we might expect to find greater marital happiness than most do in this world.
2. Our core values and virtues are aligned. Long before we were married, someone influential told us that “compatibility” is less important in marriage than shared core values, and we’ve found that to be true. We are bound by the things that we hold most deeply and reverently: our faith, integrity, generosity, loyalty, optimism, delayed gratification, personal responsibility, gratitude. Knowing we are united in what’s most important bridges a lot of gaps day to day.
3. We cast vision for our future together. John and I both score highly for the Futuristic StrengthsFinder theme (“People exceptionally talented in the Futuristic theme are inspired by the future and what could be. They energize others with their visions of the future.”), and so we make time to dream together. We talk about what we hope to do next week, month, year, in ten years and fifty years. We talk about what we want our future summers to look like, future anniversaries, camping trips, financial goals, even our retirement. Believing we’re going somewhere good together keeps us united and happy.
4. We started young and have grown in the same direction. In my marriage vows, I promised John that we would always grow toward each other, not away. I know God was with me when I wrote those vows, because this has only become more true and important over time. When you inevitably change (and you will, especially when you’re high school sweethearts), you have the choice of growing toward your partner or away from him. At every juncture, we’ve tried to grow toward each other (though always imperfectly), and it has led to joy and beauty we never would have known had we dug our heels in.
Finding each other young was also a gift we did not deserve – our similar backgrounds and almost non-existent dating history basically took a whole category of potential landmines off the table, and that has certainly aided in our happiness.
5. We regularly reflect on our life together. At Cultivate, one of our core phrases is “reflection reaps rewards,” and it is certainly true in our marriage. Not only do we regularly (at least annually) set aside time to reflect on what’s working and what’s not in our marriage, but we try to act on what we uncover – for example, banning certain phrases, or setting thoughtful intentions. Tiny nudges in the right direction, when extrapolated over time, have made a big difference in how happy our life is day to day.
6. We treasure and celebrate our marriage. We only reflect and dig in and fix things when we believe they have value. And in the case of our marriage, we do – we believe it has great value, that it’s important (see no. 1). We remind each other of that regularly. And we spend time and money celebrating what we have, whether through an end-of-year dinner or a 10th anniversary trip.
7. We want to look good for each other. Some might chafe against this one, and I get it. Of course our love is not conditional on outward beauty, and we are not aiming for perfection. We have plenty of slouchy days. He has seen me and loved me at my most vulnerable, and would do so a million times over if needed (as would I, for him).
But – I am honoring the body he fell in love with just as I am the soul and mind and spirit he fell in love with, and he is doing the same for me. And we cheer each other on in this by doling out frequent compliments (John is exceptional at this; I try to keep up.). The things we love become lovelier when we love them, and we both believe that complimenting each other regularly has helped wire our brains to see each other’s loveliness. And of course it makes the other person feel good! There’s probably some brain science that could back me up in this :)
8. We spend time together. I wouldn’t say date nights are foundational for our marriage – we could survive without them – but as this is a post about happiness, they can’t go unmentioned. Spending time with John and talking with him is one of my greatest delights! As parents, we don’t have a ton of free time, but what we do have, we try to spend with each other. We go for walks. We watch the same shows. Neither of us have hobbies that eat up large chunks of our time. We of course have our own interests, but we make what we have in common the priority.
9. We never give each other a reason to doubt our love. I wrote these words in 2014 and they are equally true today: I’m not sure if I’m qualified to give marriage advice, seeing as we’ve only just passed our first anniversary, but perhaps I can offer some relationship advice — we have been together for almost ten years, after all. There are a lot of things I could tell you about what works for us, but I think one of the strongest things about our relationship is that we trust in it without reservation. We’ve never given each other a reason to doubt it, and so we’ve never been tempted to do so. We don’t treat our love for each other like it’s conditional, or could be threatened to be taken away, or withheld as a bargaining chip. Even if we are angry or frustrated, at bedrock, we both have always known without a doubt that we are acting from a place of unshakeable love.
10. We believe and act like we are a team that’s a force for good in the world. We believe our marriage has a purpose larger than just ourselves, our children, or our happiness. We know we can do more together than we can apart, and we’re curious and expectant about what that might look like in the years to come. And having purpose makes us happier, just like most humans.
I read through a lot of old blog posts as I was writing, and this quote (from John!) stuck out to me: “People often talk about how marriage is so hard, but we’ve found it to be the most comfortable and best thing ever. I think the world (and people thinking about marriage) need to hear more messages about how great marriage can be, and we are happy to do that.” Writing about marriage is not the easiest thing, but I think it’s a good thing. I hope you agree :)
I’m curious: is there one of these keys you’d like to hear more about? Even though this post is long, I had to restrain myself, because each felt like it could be a blog post of its own! And if you’re in a relationship, I’d love to hear a key to your happiness together!
The parenthetical portion of this post’s title felt important, because though this is a solid overview of what constitutes “family goals” in the life of our family right now (with a 7-, 4-, and 1-year-old), I guarantee they will evolve. Right now, our family goals are almost entirely parent-directed, but over time, I look forward to folding our kids into the process. And you know we will be encouraging our kids to set their own goals once they’re a bit older :)
But that day is not today. So let’s dive into what family goals look like for us right now!
How do we come up with our family goals?
At our end-of-year celebration dinner, one of the questions John and I discuss (after reviewing what went well and where we struggled in the past year), is “what are our goals for the year ahead?”
I’m usually in the middle of completing my PowerSheets Prep Work and finalizing my personal goals when we have our celebration dinner; all that the PowerSheets process has stirred up is fresh in my mind, and inevitably comes to bear on the conversation. In this way, though John and I don’t fill out PowerSheets together, they definitely play a part in our family goal setting.
Unlike my personal goals, which I land on after many hours of reflection and sometimes extensive hemming and hawing, setting our family goals is simple: we generally leave dinner with them in hand.
How do our family goals differ from my personal goals?
Our family goals are things that matter to both of us that we’d like to complete, achieve, or focus on in the year ahead. They fall into a few categories most years:
— Natural next steps of long-term goals we’re working toward — Goals that John and I both feel led to pursue and that we will be pursuing jointly — Goals that will have a noticeable impact on how our family spends our time — Household “to dos” that will require our effort, money, or time. (Think: not particularly visionary or exciting, but they need to happen.) — Fun things we want to prioritize that need extra visibility to happen. (Maybe we’ve struggled to follow through in the past, or they require more planning.)
We also usually throw John’s personal goals onto the family goals list, because he only has a few and doesn’t require a fancy planner to make progress on them :)
Overall, our family goals are ones that involve a significant amount of John’s and my, or our entire family’s, energy, buy-in, time, and/or money. My personal goals, on the other hand, mostly involve my own effort and time, and don’t really need anyone else’s buy-in.
How do we stay accountable to our family goals?
While I use a somewhat elaborate system to break down and track my personal goals, we go super simple with our family goals: we stick them to the fridge :) In the days after our end-of-year dinner, I’ll type them up and print them out. (This is a good chance to review them one more time and make sure we didn’t forget anything.) Then, they go on the fridge, where they’ll stay for the rest of the year.
It sounds simple (and it is), but it’s effective. We both see them every day, which keeps them top of mind. We’ll often talk while standing in the kitchen, so it’s easy to chat through a next step or remind each other of a goal that’s coming up since the list is right there. As you’ll see below, our family goals do tend to be more specific, which makes them easy to live out – they either don’t really need to be broken down any further, or the steps to break them down are naturally clear.
Finally, I would add that we take our family goals seriously, but we hold them lightly. Yes, we want them to get done, but neither of us are the type to stress out about whether or not they get accomplished. We know we’re moving in the right direction and that what most needs to get done will get done. Progress, not perfection :)
Are our kids involved in setting our family goals?
At their current ages (7, 4, and 1), they are not – John and I set them on a date night. I fully expect we will involve them more in the future, but for now, it’s just the two of us.
June did peruse the list after it went up on the fridge and let us know she thought they were “good goals,” so at least we have her approval :)
What are our family goals for this year?
I’ve organized them into the categories above and added a little explanation where helpful!
Natural next steps of long-term goals: — Increase giving to Home Free by X amount. “Home Free” is what we’ve dubbed our mortgage fund account. When we set our budget for 2023, we decided to increase the amount we’re transferring to it each month. It’s been three years since I last shared about our mortgage plan and I think we might be due for an update, because we’ve been in talks about changing our strategy…
Joint goals: — Eat more fish. We very occasionally eat shrimp and almost never eat fish at home, and we’d like to change that. Recipe or preparation recommendations welcome in the comments! — Stretch nightly and increase flexibility. We were in a great rhythm of doing a 10-minute Peloton stretch together before we went to bed each night, but John’s injury and Annie’s birth knocked us off course. It feels SO good when we’re consistent, plus it has other benefits, like helping us get to bed on time and at the same time. — Complete 5000/6000 Peloton minutes. After trying out several different strategies over the past few years, we’ve found that tackling our workout goals together – and for the most part, working out at the same time – is most effective for us. Happy to write more about this if it’s of interest!
Goals that will impact how our family spends our time: — Begin piano lessons for June. I am equal parts nervous about and excited for this. I am sure we’ll unpack this on the blog at some point in the future. — Enjoy monthly kid dates. We are scaling up the frequency and scaling down the expense/logistics for these after our inaugural year in 2022. John and I will each take one of the older kids to do something solo each month, swapping kids each month. Think: going on a bike ride, going to get bagels or ice cream. — Swim lessons for older kiddos. — Have a family over for dinner every month. One of my personal goals that will require the whole family’s buy-in! — Adjust to 3 day/week rhythm. We recognize that my shifting time away from work will have ramifications on our family life, and set this goal as a reminder to stay in tune as this change rolls out.
Household to dos: — Paint master bath cabinets. — Pressure wash the patio. — Update our legacy box. This also appears on my personal goals, as the portions that will fall under my purview will require dedicated effort.
John’s personal goals: — Read the Bible. He is followingBibleProject’s One Story that Leads to Jesus plan and usually listens to the scripture/watches the videos while getting ready for bed. — Reach first rung of compensation ladder. This is for his variable compensation at work.
Fun things we want to prioritize: — Camp in backyard. This is super simple, but just complicated enough that it’s easy for it not to happen (and it didn’t happen in 2022, which earned it a spot on this year’s list). — Play more tennis on weekdays. We did this once after my work hours changed, and it was an absolute delight. More of this in 2023! — Go to a Duke game. Because we live too close to Durham for us to have gone so long without seeing a game :)
I’d be happy to answer any questions you might have about our family goals! And I’d love to hear if you set family goals, or your kids set goals, or if you plan to do either in the future.
By now, most of you are probably aware that our tenth-anniversary trip was rerouted at the last minute. With a hurricane bearing down on Bermuda, we booked new flights and accommodations less than 24 hours (!) before departing for Mexico (!) in a grand pivot. Though it was a stressful few days leading up to the trip, it all worked out wonderfully: for our scrambling, we were rewarded with five days of relaxing, enjoying each other’s company, reminiscing, and casting vision for our next ten years of marriage in our own mini marriage summit. It was a true gift. I’d love to tell you about it and share a few photos today!
Before we get to the fun, though, let’s do a brief recap of the stress, ha. Those may look like two happy faces on an airplane to paradise, and they were, but in the week leading up this moment things weren’t quite so happy. About a week before we were due to depart, we began watching the weather (as one does). John also began tracking the weather on various websites and apps (as he does, amateur weatherman that he is). And what did we see? A hurricane headed straight for Bermuda. No worries, we thought: surely the track will change in the next seven days. So every day we checked, and every day… it remained resolutely headed for our island. Five days out… four days out… three days out… still headed straight for Bermuda.
We began to feel more and more nervous. At some point, one of us suggested something about how maybe we should consider alternative options…? To which the other probably said something like, no way! Really? No, we probably don’t need to. Nah…….. but the track continued to not change, and the hour of our departure inched ever closer.
About 48 hours out, we agreed that continuing with our trip to Bermuda was not a viable option for us. The hurricane was scheduled to directly hit the island the day before our departure back to the U.S., and we felt we couldn’t risk getting stuck on the island for days with no power or water and our kids back home. We considered postponing the trip, but agreed we’d rather go forward with a trip of some sort since we had both taken the time off work and my parents had cleared their schedules to watch our kids.
(Side note: We had purchased travel insurance, since we were traveling in hurricane season. However, Bermuda needed to be under a hurricane watch or warning for our insurance to activate. This was challenging, since the hurricane was supposed to hit toward the end of our trip, and watches/warnings are generally only issued 24-48 hours before landfall. We had to make the decision to rebook our flight and accommodations before knowing we would receive a reimbursement for our Bermuda itinerary, which was unnerving, financially.)
With that decision made, John dove into research mode and began obsessively searching for a new destination: somewhere warm, a short and easy plane flight away, and not in a hurricane’s path. Though he considered many destinations, including domestic options, he quickly narrowed in on Mexico, and then Banyan Tree Mayakoba. I wish I could tell you all the details and what about it stuck out to him – it was not on our radar at all before this week – but he handled all of the research and most of the decision-making. I glanced at a few photos before giving it my thumbs up and hopping on the phone to book our room.
And then 24 hours later, we were there! We drove the two hours to Charlotte, then hopped on a 2.5-hour flight to Cancun. (Everything everyone says about flying sans-children being its own vacation is entirely true. Though we were still winding down from the stress and adrenaline of changing our plans and getting out the door, just sitting in the airport reading a magazine and not managing little people was incredibly relaxing!)
But of course, that was only our first taste of what was to come. After making our way through the bewildering gauntlet of taxi drivers at the airport door, we found the driver we’d booked through the resort and made the 40-minute drive to Mayakoba.
The view from the lobby in the main building. Cello is off to the left and breakfast was served to the right.
Once we stepped on property, we never stepped off until we headed back to the airport. We might have done things differently if we had had more time to plan, but we didn’t feel like we were missing anything by staying in place. Mayakoba is a beautiful and unique property. It’s a large natural preserve of mangrove forest set next to the ocean, with canal waterways crisscrossing the property. The rooms are spread out around the acreage, with some at the main building in the heart of the jungle and others near the ocean (our room was on the beach – an oceanfront veranda pool suite). Our room came with bikes to move around the expansive property and our rate included breakfast, too.
It also included fresh salsa, guacamole, and lime-y margaritas as we signed our check-in paperwork, which is a very direct route to my heart.
The margaritas may have made the cost go down easier, too. Because of course, this trip was a splurge – though one we had planned for, saved for, and felt incredibly grateful to experience. The view from our room alone was an embarrassment of riches.
The funny thing about our grand pivot was that in the end, we actually got a more luxurious vacation than we had originally planned: Bermuda is just a generally expensive locale, and we were already planning to splurge there. When we rerouted our budget to Mexico, a much less expensive location, it went further. We soaked up every minute. There are lots of things our money has to go to, but when John and I think about the money we get to spend, there are few things more worthy of celebrating than ten years of marriage to a best friend.
At top is the pool at the Sands Beach Club, close to our room. Below is the pool at the main building.
After exploring our room, we headed out to the beach. We swam in the ocean. We took a dip in our pool. We lounged by the resort pool. We rode bikes around the property. We had more chips and guacamole and margaritas.
It turned out it was totally fine that we hadn’t made any reservations or plans: we were perfectly happy to spend our days with no agenda, moving from one body of water to another.
We anchored our days with big breakfasts at the buffet in the main building and with dinner at one of the restaurants on-property. That buffet, man. We actually had the option each day of a plated breakfast at the beach restaurant near us or the buffet breakfast, and once we had the buffet we never sampled the plated breakfast, ha!
Walking to dinner the first night at the Sands Beach Club
For dinner, the concierge helped us make reservations for the first three nights when we arrived, and then we returned to our favorite on the fourth and final night. We had our choice of times and locations throughout our stay: we were lucky that we were traveling in something of the off-season (September – December and January are their busiest months), so nothing ever felt crowded. In fact, we were often the only couple at the resort pool. Most of the other guests were attending a luxury travel conference, and were in seminars or off-property during the day.
We tried almost all of the on-property restaurants throughout our stay. We had dinner the first night at the Sands Beach Club, a beachfront spot a short walk from our room, which specialized in seafood and local Yucatan flavors.
The second night we ate at Cello, an open-air Italian restaurant in the main property. Cello overlooked the canal that flowed through the main building, and it was so beautiful to watch the boat moving in and out lit by lanterns and candles.
This photo of Saffron is the only one that’s not mine – my photos just didn’t capture the magic!
Our third and fourth nights we ate at Saffron – it was so magical that we immediately knew we needed to return for our final dinner. Built on floating docks over the water, it was an experience.
The Thai food was delicious, yes, but everything from how we were greeted, to the service, to the setting, was just so special. Probably the most magical dining experience we’ve ever had.
This is as good a time as any to mention the service: it was phenomenal – from top to bottom – throughout our stay. The entire staff was so warm and kind, professional, quick to help with anything we needed and eager to make our stay wonderful, especially when they heard it was our anniversary.
One other element I need to mention that added to the magic: our favorite way to move around the resort was actually via the canals, in a boat that ferried us between the beach club and the main property via mangrove-draped canals. For free! We took the boat to and from dinner every evening and it was so lovely.
I mentioned that we didn’t go off-property, and that’s true, but we did have a few adventures on-property.
We rode our bikes on miles of path, we ducked down into a small cenote in the jungle (not one open for swimming), we tried to get close to the little racooon-like animals (coatis!) all over the property, we visited the village center shared with neighboring resorts, and we rented hydro bikes one afternoon for a guided tour through the canals. It was just the two of us and our guide, who told us all about his work as a free diver mapping the hundreds of Riviera Maya cenotes. The water was crystal clear and John was thrilled to see a crocodile.
In addition to these adventures, eating, and relaxing, we had one other priority: our marriage summit. As soon as we decided we were going on this trip, I knew I wanted to use some of our time away to reflect on the past ten years together, and vision cast and dream for the next ten. John and I have realized that our happiness in marriage is fueled in part by gratitude for what we have as well as our shared passion for looking forward with excitement and intention. I knew this was a chance to indulge in both that we could not pass up.
Our summit was nothing fancy, but it was a delight: the quality of the experience was directly related to the conversation and our desire to engage in it, not anything complicated we had planned. To prepare, I spent some time brainstorming a few questions before we left. I wrote each question at the top of a page in a thin notebook; we carried it with us around the resort.
We tackled 2-3 questions a day, while lounging by the pool or the beach or at a meal. Sometimes I’d sit and write while we talked, and sometimes I’d read the question and then we’d talk about it while we waded in the ocean or swam in the pool (and then I’d capture some of what we talked about on the page once we were dry). Some questions were fairly simple to answer, while others generated more than an hour of discussion.
An important note: these questions were designed to help us celebrate God’s goodness in our last ten years of marriage. We were not using this time to problem-solve or give constructive criticism or workshop an issue. Those things are important, and all have their place in our life together, but this was not it, ha. This was meant to be a joy.
I loosely grouped the questions into past, present, and future. Here are some of the questions we used:
THE PAST — What are some of our favorite adventures, trips, meals, and moments from the last 10 years? — Where have we seen God be gracious to us? — What are our keys to a happy marriage?
THE PRESENT — What are our family core values? Our mission statement?
THE FUTURE — What milestones will we mark in the next 10 years? — What adventures do we want to have in the next 10 years? — How do we want to be generous in the next 10 years? — What do we want to be part of our weekly, monthly, or annual rhythms?
The questions that ended up being our favorites to discuss were the keys to our happy marriage and the ways we want to be generous in our life together. I know everyone’s personalities and relationships are different, but I highly recommend trying something like this if you can create time away on a milestone anniversary. The questions themselves and the conversation they generated were wonderful, but just layering them into our days added such a unique and memorable element to our trip. I am so grateful.
And there you have it! A marvelous way to mark a truly marvelous decade of marriage. The decade itself would have been enough, but we are so grateful to have been able to mark it in this way. If you have any questions about our trip or summit or anything else, I’d be happy to help! Thank you, as always, for coming along for the ride!
For me, one of the delights of getting older is having the opportunity to model what a loving, generous, thoughtful grown-up life can look like to the kids and teens around me. Obviously, it must be said that I DO NOT do this perfectly, not even a little bit – but it is something I think about often. What messages am I sending to the younger people around me about what it means to be a grown-up? From looking at me, will they think it’s fun? A privilege? Something to look forward to? Or will they think it looks like a drag, something to be delayed as long as people?
And how about marriage? What will they think about marriage from watching and listening to me? Will they think it’s something that holds me back? That exasperates me? That erases me? Or will they sense it’s something that delights me, nourishes me, and challenges me to be the best version of myself?
In addition to my children, some of the people I am most aware of having the opportunity to influence are our babysitters. I think about it so much! At a time in their lives when, psychologically, they’re pulling away from their parents and looking more to their peers and social media, how interesting is it that they can come into our home environment – a somewhat neutral space – and (hopefully!) see the beauty and allure of something beyond high school or college life, or the shiny facade of social media. In the smallest of ways, I hope being welcomed into our lives expands their perspective of what matters in the big picture, and maybe gives them something to look forward to when school or their social life feels hard. (Or even when it feels like the opposite – like high school is the MOST FUN they’ll ever have in their life, and everything else will be downhill from there).
Or maybe they’ve literally never had these thoughts once, ha! But I suspect they have, because I remember having them when I was their age. In high school, I had teachers and other mentors who sparked my interest in grown-up life and inspired the direction I wanted to grow, and I am SO grateful for that.
All this as long-winded intro to sharing these “boxes of sunshine” that we sent to our two babysitters who started college this fall. June and I cruised the aisles of Target to select goodies for them; everything fit surprisingly neatly into fig bar boxes from Costco :) A little yellow tissue paper and curly ribbon brought everything together! Here’s what we included in our college care packages:
Scarecrow Crunch trail mix (one gal said this was her favorite item in the box and it really does look delicious)
And a note from me, a letter from June, and a drawing from Shep. Of course, it must be said you could literally put any one of these items and a heartfelt note in a mailer and ship it off to an 18-year-old and it would bring a smile to their face, but we had fun putting these together.
I would love to hear if you ever think about the messages you’re sending to the younger ones around you! If you do, what’s the message you hope you convey?
