Posts Tagged ‘mark gungor’

In my Laugh Your Way to a Better Marriage seminar I explain in detail how a man’s brain tends to compartmentalize things. It’s like men have separate boxes in their heads for everything: money, sex, kids, wife, in-laws, etc. And for a guy these boxes don’t touch. He thinks about one thing at a time and then moves on to the next thing since one box isn’t connected to another.

Then I go on to explain how a woman’s brain is like a big ball of wire where everything is connected to everything and there is no compartmentalizing at all. Money can be connected to the in-laws and sex can be connected to the kids. Things can run together very easily in a woman’s brain.
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In the last post I was talking about handling arguments and the benefit and wisdom of backing off and taking a time out during a super heated battle. When a couple is seriously locked in a battle and the adrenaline is surging, odds are they are not going to solve the problem and usually one or both will say mean and hurtful things that they will come to regret later. And as I said, these words can be very damaging.

My experience has been that many women will take one phrase that their husbands have said in the heat of the battle and rehearse it, hold on to it, and become convinced that “it’s how he really feels deep down inside or else he wouldn’t have said it.” I’ve had women over and over say to me, “He said such and such…” and she is so hurt and upset over it that in some cases it actually leads to divorce.
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Recently I came across an article in a woman’s magazine that listed “new rules” for marriage and it debunked what are common “myths” of marital relationships. One of the myths was: Never go to bed angry. If you don’t hash through every conflict right away, it’ll lead to resentment and blowups. For years most of us have heard the saying, “Never go to bed angry”. It actually comes from the scripture in Ephesians 4 where Paul writes: …do not let the sun go down while you are still angry… (NIV). Often people will interpret that to mean they can not go to bed until they have settled every last detail of the argument. Couples will stay up till the wee hours of the morning hammering at the issues—and each other—trying to get to a resolution. I’m sure the verse does not literally mean don’t go to sleep until you’ve completely solved the problem in a way that is totally acceptable to both of you. What it does mean is that you need to let go of the anger, even if the problem is not solved.
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A recent survey showed that teens who take abstinence pledges are just as likely to have sex and are less likely to take precautions against pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Many in the faith community are disheartened by such study results, but I can see how this happens. And it’s not a problem with the kids; it’s a problem of parenting. Parents assume because the church is has kids make abstinence pledges and wear promise rings, they don’t have to do anything. Parents are not taking their responsibility to parent and raise these kids; they get them to take the pledge and then take their hands off. They allow these young men and young women to spend inordinate amounts of time together alone and think that a purity ring on their finger is going to be the magic force field of protection. Listen, for teenagers to have sex, they have to have the opportunity to have sex and poor parenting is giving them the opportunities.
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“A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself from within.” – Ariel Durant

There has been quite the uproar over Sarah Palin’s seventeen year old daughter who is pregnant and plans to marry the father. Many have decried this potential marriage as a terrible idea since the couple is “too young”. But it wasn’t long ago that such a marriage would not have been thought of as unusual.

“The traditional markers of manhood — leaving home, getting an education, starting a family and starting work — have moved downfield as the passage from adolescence to adulthood has evolved,” says Michael Kimmel, author of Guyland. For instance, in 1960, almost 70 percent of men had reached these milestones by the age of 30; today, less than a third of males can say the same.
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