Contemplating why sometimes your marriage seems stuck in a rut? Ever wondered how much of it might be due to your thought patterns and assumptions? Brace yourself for an eye-opening journey into the world of cognitive distortions and their impact on our relationships. We embark on a deep exploration of thought patterns such as black and white thinking, overgeneralization, and all or nothing thinking, which can often lead to unnecessary conflicts. We're pulling back the curtain on these distortions and offering practical tips on how to challenge and alter them.

When it comes to conflict resolution, are we magnifying disagreements due to misguided assumptions and conclusions? We're decoding how incorrect interpretations, triggered by these cognitive distortions, can cause ripples in our relationships. Here's a simple truth - questioning your assumptions and countering negative thinking with evidence and diverse perspectives can help diffuse tension. Furthermore, we delve into the importance of emotional management and the strategy of taking a timeout to avoid escalating heated discussions.

Join us for a stimulating discussion on emotional self-awareness. It's not enough to just challenge cognitive distortions, we must also enhance our self-awareness. Acknowledging our thoughts and emotions and actively working towards improving our self-awareness can be a game-changer in relationships. As we conclude this insightful episode, you'll walk away with practical tips and insights that will help you improve your relationships and overall life satisfaction. So, are you ready to challenge your stinkin' thinkin'? Because we sure are!

Thanks so much for your support of the Love Lessons Podcast. Find us on YouTube for in-depth, exclusive, and behind-the-scenes content.

Episode Transcript:

Blaire: 0:00

Does it ever feel like you're stuck in the same cycle of fighting with your better half? It's like you're having the same argument over and, over and over again and you can't get out of it. Well, coming up on today's show, we're going to discuss how you're thinking might actually be part of the problem. Plus, we're learning how to challenge those thoughts in a healthy way. It's all coming up right now on Love Lessons.

Announcer: 0:28

Real Life, real Talk, real Relationships, faith-based Tips, trips and Challenges to Improve your Marriage and Change your Life. It's the Love Lessons Podcast with your hosts, christian counselors and marriage experts Dr Zakk and Blaire Gammon.

Blaire: 0:53

Welcome to episode number two, called "Bad Thinks”

Zakk: 0:58

Bad Thinks. Do you ever have bad thinks?

Blaire: 1:01

I think we need to explain to the people what bad thinks are.

Zakk: 1:05

So I love this. So when our middle child, Haven, was little and she couldn't go to sleep, I don't know that it was quite nightmares, but it was like she was scared of something, scared of the dark or whatever, and she'd come out crying and she'd be like I have bad thinks, I can't go to sleep, and it was the most pitiful thing that you've ever seen.

Blaire: 1:24

My brain is thinking bad thinks and I can't go to sleep. It was sweet and precious all at the same time and sad, and we'd say, well, just stop. And she's like I can't stop. I tried not to have bad thinks.

Zakk: 1:37

So it really was.

Blaire: 1:38

We didn't know what to do at the time.

Zakk: 1:40

But it's really helpful now because I realize that Haven's not the only person who has bad thinks.

Blaire: 1:46

Exactly so. We have bad thinks about a lot of things in our lives, but specifically those bad thinks can contribute to challenges in our relationships.

Zakk: 1:55

Yeah. So on today's show we're going to be talking about stinking thinking, how your thoughts and those patterns can really cause some problems when it comes to conflict in your relationship. We're also going to talk about how sometimes we just need to be mad for a little while and that's okay. It is time for my favorite part of the show the end. No, not the end. It's time for fun facts. Okay, everybody loves fun facts. So it turns out a good marriage makes people more satisfied in life. Okay, so you might hear that and think well, duh, Zakk, but here's why I say this. So, according to a study from Wake Forest University, marriage does more to promote life satisfaction than money, sex or even children. So in other words, it doesn't matter what job you have, it doesn't matter what the kids are doing, it doesn't matter all the stuff that you acquire or any of that stuff. If you want to truly be satisfied in your life, then a good marriage is key to that, assuming that you're married. If God's called you to singleness, then of course. But if you are married and the marriage is good, then you will find the most highest level of satisfaction.

Blaire: 3:08

If you are questioning that fun fact now, then I would say think about the word that it used there good marriage. So if you were questioning that thought, then I would say you need to probably put some questioning into if your marriage is a good marriage or not, because you might not be living out of that fruit right now.

Zakk: 3:24

Right, and I would even argue that a happy marriage has gotten necessarily a good marriage. Oh, absolutely, because if you're sweeping stuff under the rug or you're pretending like it's not an issue, then I wouldn't call that a good marriage, I'd call that a fake marriage.

Blaire: 3:38

Just getting through it. You're gonna trip over all the stuff you slipped into that rug at some point. That's good, mm-hmm, that's good. So our first few episodes of love lessons. It's really important to us to kind of go after the low-hanging fruit, if you will. Yeah, there are a lot of things that we could and we'll talk about, but we really wanted to focus the first few episodes on what are those things that we can address In just a few weeks that people can go ahead and put into play, that they're gonna see some hopefully pretty immediate results in. They don't have to be listening to a podcast for, you know, months and months before they're finally able to learn something and do something with that information.

Zakk: 4:15

Yeah, exactly, there are so many small things that even in marriage counseling with folks that we do, that we implement really quickly, that they can see those results pretty quick.

Blaire: 4:23

Yeah. So today's concept in our episode titled of bad thinks, if you will is really looking at our thinking process, our stinking thinking. Everyone has thoughts, because you do things out of your thoughts, you have emotions and behaviors, etc. And so what happens when your thoughts are unhealthy? What happens when your thoughts are irrational? How does that impact your relationships and your own mental health? So something that we see in marriage counseling is that when couples have conflict, their thinking patterns will get in the way of Resolving that conflict and can actually contribute to making the conflict a lot bigger than it has to be. I can't tell you how many times couples will come in with having a conflict, having a disagreement, and I'll ask details about the conflict and they can actually get back and tell me what they were actually disagreeing on. It's more so about how they are disagreeing that they're now upset. I don't like that. You looked at me the way, this way or that way, or you know, insert whatever it is here, and so we want to try to work through resolving that. But we want to look at what thinking patterns these are Some, some examples of these and try to address what those are with people.

Zakk: 5:33

Yeah, because once you learn what you're doing and you recognize it, then it's a whole lot easier to put a stop to this Right Absolutely.

Blaire: 5:39

What step one is acknowledging. That's right. So the first cognitive distortion, the first statement thinking bad things, if you will is what we call all or nothing thinking or overgeneralization. So this is the you never take out the trash. So the first cognitive distortion is what we call all or nothing thinking or overgeneralization. So an example would be you never take out the trash you always yell at me. So what you can see here is we've used words like always, never or every. It over generalizes and takes every single situation, time that's occurred, and lumped it into you know All or nothing, and the reality is it's usually somewhere in the middle, right. And so, okay, maybe he didn't take out the trash the last three of the seven nights, but the other four he did. Okay, well then, in reality he didn't do it the last couple nights that you wanted him to, and so maybe you need to change your thinking process in that way.

Zakk: 6:44

Yeah, and the reason that you change that thinking process and the reason that you recognize what you're saying is if you are in Disagreement with your spouse and you come to them and you say you never do what I want you to do, how's that gonna go? Are they gonna say you're right, I never do that? They're immediately gonna jump to the defense. Absolutely, you never take out the trash. Yes, I did. I took it out three times last week. Okay, the argument's on about how many times the trash gets taken out. You're mad because it wasn't taken out, right, so let's call it that and Actually, is it about the trash?

Blaire: 7:16

sometimes it's usually that underlying it's about the fact that you feel like they didn't care about you, or the disrespect or the Expectation that it should fall on you and your disagreement about gender stereotypes and roles, and like it's usually much bigger than the trash yeah, getting taken out.

Zakk: 7:32

I'm so overwhelmed with everything that's on my plate and the least that you could do is take out the trash, and you did that's what didn't see me?

Blaire: 7:38

You did not care, right, yeah, but we don't think right in our bad things to go that deep, we actually will go surface level, and then we'll start jumping into some of that all or nothing thinking or over generalization. So another one that's really kind of on the same trend as this one is that black and white thinking yes, so it is this way or that way. There is no gray, there's no in between here and this one. I see a lot of times with couples, especially when they want to be right, when they're Disagreeing because they want to win the argument and not necessarily to end the conflict, to resolve it. An example that I use is if you could be on vacation in Paris and you could be on the observation deck of the Eiffel Tower, both of you are there same place. One of you is looking out of Binoculars that look on one side of the city and the other is looking out binoculars that look on the other side of the city. You are looking from the same place, but you have a different view. Your interpretation of what you're seeing is different because you're looking at things differently. Your lens is different, if you will, and so when we are disagreeing with someone about their interpretation. We are saying your truth essentially, or what you're seeing is wrong, but we don't know that because that's their interpretation. Ours may be different, but we have to leave room. We have to leave some gray in that black and white to know, okay, while I may see it this way, there could be other facts and other things at play that made my spouse interpret things to be different than what I'm looking at it as.

Zakk: 9:09

And it is so easy to get lost in the weeds and those disagreements. Right, absolutely it. There are so many things that it doesn't matter if there are standards that we have to make for things that are right and wrong, but there are so many times that what we view as right and wrong is our opinion. Oh yeah, absolutely. The truth of where right and wrong is is found in scripture. Right, god says what is right and what is wrong. Scripture does not talk about what color curtains that you have. Right, scripture does not talk about a decision that you have to make regarding Purchasing a new vehicle or figuring out where you're going to go eat tonight. Those are matters of opinion. Sometimes your spouse is gonna have a different opinion for you, and that's okay. They should, because if you both agree about everything, then you've got a yes man and that's boring.

Blaire: 9:56

Absolutely yeah. You don't have anybody to hold you accountable when you're wrong, and that's one of the things that we happen. Marriage is we have someone who can love us, but also to point us into truth, and so what scripture does tell us, though, is that we're supposed to honor, love and cherish, and we don't do that a lot of times when we have disagreements, especially when we use black and white thinking. Another one of them is catastrophizing, so this is thinking that the worst possible outcome is going to be what happens. So, you know, we get into this disagreement, and the worst possible outcome is that you leave. So then I'm going to think you're leaving, so I'm going to disagree and or argue from the stance that you're just going to leave me anyway. So why does it matter?

Zakk: 10:40

Well, I did that right early on in our marriage. If we would get into a fight then I would have this just melt down that you were going to leave and it was going to be over, and it would be. We would fight over the dumbest things, that I was convinced that this was it and we were gone.

Blaire: 10:57

And so that thinking got the fight and disagreement to be so much bigger because it could have been resolved. But there were a lot of emotions and behaviors that came out of that negative thinking that caused, you know, this big argument that we had to later try to come back and resolve and create these emotional repairs for was really challenging, and so it's a lot of pressure on the relationship, so catastrophizing, worst possible scenario. I know you're going to cheat on me because that's just how you are, that's just who you are. Well, maybe this person really has been redeemed and by the blood of Jesus, and is trying to not do that, is working towards other things, and you're holding these things over their head because you've not healed. And so your your worst case scenario. This is I'm going to make a catastrophe out of nothing, mountain out of a molehill, if you will.

Zakk: 11:45

And it goes back into that all or nothing thinking right.

Blaire: 11:47

Absolutely, they all are on the same vein. One of my favorites the should statements.

Zakk: 11:52

Please be careful, do not should all over yourself. It's my favorite things to say to clients.

Blaire: 11:58

I know, and it always gets like a reaction, especially at Christian counseling, like what?

Zakk: 12:06

did you say? I didn't say you have the clap. I said don't, should all over.

Blaire: 12:14

So I think you did it. I did so. Give me some should statement examples.

Zakk: 12:19

I should be a better wife, because my husband needs me to this, this and this, and I'm just a failure. She should be more aware of what it is that I need. He should just know that I want him to do this. It just gets why. Why should they?

Blaire: 12:40

Right, are they a mind reader?

Zakk: 12:41

Right.

Blaire: 12:42

Because that's also a cognitive distortion is migrating. They expect that they should, should know right what I need. And if they're not doing what I need, then it's because they don't love me, care about me, want to put the time and effort in. Well, we're. In reality, they never had any idea. I have an example of that. I'll tell people indirect behavior not telling people what you want, not telling your spouse what you want, expecting them to read your mind and I say this to somebody who has indirect behavior and I think I've gotten better at it over the years but early on in our relationship I would not tell Zach what was wrong. If I, if it could have been that, you know, it was just in a mood, versus, there was some big thing, but I wouldn't communicate it. I would make him chase me and ask me, and in my head it was he should just know, he should just know. And that's wrong, you should not know. Now there are times that we have told our spouse things and they should remember, but we're expecting them to be perfect in their thinking and not leave any room for the fact that they might be having a rough day and or having committed what our truth is to their memory.

Zakk: 13:47

And you know if you are upset with someone and your reasoning for being upset with them is you should just Know.

Blaire: 13:55

then stop it right there.

Zakk: 13:57

Yeah, you've already. Yeah, it's already doomed to fail. Yeah, because they're not going to just know. There are. When you've been married for a long time, you learn certain things about your spouse and you learn certain patterns. If I've had a rough day at work and I come home and you see me, you can tell I've had a rough day. Yeah, you know that right. If you're upset because you just realized that three days ago I said something to you that you didn't like and I'm walking in the door after I get home and Europe's I'm not going to know that, how am I supposed to know?

Blaire: 14:25

Right, yeah, so indirect behavior, not saying what it is that you're thinking or feeling and expecting someone to read your mind. So my example of this is if you decide that you want to go to the movies, there's a movie playing you want to see and you want your spouse to take you to the movies. So if I said I want to go see a movie, but I don't want to ask Zach to take me to the movie, for whatever reason, I want him to just know to take me, I might do things that are indirect in behavior to try to throw out some breadcrumbs, if you will, so that you'll kind of pick those up and it'll lead you to where you need to go. So, for example, I might say you know, Zakk, I really like the popcorn at the movies. You know the new seats at the movie theater, they're so comfortable. Or the sound in the new movie theater is so nice, it's really nice for watching. What are you understanding If I say a couple of those things over and over? You're understanding that I want to go to the movies. I'm just not asking to go to the movies. Yeah, I'm waiting for you to read my mind, to pick up those breadcrumbs and say hey Blaire, do you want to go to the movies? Well, that's not fair to you to have to take on the responsibility of knowing and reading my mind. And if I do that and you pick those breadcrumbs up and you ask me, all you're doing is reinforcing my negative behaviors.

Zakk: 15:37

Yes, Brene Brown said something one time on a podcast that I thought was really profound. She said the first thing that I tell couples is to take what the other person says at face value.

Blaire: 15:47

Yeah.

Zakk: 15:48

If you go home and the other person seems upset and you ask them what's wrong, they say I'm fine. Okay, you're fine. Now there's a level of codependency there that you have to work through. Sure, but you're fine, and you take them at that word. If they continue to stop around the kitchen and slam dishes, you might address it a second time and say Listen, I know that you said you were fine and your behavior says that you wasn't. So if you decide you want to talk to me about that, then I'm happy to talk about it, but you leave it at that. Don't reinforce that bad behavior.

Announcer: 16:19

This episode of the Love Lessons podcast is brought to you by Revive Counseling Center. Revive provides faith-based counseling services to help people find spiritual, emotional and physical wellness, with multiple in-person locations, as well as convenient online counseling options. Revive Counseling Center has helped countless marriages and individuals find help and healing, allowing people to create fulfilling and thriving relationships, reviving hope and restoring lives. Learn more at ReviveCounseling.org.

Blaire: 16:51

So another one is emotional reasoning, and so this is assuming that emotions reflect how things are. So I feel like my husband is a bad husband. Therefore he is a bad husband. It also goes into that overgeneralizing. So I'm feeling this way and so that must be the truth. Well, in reality, I'm feeling this way because of this one disagreement, and so is my husband a bad person or a bad husband? Or am I feeling that way? A because of my emotions? My thoughts have led to these emotions because of this one conflict. Am I making that transcend all of our relationship above this one particular conflict?

Zakk: 17:31

It's this lie that we have believed that feelings are facts.

Blaire: 17:34

Absolutely.

Zakk: 17:35

And what I really encourage people to do is that if you feel like your husband doesn't love you, what you're doing is that you're putting the responsibility for that emotion on your husband. I feel like my wife doesn't respect me. You are putting that responsibility on her, mm-hmm. If you go to your husband and say I feel like you don't love me, or if you go to your wife and say I feel like you don't respect me Just like we talked about earlier the other person nine times out of ten they're not gonna say why do you feel like that? They're gonna say no, that's not true. I do love you, I do this, this and this, or I do respect you because of this, this and this, and they're immediately gonna jump to the Defense. And so you believing that lie is just conveying to the other person that they automatically have to be defensive toward you when you feel that way and how many times while our defenses are up, are we actually going?

Blaire: 18:23

You know what you're right. So when they're defensive saying, no, here's a, b and C why I do love you, most people are not gonna receive that. Emotions are too High. We're gonna start arguing. Here's all all the reasons I think you don't. And so then we're. We're arguing over this thing.

Zakk: 18:36

That really doesn't have to be a thing, because we've not actually evaluated why we believe what we believe and a lot of couples will Get into that argument and they'll get into this tit for tat or this piss and match with each other when they start listing off all the things they do and they'll start listing facts and at that point you're not. You're still not arguing facts. You're arguing from an emotional place by throwing facts into it. Yeah, and it's ever helpful.

Blaire: 18:58

Do you think they maybe need to utilize the distance or pursuer tool and take a break and come back to it when they hold off exactly.

Zakk: 19:07

So if you've missed episode one, go back and listen. Go back and listen.

Blaire: 19:10

So the last one I really want to talk about, which we already talked about it's really encompasses a lot of these is jumping to conclusions. Yes so what's your favorite thing to say here?

Zakk: 19:19

I love. I love to call people out in marriage counseling, yeah, and they'll start listing off these things and they'll explain how their job into a conclusion and I'll say, wow, do you stretch before you make that really high job? Yep, and it it stops people in their truck. It's great for me because I love to see the reaction on their face, but it's for them. It really forces them to stop and think what, what am I doing here? Am I placing and An expectation good or bad on the other person that they are going to do something, just because it's happened before?

Blaire: 19:53

and we've all done it. We can all think back, whether it's in our relationships with our spouse or with friends or family, or whatever. It is Times that we've jumped to conclusion and been wrong, and so we can use that experience as our teacher, that maybe, maybe we're jumping to a conclusion in this situation. And that actually ties into how you combat some of these, these negative thinking. Some of this thinking, thinking what we call it is socratic questioning. It's putting these thoughts on trial. So, if you think of law and order, you know SVU or any of those other shows Thank you do, wolf. Anyway, if you think to any of those, you can, you know, imagine yourself in a courtroom and there's a witness on the witness stand and there's the judge and the jury and the defense and the prosecution and and all of these things, and and imagine that your thought is what is sitting in the witness stand and you are the either Prosecutor of defense and you're questioning this thought. What you're trying to do is figure out of what it's saying is true, if it's really valid, and so you're going to put your thoughts on trial and so some of the questions that you're gonna ask this thought to try to figure out if it's really true or not is. The first one is what evidence is there for or against my thoughts? So I'm thinking that my husband doesn't love me. What evidence do I have to support that and what evidence do I have against that? Is it true? Another one is am I basing this thought on facts or feelings, kind of like you touched on earlier? Our Feelings are not facts. Those are our feelings. We want to validate that they exist, but that does not mean that they are facts. Is the thought black and white when in reality it's a lot more complicated than that? Am I using black and white thinking, thinking that it's either a or b? Do I need to open up my thinking and my understanding a little bit to understand that there could be a Little more at play here? Could I be misinterpreting the evidence? That's another good one. Am I misinterpreting what is actually at play?

Zakk: 21:52

You're always going to look at something through your own lens if you don't force yourself to look at it from a different perspective.

Blaire: 21:58

Absolutely so. This is causing and forcing you to do that, to look at it through that different lens. Am I making assumptions, am I jumping to conclusions? And what other people have a different interpretation of the same situation? That's a good one. Other people have the same interpretation of the situation.

Zakk: 22:18

Let me just say there, though Don't go ask your mama, no, don't go ask your sister, don't go ask your best friend what they think about your situation. They are always going to be biased and they're always going to take your side. Even most of the time they're gonna take your. That was all or nothing thinking. Did you hear that? Well, dad, they're not yourself, likely most of the time, going to take your side and only see your perspective and Automatically place blame on the other person. That's not fair, because you're still not. You're still getting biased information right, even if it's not coming from yourself absolutely. And guess what you get over? This disagreement with your spouse and mama's still gonna be a mad Idol oh, absolutely.

Blaire: 22:54

And then you're gonna have to defend this person to To your mama, yeah, and then you're really stuck in between a rock and a hard place there. So, yeah, am I looking at all of the evidence or am I looking at just what supports my thought? Yeah. I'm going to ignore all of the other truth, truth two through ten, because Truth one what I feel is the truth at least supports my way of thinking.

Zakk: 23:22

How easy is it to dismiss everything that tells you that you might be the one who's wrong, just so that you can yeah, could my thought be an exaggeration of the truth? Neve.

Blaire: 23:35

Am I being dramatic?

Zakk: 23:37

Not me.

Blaire: 23:38

We know nothing about this in our house. Nothing about it at all.

Zakk: 23:42

Everything is theatrical in our house.

Blaire: 23:43

Absolutely it is, and so we have to both of us have to do this. Am I being dramatic? Am I exaggerating what's going on? Am I making a mountain out of a molehill? Essentially, Am I having this thought out of a habit or do facts support it? Is it habitual thinking? Have I grown accustomed to this thought, allowing it to hang out, and has it taken root, and is that why it keeps popping up? Did someone pass this thought or belief to me? Are they a reliable source? So if my dad abandoned me and my childhood and or told me he doesn't love me, then that will leave an imprint, can leave an imprint, and you become an adult, and then you get married and then you have conflict with your husband, and so the thought in your head might be he doesn't love me, he's just going to leave me, and this thought has been passed on by this history that you have this lived experience. But it's not true, and so you're going to disagree and or have conflict from a place of this thought, and it's actually fallacy.

Zakk: 24:50

I mean think back to when we first got married. Before we got married, you've told me that you had this assumption that we probably wouldn't end up making it, because people always get divorced. This was before healing, of course, that we would just, we would end up divorced just like everybody else, because everybody always ends up divorced.

Blaire: 25:10

Well, at that point I already had a failed engagement as well. So, and my grandparents were married for many years, but they were the only married couple that I'd really seen. That had made it very long, and so in my head, you were together until you weren't happy anymore and then you got divorced and that was just a fact of life, and so that fell out of love. You've, until you fell out of love it's all real thing to lie.

Zakk: 25:34

Anyway, and so yeah, that thinking process impacted how I disagreed and how committed I was which then reinforced my poor behavior of catastrophizing, thinking that you were going to leave because there was a real possibility Probably would have.

Blaire: 25:51

Yeah, absolutely yeah. So someone passing those thoughts, this is a big one, because there are things that are imprinted on us that we don't even realize, belief systems that are holding all of these things that we don't even realize in our lives. That that's where it stems from.

Zakk: 26:09

Yeah, let me say this too, because we've picked on women and used a lot of examples about women saying what men do. But men, let me say this too If you automatically think that anytime that your wife gets upset about something, that here she goes again, she's just a woman who's going to nag and run her mouth, you might have a problem with women, and so you really need to do some soul searching. Did mom always nag on dad and dad would just shut down and not say anything? Did dad call mom, or raging you know what, when she wasn't around, because he didn't like the way that she behaved? What is our reasoning for thinking it's really easy for us to say well, women are the ones who say you should just know, or women are the ones who automatically jump to a conclusion because they're so overdramatic. Men have just as much responsibility in this too.

Blaire: 26:59

Absolutely Men. While women get the right for being overdramatic, men get it for shutting down and not engaging and in reality, both should be coming to the table to try to work through the conflict.

Zakk: 27:09

The focus groups tell us that it will be 95% women who listen to this show, and I really encourage you to share this with your spouse as well, your husband as well.

Blaire: 27:17

Absolutely. And then the last one that I want to touch on is is my thought the worst case scenario Is am I catastrophizing? Challenge your thinking. Is this the worst case scenario? She's going to leave. Here's where we are. She's going to leave me. You know, if you had been questioning those thoughts years ago, then you might have seen if she left. No, no, bags are packed. We have had this argument before and she didn't leave. So history is telling me she's probably not going to again. We're working through conflict, you know any of those things. So how can I do some self-talk with all of these thoughts to kind of tie it back together? You know, we've touched on it a little bit. But our thoughts, we're going to have them, whether they're rational or irrational. We cannot control the fact that we have thoughts. So everyone has thoughts and thoughts are not bad things. Positive and negative thoughts, they're even neutral thoughts like I need to load the dishwasher or I need to, you know, make the bed, whatever it might be. But thoughts are not a bad thing. We have rational thoughts and we have irrational thoughts. We cannot control that. We have thoughts, that thoughts pop into our brain, but what we can control is if we allow that thought to take root and to create emotions and behaviors with us.

Zakk: 28:32

So there's this analogy that I like to use. That's pretty simple, but I think it's pretty profound you can't stop a bird from flying over your house, right?

Blaire: 28:40

Yeah.

Zakk: 28:41

They're going to fly over, whether you're life it or not, but you can keep them from building a nest.

Blaire: 28:45

Yeah, yeah.

Zakk: 28:47

You can't stop those thoughts from happening, but you can challenge them when they come up. You do not have to live by them. You should be living by the truth. And so how do I compare my thought that I'm thinking to what the truth actually is?

Blaire: 29:02

Yeah.

Zakk: 29:03

I think it's really important to let pastors at come out for a second. You know, if you're having trouble in this area, that's one of the gifts and one of the beauties of the Holy Spirit dwelling within us is that we can rely on him to help us right. There are reasons that we have fruits of the spirit, including gentleness and patience at self-control, right, and so if you are struggling in this area and you're having trouble with bad things, if you will ask God to help you in this area, lord, help me to see my spouse the way that you see them. Help me to understand if what I'm feeling lines up with the truth of your work. There are so many unnecessary arguments that happen because we have set the Holy Spirit aside and we let our own negative thinking and these negative thought cycles to take over and we just run with this idea that we have to prove the other person wrong. Who do you think you are? One of our favorite things to do when we get in front of a group of people, or perhaps on a podcast, is to tell on other people airing dirty laundry, if you will. Oh no do you know what story I'm?

Blaire: 30:15

doing. I have a couple in mind, I'm not sure.

Zakk: 30:19

There was a time early on in our marriage when my wife almost let me die.

Blaire: 30:26

This wasn't even the ones I thought you were gonna tell okay, go ahead with it this is the one that scarred me the most.

Zakk: 30:33

So many, many minutes ago I worked in television news and In bowling green, kentucky, where we lived, there was a march of dimes benefit dinner, and so the station that I worked at we were, they were a sponsor of ours and we sponsored stuff with them, and so we got tickets to this benefit dinner, and so what's really nice about it is that all of these Really nice, fancy restaurants from all over town come in and they basically cater this free buffet right.

Blaire: 31:06

Yeah, even the colleges, their culinary school, had buffets there.

Zakk: 31:08

Yeah, so it's not like mom and papa's buffet, it's like really nice. You know cuisine. Yes, that that's available. And so what was really nice about this was two things. Number one we were broke. We didn't have any like McDonald's was a luxury for us, right?

Blaire: 31:23

Yes, it was and number two, I think her bank account was overdrawn the night we went, probably said number two Mama was pregnant, but mama wasn't just pregnant, mama was like 74 months pregnant. Yeah, I think I was like seven months pregnant.

Zakk: 31:38

Oh, I think it was later than that.

Blaire: 31:39

This was like December was okay, seven or eight months yeah.

Zakk: 31:42

So I mean you were like a handful of weeks away. I was waddling right, yeah, so you were a stay-at-home mom at the time with our, at that point, two year old, and you didn't get out of the house much. I was working two jobs, I was going here, there and everywhere. I'd, you know, give you a kiss goodbye in the morning before I left, and then I'd see you at night at 11 pm, and so we had this opportunity to dress up and go to this really nice dinner. Yep, right, it was really exciting. We Walk in and it is like pregnant girls dream all this not I still have dreams about that sometimes. Do you? You and you're pretty sparkly dressed there are still sparkles that I find to this day from that dress and you walk in and you're nice dress and you're finally able to wear makeup and stuff and go somewhere and there's all this food in its head, right, I'm glad. So we go through the buffet line, we go to get our food and we sit down, and so it's already awkward because we're having to sit. We're eating at a table with three other people one of the people I worked with, and then she brought two family members with her. I don't know this woman very well, so we're like trying to make small talk, talk about the weather. I don't know, it's awkward.

Blaire: 32:46

So we're eating and I was eating, mom was eating, okay, yeah.

Zakk: 32:53

I don't know that I was quite eating, no, but so I got some shrimp from the buffet line. I've never been a huge seafood fan, but I had eaten some shrimp over the course of my life. And and listen, we were poor. I wouldn't use to eat and shrimp I was used to eating the McChicken. Okay, and so grab some shrimp, the other food of the sea, that's it.

Blaire: 33:14

That's it.

Zakk: 33:15

So I get, I take a bite of the shrimp and as soon as I do, I immediately recognize something's wrong and I spit it back out. Thankfully, don't swallow it, but as I sit there, the longer I sit, I can tell that my tongue started to swell up and my throat starting to swell and Like something's not right here. And so, despite the fact that I'm dramatic 95% of the time because I didn't know these people we were sitting at the table with, very well, trying not to be uncouth. I was trying not to be uncouthed. It's really nice event where all the rich people in Bowling Green were yeah and so I Lean over and whisper in my dear, sweet wife's ear I think I'm having an allergic reaction to this shrimp and my wife, the love of my life.

Blaire: 34:00

Your moon and your stars.

Zakk: 34:01

I'm there with my stars calmly puts her fork down, stops chewing, leans over and whispers in my ear what did you say?

Blaire: 34:13

If you ruin this for me, I will kill you. And then I've picked my fork back up and I kept eating my red velvet cake.

Zakk: 34:28

I'm on the verge of anaphylactic shock and mom is concerned about her cake. Now, thankfully, you drink some water. I went to the bathroom and chugged water out of the bathroom sink. Talk about being uncouth. Yeah, I just realized.

Blaire: 34:48

And you are gone for a while. Do you remember I was like where did go? I just went and got some more.

Zakk: 34:56

And so I survived. Obviously, here I am, thankfully, because I didn't swallow it. I think that was probably, you know, for the best, and it turns out that after that I was allergic to shellfish before I'd never been, so it was a fun learning experience, but I would have appreciated some support in that moment.

Blaire: 35:10

You know, I think that was probably the persecution that Jesus was talking about with experience.

Zakk: 35:15

Yeah, okay, but I literally could have died.

Blaire: 35:19

No, no, it wasn't that we were not that far from a hospital. They actually had EMTs there. You didn't swallow it like you were fine that ounce of concern would have been beneficial.

Zakk: 35:31

I feel gaslit. It's time now for love notes.

Blaire: 35:34

Love notes is a part of our show where we give you a small tidbit of information or a call to action that you can put in play. And you're like this week. This week's love note is that we want you to work on yourself awareness related to your emotions. Now, our emotions can cause blind spots in our lives, and so if we're not aware of the emotions we're having, we're probably also not aware of the impact it's having in our relationships. And so, this week, how can you become more self-aware of your thoughts and your emotions? And so some tips to do that. The first meditate, pray, ask God to reveal to you what thoughts you're having and what emotions that you're having, and what emotions that is bringing out. The second is to journal. How are you able to get your thoughts from your mind onto a paper and what impact is that having? Discuss with somebody you trust now, not your mom or your dad, but maybe someone at your church or your pastor, someone who can give you sound counsel and advice that's not going to be biased, and when they tell you about how you're feeling. And the last thing is to put effort into your thinking about your emotions and your thoughts. Don't just have the thought and allow it to have an emotion that dictates your behaviors. Actually think about the thoughts you're having and the emotions that are related to those, and put those thoughts on trial. What are you doing?

Zakk: 37:00

Oh, I was making notes from love notes. Okay, hold on. Can you repeat all of that? No, you can go back and watch. Oh, because this is a podcast.

Blaire: 37:12

It's a podcast.

Zakk: 37:14

The last thing and you can start it. Can I pause you Absolutely.

Blaire: 37:19

On the podcast, but not in real life.

Zakk: 37:21

Oh, dang it alright. Well then, I guess there's no point writing this down. Thank you, guys. So much for tuning in to episode 2 of the Love Lessons podcast. Don't forget to follow us on social media and visit us at lovelessons.fm. We'll see you next time.