Are you living your best life? Stop playing house and build a forever home.

Foundation: mutual respect

Plumbing: communication

Electrical: spirituality

Walls: family, friends and accountability

Fireplace/furnace: love, affection and passion

Roof: trust

Imagine a quiet evening at home. You’ve eaten dinner and gotten comfortably settled on the couch in your softest loungewear with a nice after dinner coffee or tea. 

Sounds nice doesn’t it? Think about your life. If this was an evening in the life of you. What are your surroundings like? Is there peace in your home? Do you feel loved and appreciated by your spouse? Do your children respect you and listen to your direction? What is the flow like? Is there order in your home? 

No one has a perfect life. But your home should be the highlight of your best life. It may not be quiet by any means. It may be vibrant and exciting and boisterous; the halls may be bustling with activity; cooking in the kitchen, laundry in the back room, football game in the family room, video games in the basement, FaceTime calls from the bedroom. Whatever home sounds like it should feel peaceful. The peace in knowing that the core areas of your household are in good shape. They are being maintained appropriately. Solid foundation, plumbing is flowing free and clear of obstruction. Electrical is up to code with no shorts or frayed wiring. Walls are solid and positioned in the perfect places, covered with beautiful memories and reminders of good times. Fireplace is filled with crackling wood, warming the entire home from the center. Roof is solid and protective from the outdoor elements. Those are the elements of a forever home. 

There is no doubt how important these basic elements are to a happy, healthy home life. The physical, material, spiritual elements. 

How do you insure that you build well from the beginning

How do you regularly and properly maintain your home

How do you identify and make needed repairs

But let’s dig deeper and put this into perspective of your marriage. You’ve heard the saying “happy wife, happy life” or happy spouse, happy house. What condition is your house in? If you’ve been married for some time now, there are likely areas that are in need of maintenance. How’s your foundation, is there a few cracks here and there from settling?  Be quick to make repairs. [written Nov 19, 2018]

Sunday August 25

Why is there a sudden trend of middle aged married couples divorcing after decades of devoted matrimony? It’s like first you lose your children to college, you seem to lose yourself and then you wake up to discover you are losing your husband?

Because major shift happens when we have children. A major life changing world-turning event. Your heart expands 1000 times larger than you ever thought it could and makes room to love your children. But have you ever stopped to think that it expands so you can keep loving your husband with the same passion and intensity? But it doesn’t really happen that way does it?

The to do list when you are three months into dating the perfect guy:

Wake up and thank God you’re not single anymore

Go for a run (Gotta stay size 6 by any means necessary)

Skip that muffin or bagel and make a green smoothie

Shower, shave, tweeze eyebrows and track down any other unwanted hair and destroy it

Pick out that perfect outfit—the mix between classy and sexy with a hint of sultry (you never know you might have lunch or happy hour date with your boo)

Make sure makeup is on fleek

Blow out and perfectly style hair

Text him that perfect good morning selfie

Drive to work (Beaming)

Be the boss that you are

The mid-week to do list when you are xx years married to same guy:

Wake up and beg God for five more minutes of sleep

Crawl into the kitchen and get a 20 oz mug of coffee

Grab a donut to go with said coffee

Get your kids up

Fix their lunches

Finish and find homework, papers, projects etc.

Get them on the bus

Gasp breathless as you walk back from the bus stop

Take a two second lukewarm shower

Look down take a deep breath and consider the crazy idea of…nope no time!

Look in the mirror at all that hair and figure out how to hide it

Put on some spandex to hold in all the lumps bumps and humps

Plaster on as much makeup as possible to cover any other hair that you can’t hide under clothes

Put your unruly hair in a pony tail

Text him his honey do list followed by please get all this done ok followed by kissy face emoji

Drive to work (Dreading)

Wonder how this became your life

So what changed?

Do you see that both you and your self-care and your attention for your man have become low to no priority?

Just like a garden, that what is tended grows and thrives and that which isn’t shrivels and dies.

Don’t be fooled. This doesn’t just happen all of a sudden. This happens slowly and quietly and methodically until one day you wake up and realize your kids have their own lives and you are launching them off into the world and you look over and wonder who that strange guy is in the bed next to you…