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I
recently heard a story about a Boy Scout who had received a new hatchet as a
gift. On his next overnight campout he was excited to try out his hatchet by
cutting down wood to build himself a nice big fire. Although it was dark when
they finished setting up camp he set to work chopping a fallen tree for his
fire. He chopped and chopped, but his hatchet wasn’t working very well. In
frustration he worked harder, but to no avail. Feeling disgusted with his new
hatchet he walked back to camp. As he came close to the firelight he was
astonished to discover that he had neglected to take the cover off of his
hatchet! He had been blaming the hatchet, when in reality it was his own
inattention to detail that led to the poor performance of the hatchet.
Enhancing Your Love
Map
Just
as this boy’s failure to pay attention to a minor detail about his hatchet
caused it to perform poorly, married couples’ failure to pay attention to the
small details of each other’s lives can cause distance and disappointment in
their relationship. Dr. John Gottman refers to knowing details about your
spouse as a love map, and says that
enhancing your love map is the first principle in his book “The Seven
Principles for Making Marriage Work”. Do you know what your spouse would do if
he won the lottery? How about his deepest fear or wildest dream? Do you know
who his best friend was growing up? You may wonder how knowing such seemingly
trivial things can be important to a strong marriage. The truth is, having a
detailed love map is as important to a rich relationship as taking the cover
off a hatchet is before using it to chop up firewood because, as Dr. Gottman
says, “Without such a love map, you can’t really know your spouse. And if you
don’t really know someone, how can you truly love them?” (Gottman, 2015, p.
54.)
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Enhancing your own love map can actually be a lot of fun. This
week I planned a date-night activity with my husband where we played a game
asking each other 20 questions such as “what was I wearing when we first met?”,
“what is one of my favorite movies?”, and “what is my biggest worry at the
moment?” We received points for each question that we got right, and the winner
got to choose the ice cream flavor for our treat. I was pleasantly surprised to
find that we answered most of the questions right, indicating we have a pretty
good love map. Yet there were still fun things to learn about each other, and
we realized that we want this to be a regular activity so that we keep our love
map strong and detailed. The best part of the activity was all of the talking
that we did as we explained our answers and even asked some follow-up
questions. It felt really great to just spend some time talking and laughing about
the details of our lives together.
Nurture Your Fondness
and Admiration
In my opening story, the Boy Scout was finding fault with
his hatchet in order to explain why it wasn’t meeting his expectations. The
truth is, the hatchet was perfectly sharp and able to fulfill its function, but
it was hindered by the cover that the boy had neglected to take off. Likewise, it’s
often easy to focus on the faults of your spouse rather than his or her good
points, and eventually those flaws become all you can see and hinder the
admirable qualities that attracted you to your spouse in the first place. This
brings us to Dr. Gottman’s second principle, Nurture Your Fondness and
Admiration, which he describes as “two of the most crucial elements in a
rewarding and long-lasting romance.” (Gottman, p. 69.) Although it may seem
ridiculously obvious, Gottman reminds us that happily married couples really like each other. They like being
together and they like qualities in the other person. You can nurture this fondness
and admiration by reminding yourself often of your spouse’s positive qualities,
which will help you prevent the four horsemen (see last week’s post) from
taking up permanent residence in your marriage.
I
know from personal experience that this second principle is spot on. I have
sometimes found myself in a downward spiral of feeling frustrated and eventually
angry over my husband’s behaviors or characteristics. It’s amazing how quickly
those negative feelings permeate my entire attitude towards my husband.
Luckily, the cure for this is quite simple: focus on the positive. In February
I decided to write 14 things I loved about my husband on hearts and tape one to
his closet door for each day leading up to Valentine’s Day. He loved it! A few
days ago I decided to get more specific and wrote several little notes to my
husband sharing details of things he has done for me this week that really
meant a lot. The practice of doing this has really brought my focus back around
to the reasons why I think my husband is fantastic! Those little things he does
that sometimes bother me are pushed into the background and seem trivial.
A Final Thought
There
may be times when a relationship is so overrun with negative feelings that
finding anything positive about the other person can be difficult. Dr. H.
Wallace Goddard counsels that we should be frequently praying for help to
strengthen and sanctify our marriages. “We can ask Father to help us see our
partner and his or her struggles with the loving-kindness with which he views
them.” (Goddard, p. 44.) I have found that when I seek for Heavenly Father’s
help as I work on enhancing my love map and nurturing fondness and admiration
for my husband, our relationship quickly begins to meet and even exceeds my
expectations. Just as a new hatchet works best when its cover is removed, so
our relationships flourish when we know details of our spouse’s lives and focus
on their good qualities instead of the bad.
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Sources:
-Goddard, H. W. (2007). Drawing heaven into your marriage:
powerful principles with eternal results. Fairfax, VA: Meridian Pub.
-Gottman, J. M., & Silver, N. (2015). The seven
principles for making marriage work: a practical guide from the country's
foremost relationship expert. New York: Harmony Books.
-Packer, A. F., (2014). The Book. General
Conference, October 2014.
