Love Dare Day 18

I love horses. I love everything about them. I love riding them, I love training them (most of the time), I even like the "chores" that go along with them. I read a lot about them because one thing a good horse rider/trainer knows is that you don't ever know everything. And I want to know everything I can about the subject.

We all like discovering new things about our areas of interest. Whether it's football (GO DAWGS!!!), or sewing, or gardening or cooking, whatever it is we like learning about it and have a deep desire to know more.

All of those things are great and it's good to have areas of outside interest and be knowledgeable on the subject. But, how well do you know your spouse? How much do you know about him/her?

Remember back in the day... you know, when you were dating? You always felt like you couldn't get enough of being around them. You felt like you were learning something new everyday. I remember when Frank and I started dating 14 1/2 years ago. I won't tell you how old I was cause that would give away my age, but we spent every waking moment together filling our noggins with any and every piece of information we could about the other. I was working and going to school. Frank was working and going to school. We both participated in the theater at college (we did go to the same college for a little while). Needless-to-say, we had very, very full schedules. However, it didn't matter. As soon as practice would be over, we would go out for a while or he would come back over to my house. My parents loved him so they always let him stay as late as he wanted. We laughed all the time. I'm not sure now if he really was that funny or if I just wanted him to think that but... well, anyway. Most nights we would fall asleep watching a movie or something on TV and he would leave around 1am or 2am. Then we would start all over the next day. Do you know what would happen to me now if I tried to maintain that kind of schedule? Shesh! I don't know how we did it.

Yes, I do. We had such a deep desire to know and understand each other. This quote was in the movie and is also in the book. I think it is worthy of repeating. if the amount that you studied your spouse before marriage were equal to a high school diploma, then you should continue to learn about your mate until you gain a college degree, a masters degree and ultimately a doctorate degree.

WOW! All that studying I did beforehand... That really puts what I should be doing now into perspective.

If we are missing the level of intimacy that we once shared together, then one of the best ways to unlock their hearts is to begin studying them again. Proverbs 18:15 says The ear of the wise seeks knowledge. Ask questions. Listen to them. (break out that HDT if you need to!) Ask God for discernment in understanding where your spouse is coming from.

Here is what I had to do today: PREPARE A SPECIAL DINNER AT HOME, JUST FOR THE TWO OF YOU. FOCUS ON GETTING TO KNOW YOUR SPOUSE BETTER. DETERMINE TO MAKE IT AN ENJOYABLE EVENING FOR BOTH YOU AND YOUR SPOUSE.

Since there was NO way the kids were going to be shipped off for the evening (they are already going to be away this weekend. I didn't want to be greedy. Well, I wanted to, but I just didn't feel like pushing it!) I decided that we would just wait until the kids went to bed to have a nice dinner. AND we had already rented a movie over the weekend that we hadn't watched yet so perfect!! I cooked something really nice (it was the chicken pesto spirals! recipe is on this blog) which just happened to turn out GREAT! We didn't talk about the kids a lot over dinner. And it was just nice enjoying some conversation without having to cut someones food or tell them to "EAT" for the 1984th time. We watched the movie and even sat next to each other on the couch instead of retreating to our favorite chairs. And the movie was a comedy, so we laughed A LOT! I will spare you the details of the remainder of the evening *wink*, but I'm pretty sure it was an enjoyable evening for both!

I realized that even though we have been together for a long time, there is always undiscovered territory. I just have to take the time to learn about it... and then go conquer it!