Feeding love by developing thriving love habits is the key to a thriving relationship. Just ask Jon Beaty.
When Jon’s wife told him, “I’m homesick. I want to go home,” on their honeymoon, his heart sank. Jon had dreams of being everything his wife needed. This led to the couple from thoughts of living happily ever after to struggling to connect.
Over time, Jon and his wife rediscovered hope. They saw there were practical things they could do to make their marriage work. And eventually, they began practicing thriving love habits. Today, Jon’s mission is to help couples transform their marriages from struggling for survival to thriving. Jon and his wife Tami have celebrated over 30 years of marriage and are the parents of two thriving children.
Jon is a licensed clinical social worker. He is a coach, counselor, blogger, and speaker. Jon has been published by Fox News, The Gottman Relationship Blog, Lifezette, and The Good Men Project. He has also published the book If You’re Not Growing, You’re Dying: 7 Habits for Thriving in Your Faith, Relationships, and Work.
I had the opportunity to interview Jon during our Thriving at Home Summit. The two of us dove deep into strategies for developing thriving love habits. Here are some of my favorite takeaways from our conversation.
Exiting Survival Mode
- When things are bad, the first step is recognizing we are stuck. The good news is things don’t have to stay the way they are.
- No matter how amazing your spouse is or how amazing you are, the two of you don’t have the ability to fill all of each other’s needs. Letting go of these expectations is a good first step to exiting survival mode.
- Another good step is to get outside support. This might be from a therapist, pastor, or coach. Because we can’t see our own blind spots, seeking outside help is huge.
- Also, keep in mind that a thriving relationship is a growing process. So don’t expect things to change right away.
Moving from Surviving to Thriving with Love Habits
- Human beings are hardwired to be selfish, survive, and get their needs met. But these strategies don’t work so well in marriage.
- This is why we need to infuse the power of God into our relationship. To truly thrive, we need that connection to God. We can only get so far by white-knuckling it on our own.
- To have a thriving marriage, feed love. The best way to do this is to begin each day by choosing love and asking God to fill you with love. This is the first and most important thing to do.
- Then, find ways to infuse love into your bond. Even small love habits, like not taking the biggest piece of the pie, can make a big difference.
- Pushing our agenda aside, being curious, and being available to listen is another powerful love habit.
- In our survival mode, we are looking for survival and connection for ourselves. In our loving mode, we are looking for survival and connection with the people around us.
Fostering the Love Habit of Curiosity
- One of the easiest ways to give status to someone else is to let them know we appreciate them.
- Getting curious involves wanting to see the world from the other person’s perspective. We often think everyone sees the world in the same way, which simply isn’t true. This is why it’s important to ask good questions. Ask,
- “What are you thinking?
- “Tell me about your dreams?”
- “What do you really want?”
- And “Do you have a number one priority today?”
More Simple Love Habits
- Grab a Bible and allow God to speak love into you.
- Take care of your health and manage your own stress. It’s easier to be a kind, loving person when our brain and body are working well.
- Attitudes are contagious, and when we are energized, it puts us in a place where we can energize our spouse.
- The bottom line is that to have a thriving marriage, remember to feed love!
Diving Deeper into Love Habits
I appreciate Jon’s passion for helping couples feed love and develop positive love habits.
If you’d like to dive deeper, you may want to grab the all-access pass to our Thriving at Home Summit.
For more insights from the summit, check out the following posts:
- Designing Your Dream Marriage: How to create your best relationship!
- Everyone’s Got Bears: Taming anxiety, depression, and fatigue.
- The Problem with Being Nice: Be kind. Be good. But please don’t be nice!
Continuing the Conversation
Dive deeper and continue the conversation in the comments below. Let us know:
- What was your biggest takeaway from Jon’s insights?
- What love habits have you already integrated into your marriage?
- How will you create new love habits?
- What will you do today to love your spouse better?
Next Steps
Jen and I are thrilled you stopped by! Kind words and coffee fuel this blog. If you enjoyed our thoughts on love habits, help us keep this great content coming. Let us know how you plan to love your spouse better. Or use the buy us a coffee button to help fund our next project. To dive even deeper, you can also check out our books and resources for couples. Jen and I are passionate about helping couples create happy marriages. Know we honestly couldn’t do this without amazing readers—like you!
Thanks for sharing your post on Life This Week. Next week, the optional prompt is 39/51 Healthy. 28.9.2020 Hope to see you there too. Denyse.
Great post. I find that when I take the steps to focus on my husband and his needs, I take the focus off of myself and don’t worry as much about the little things. Great reminders. Thank you!
Hey Sue, thanks for stopping by and great insights! I agree, focusing on our loved one’s needs is so important, especially with all of the stresses and chances happening in the world today. And that’s such a great point too. Focusion on our loved one really does help us get our eyes off ourselves and our worries—at least this is true for Jenny and I too.
Wishing you a fantastic Wednesday!
Jed, I think this is so important to remember: “keep in mind that a thriving relationship is a growing process. So don’t expect things to change right away.” Unrealistic expectations can rob us of the good we do have.
Finding ways to show love is so important, yet so easy to NOT do. Thanks for these reminders that we need to stay intentional to keep our marriages healthy and thriving.
This is such a great post! I think for me the pivotal moment in my marriage was when we realized that neither of us have the ability to meet 100% of each other’s needs and we shouldn’t expect that but rather we should be grateful that we meet about 80% of each other’s needs. I feel like we are already winning with that number! The rest of our success comes right down to really great communication where every conversation we bring to the table honesty, kindness, patience, attentiveness, empathy, humility, insight, forgiveness, and a sense of humor (my 9 guidelines for effective communication). I love that you have a mission of helping other couples create their best possible relationships. Thanks for linking up with me!
Shelbee
http://www.shelbeeontheedge.com
Our number one love habit is praying with each other every morning. It sets the tone for the day. We also spend time on our own spiritual growth–if we’re not growing as individuals, we can’t grow as a couple! On a side note, I worked with Tami and Jon back before married :). It’s fun to see they’re still thriving!
Anita, wow, small world! Jon is amazing and hopefully one day I’ll get to meet Tami too. Apparent our families are not all that far from each other.