FamilyLife Today®

Speaker 1

Proverbs 29:11. I love that verse where it says, a fool gives full vent to his anger, but a wise man keeps himself under control.

And sometimes in the moment that you're angry is the worst time to actually talk about it because I'm gonna get full vent.

Speaker 2

And you're gonna do damage.

Speaker 1

And you're gonna do damage. Right.

Speaker 3

Welcome to Family Life Today where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Ann Wilson.

Speaker 4

And I'm Dave Wilson. And you can find familylife today.com. this is family Life Today. So how many times do you think we've gone to bed mad in 44 years? Give me a number.

Speaker 3

I'm just thinking of the times I was.

Speaker 4

Give me a number. I'm getting mad right now.

Speaker 2

Crying into my pillow.

Speaker 3

Alone at night.

Speaker 2

Being so mad and sad and upset.

Speaker 4

That there have been nights.

Speaker 3

Yes.

Speaker 4

Well, here's the good news. That means we're highly happy couple.

Speaker 3

Oh.

Speaker 4

That'S what it means. That's what I just found out. In fact, our listeners are going to find out. I'm getting madder as I talk. But we're going to watch a clip today from our Married with Benefits podcast with Family Life. It's actually a YouTube clip too, and I'd say, go watch it. In fact, you can watch our show now on YouTube as well, on the Family Life YouTube channel.

We've been doing this for a little bit, and it's been really fun because we have Brian Goins who interviews Shaunti Feldhahn. Brian's with his wife Jen on this episode, which is awesome. You get both their perspectives. But Shaunti is a Harvard-trained researcher, and all her books are based on research. So this book and this concept were based on her interviews with couples to find out who are the best, who are the happiest, and who are having the most satisfaction in marriage. She uses this crazy term called "highly happy." I don't know what that means, but it means they have good marriages and they're pros.

So Brian is interviewing her with Jen, asking, "Okay, what are the surprising secrets you found out? What do these couples do?" Well, one of them that we're going to talk about today is that these couples go to bed mad. Not every night, but we'll explain what that looks like. That sounds like it can't be true, but it actually is true.

And so here's what we're going to do: we're going to watch a clip with Shaunti, Brian, and Jen Goins talking about going to bed mad. They start with a very familiar verse to a lot of people, Ephesians 4:26, which says, "Do not let the sun go down on your anger." So, man, what does that mean when they start right there?

Speaker 1

Let's talk about the verse. Because that's really. Is it just going, okay, that's nice. As the Bible says that.

And what I've appreciated about your research is that basically all the data always ends up backing up scripture. So as a researcher, you're doing all this research and they're like, but wait, and I'd be curious for you, like, did when you looked at that verse, how did that apply to your marriage?

I would imagine, like, Jeff's a lawyer. Wouldn't you wanna stay up and fight? Wouldn't he wanna, like, I'm just gonna resolve this thing?

Speaker 2

No, Jeff is the opposite.

Speaker 1

Is he?

Speaker 2

He is totally the opposite. He is definitely like, it's 10 o'clock. I am past my bedtime. I am the stay up late. He is the early to bed kind of guy.

And he's like, my brain stops working. And so I'd be like, but we need God's blessing on our marriage. Like, we can't go to bed.

And he says, now, like, you would wear me out. Like, I just couldn't. And then he would take the lawyer hat on, he'd put the law hat on and he'd go, look, we did not start arguing until the sun was already down. So I have 24 hours.

Speaker 1

That's when you're really parsing the verse. That's when you're really getting into it and going, no, no, let's understand. The sun goes down at 6. And so if we started this at 7, we got another 24 hours.

Speaker 5

I'm wondering if you have two people who do like to stay up late. They can stay still, stay up late and figure it out.

Speaker 2

Everybody, it's. Everybody's different. Right, right. That's the issue.

Speaker 5

And it's just most people are married to someone who's opposite. So someone's gonna wanna stay up late. Someone might wanna go to bed early. You have to really honor the other person. The other person, yes.

Speaker 1

And if they're using scripture as a bludgeon to go, yeah, it's a problem. You need to be like me. Cause God's saying we need to stay up and fight. I mean, for you, since that was you.

Speaker 5

What does the verse mean?

Speaker 2

Yeah, what does the verse mean, Shanti? Well, listen, I'm sure theologians have different ways of parsing it, but I will tell you for me, that at the beginning of this, I actually felt a lot of angst. I think that's probably the right word because, like you said, Brian, I'd been doing this for so many years and all of these big, expensive, nationally representative surveys. Oh wow. They back up what the Bible has said all along. Like, it was so cool.

And suddenly here I am with this one, and I'm like, oh my goodness. Does it matter if it works if it goes against what the Bible says? Like, we can't do that. And then even more of an angst: why does it work if it's anti-biblical? Like, it shouldn't work. I was actually sharing this angst with a pastor we were talking to at one point, and he was also a licensed therapist.

This pastor started laughing. He was like, okay, first of all, there's a lot of things to unpack here. But he said, first of all, just be aware that this whole section of the Bible is not even talking about marriage; it's talking about living in a community. Right? Like, let's realize that we've sort of put something on this that maybe the verse never intended to be a part of it.

Speaker 4

Or we've.

Speaker 1

Or I would say we've used it in so many marriage contexts that we feel like we have. You know, we've basically taken that verse and just. It's only applying to marriage.

It's applying to marriage, but it is applying to community. So you're not going to go. If I had an issue with the guy that I bought something from at the mall, I need to go find his house and knock on his door at 11 o'clock; that would be a little weird.

Speaker 2

That would be weird. But okay, so people, marriage is a part of a type of community. Okay. Yeah.

And so I was still angst-ridden, and he took me to, he had a big Bible in his office and he said, "Go look up this verse." And so I'm like, okay. He said, "You know, when you see 426 there, like, do you see the little carrot? If you go look, you can look on your Bible app or you can look in a Bible right now and you'll see that there's a little carrot."

And it shows that Paul was quoting a verse from the Old Testament. The whole verse of Ephesians 4:26 is, "In your anger, do not sin. Don't let the sun go down in your anger." Okay, so we always quote the second part for some reason; we're not really looking at the first part.

So what was Paul quoting? This verse would have been very familiar to his listeners, and he was quoting Psalm 44. So this pastor goes, "Go look up Psalm 44." So I looked up Psalm 44, and it says, "In your anger, do not sin. Think about it overnight and remain silent."

Speaker 1

Wow.

Speaker 6

And it's like, whoa, how did we.

Speaker 1

Get that translation all off or weird?

Speaker 3

It's just.

Speaker 2

It's not even. I think the issue is we've so put that into a marriage context. And we. So on the second half that we miss that. The whole point was really about the first, in your anger, don't sin.

And so the pastor is like, look, if you need to think about it overnight and remain silent so you don't say something you'll regret and sin in your anger, do that. If you need to duke it out at one in the morning to not sin in your anger, do that.

Like, that's the bigger picture. And that's sort of the way that we should be biblically processing everything anyway.

Speaker 1

And I like one of the translations; it says, "ponder in your own hearts on your beds and be silent." Now, ponder shouldn't be stew, which is what I tend to do. If you read the rest of that passage in Ephesians 4, where it's talking about not giving the devil any opportunity, it then talks about being kind to one another and harmonious.

So, it's like, that's actually what I should be stewing on in my bed: how do I start moving towards oneness? How do I start owning my part? What am I going to do to actually move back towards my wife or whoever I have an issue with? This doesn't just apply to marriage; it can apply to everything else.

You think about all the other verses, and it's amazing how we take one verse and make this massive, practical theology out of it. But Proverbs 29:11, I love that verse where it says, "a fool gives full vent to his anger, but a wise man keeps himself under control." Sometimes, in the moment that you're angry, it's the worst time to actually talk about it because I'm going to give full vent, and you're going to do damage, and I'm going to do damage.

Speaker 2

Right you are.

And that is actually one thing that we did see that was relatively common amongst the not highly happy couples, happy couples, or the so-so and struggling couples: that was actually a pattern.

It would be healthier to think about it overnight and pick it up in the morning.

Speaker 4

Yeah, you gotta check out the full episode of *Married with Benefits*. It's in the show notes and you can find it right there.

Okay, so we've got a couple couples in here. Gonna talk about this anger thing, right? So we got Robin and Liz Hudson back. You guys have been married nine years with three kids.

And then we got John and Al. Been married 15 seconds. So here we go. We just did the ceremony.

Speaker 7

We don't know why we're here. We know nothing yet.

Speaker 3

So anyways, you, Rob and Liz did your premarital counseling. So you probably do know a lot.

Speaker 8

It is to their credit if we say anything silly. It's not their fault, it's yours.

Speaker 9

Oh, wow.

Speaker 4

So when you. When you hear what they just talked about, what hit you, anything jump right out?

Cause it's a pretty anti. You know, this is not the kind of wisdom you would think makes sense. It doesn't make sense, but it does when you hear the logic behind it.

So what jumped out to you guys?

Speaker 9

I have to say, I feel like I'm so relieved to hear that so much. Because, I don't know, I'm just the type of person who. Like, in the other day we talked about. There was the clip that talks about being hungry, angry, lonely and tired.

Speaker 7

Halt.

Speaker 6

Yeah, halt.

Speaker 9

And so it's a real thing. It's so real. If I'm hungry, hanger is real for me.

But also, like, being tired. I'm like, if I'm tired, like, I need to do something about that before I can approach anything else. Cause otherwise I'm gonna say something that I regret.

And so I feel like there's such relief in being like, it's okay. It's okay to go take a nap, to go be angry, to do this.

Speaker 4

How about you guys?

Speaker 6

Where has the rest of that verse been my whole life? Like, where has the context of this been?

Like, I do. I'm curious what the beginning of our marriage would have looked like had we had that holistic picture of, like, what that verse is.

Even that last part of, like, something about, like, be silent, like, and processing. I mean, I don't know the exact words, but I feel like that has taken nine years of marriage for me to get to that.

Speaker 7

I remember one of the best pieces of advice I got from my first mentor was, and he's kind of an old school, be a real man kind of guy. And that was just the language that he used.

But this was right when this was in our first months of marriage. He said, "Rob, a real man always apologizes first."

That's really stuck with me, and it's also been a real challenge.

Speaker 6

Oh, my gosh. I've never heard this. And that explains so much.

Speaker 4

I was gonna say doesn't.

Speaker 6

I have never heard that.

Speaker 4

Is Rob a real man?

Speaker 6

Well, here's the deal. Why is there a deal?

Speaker 4

Here's the deal.

Speaker 2

You're supposed to say, yes, he would.

Speaker 6

Apologize whether he was there or not.

Speaker 7

Yes.

Speaker 6

And I knew it. I could call it.

Speaker 3

You're like, that's just fake. Don't say that.

Speaker 6

I was like, well, there was just so much unprocessed stuff, because it was like, well, I'm just gonna say sorry, and it's gonna be done. And I've done my part as a man.

Speaker 7

Yes.

Speaker 6

Oh, my goodness.

Speaker 3

I'm glad we could have this session for you guys.

Speaker 1

So here's the.

Speaker 7

Of that thought was I realized that I need to take time before I can actually apologize.

Speaker 3

And it's okay to do that.

Speaker 7

Absolutely. When I was thinking of the last time we went to bed angry, I left the front door unlocked. It felt at the time that it wasn't a big deal, but it was a big deal.

And so when she brought that to me, that it was a big deal, I exploded. Because the message that went through my head is, she thinks I'm a bad husband because I didn't lock the front door. She thinks I don't care about her security. She doesn't think I care about her past and why that's important.

And I spiral, and I grab my pillow, I storm out of the room, and I go into the guest room, and I'm like, all right, I'm going.

Speaker 4

To sleep here by the unlocked front door.

Speaker 6

I had locked it.

Speaker 3

But instead of saying what I hear you saying is, I'm a bad husband, all the things you thought you never said to her. No, you just left.

Speaker 7

Just left. Just went to the other room. Because I did have the wherewithal to know anything that came out of my mouth past that it was gonna be bad. It was gonna be bad. It wasn't gonna be helpful.

And so then I knew that I needed to take the night to de-escalate, calm down. But also what's going through my head is I know that I've messed up here, and I can, like, logically. Like, logically, my brain could go through.

And I knew what I had done wrong. I could have parroted an apology to her in that moment, but it would have been.

Speaker 3

It wasn't sincere.

Speaker 7

It wouldn't have been sincere. And so that's kind of the new side of this is I do want to apologize, but I need to be at a place where that is an actual real apology where I am able to enter in to how much what I have done has hurt and has offended.

Speaker 4

I mean, actually tell me I'm wrong. It sounds like you just did what they said. You went to bed angry because you needed time to process.

Speaker 3

Yeah, I wanna hear the rest of it. So you woke up and then you.

Speaker 7

Woke up and this was a unique scenario.

Speaker 6

This was a unique scenario and I think it speaks to some of the work we've been doing to know ourselves and know each other.

But that night in particular, like I just knew he was spiraling. Like I could see him spiraling and I was like, you know what?

Like I'm gonna draw near to him. Like, yes, I'm really hurt. But I like came in the guest bedroom and just like laid there next to him.

Speaker 3

So you're giving him grace?

Speaker 6

Yeah, yeah. And that is by no means every situation, but this particular night, that is what happened. I think this is where the kid piece comes into play, and it's complicated. In that moment, it was totally sincere, and I wanted to focus on him.

But then I do feel like what I really needed to talk through did get lost in the crazy. From my perspective, I was like, well, he'll come to me. But life is crazy, kids are crazy. And when's the time?

I mean, in real time, you're seeing us learn stuff about each other with you guys, because there's just not that much uninterrupted time.

Speaker 3

So as we talked previously, things can get brushed under the rug and you want to go back and deal with it and it comes back up and it builds up.

Speaker 6

You're going to trip over it eventually. And we did. And eventually we did revisit it and there was more closure and we were able to talk through it. But I think that situation, it was.

Speaker 7

A multi step process.

Speaker 6

Yeah, yeah. Because stuff kept building on top of that because there was a bigger narrative underneath that one situation. And there was like a broken trust too.

So the undealt with stuff, I mean there's like a learning curve with that situation of like what does it look like to revisit? Because most nights it isn't the best time for us to talk.

Like 7:00 is really the like when the kids are in bed. There is no more like you know, it's already too late because we're both exhausted.

So when is the time? So when is the time? Yeah, when is.

Speaker 4

Well, I was going to say we were taught, but before marriage, the opposite of what Shanti just taught us on that video was the verse meant literally: you have to resolve it. You never go to bed angry. This is what the Bible teaches.

I'm literally falling asleep. And Ann is. She's a purist in terms of "got to do it" as she is. You can't go to sleep; you're in sin.

Speaker 3

You're in sin.

Speaker 4

I can't even think right now. And no kids. So it shouldn't have been that hard. But.

And then it was literally, Shanti's revelation hit me. One night was, okay, the fight started at 9pm. It's 2am; we got till tomorrow thinking that's what scripture means.

And it was years later where I realized that's not even what scripture means. It's more of a principle of don't let anger fester for days and weeks and months. Resolve it quickly.

Now, here's one of the things.

Speaker 3

Well, wait, let me go back to their question, because I think a lot of couples with kids that are just. It feels overwhelming. It feels like you have no time to resolve anything. Everything is left untouched.

Speaker 4

Sometimes they're part of the anger.

Speaker 6

Oh, 100%.

Speaker 3

Because they're contributing to that. Exhausted, physically and mentally in every way.

And so one of the things that we did, and we didn't do it right at first because I needed to resolve it quickly. Dave needs time to process. And so, like a month. But we would plan the time, even if it was after the kids were in bed the next night.

We conserved enough energy and we knew. And he knew. I couldn't go another day with it being unresolved or not talked about. So you can reserve mentally, like, we're going to talk about this tonight.

So there's a way of preserving yourself and reserving an hour, and by the way, it prepares your heart.

Speaker 4

That's in the book. They didn't even get into it on that little clip. But in the book, what Shanti found out is the couples that did not have great marriages went to bed angry saying, we'll talk about it. They never did.

Speaker 3

And that was my fear. Because if you. I call it a person that's withdrawing, a withdrawer, they'll never get to it.

Speaker 4

Because they don't want to.

Speaker 3

They don't want to. And that just is my angst.

Speaker 2

Like, no.

Speaker 8

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 4

So remember that the couples that had a great marriage did get back to it. They said, "We should go to bed now. We're not making any progress. I may need to process."

"You may, but tomorrow at 5:00 or tomorrow at 7:00."

And they did. Tomorrow. And they're the ones that are highly happy.

Speaker 8

We've got some good friends, Marie and Kyle. For our wedding, they gave us a little kind of a marriage journal is what it's called. It's called the marriage journal. It's like a weekly check-in with your spouse.

It’s got a little bit of content, a little devotional, and it has a bunch of questions that you kind of have a little discussion about. They're the same questions every week. It's like, what was your high? What was your low? One of them is, do we have any unresolved conflict that we gotta tackle again?

So, we have built into our week a moment where, if there was something that we did not get a chance to unpack and bring to full resolution, we've got kind of that last-ditch opportunity on the weekend. It’s like, okay, I'm still bent outta shape about this; we gotta talk about this more.

Speaker 9

Well, and I say it's been helpful for us. And I have to say there have been weeks where we haven't done it.

Speaker 6

And we've only been married for a.

Speaker 9

Short amount of time.

Speaker 4

We're talking weeks in like 12 weeks.

Speaker 9

I know, but something that's like really helpful for me, cause I would be the type of person to shove it under the rug and not think about it is like, oh, I'm like, okay, is there any conflict?

And so I'm like, ah, I wanna resolve it before we get to that question, like. Cause I'm like, oh.

So for me it's been helpful for us to think of like, okay, in the moment or after. It's like being able to do that so that it's not every week we get together.

And I'm like, okay, here's my list of conflicts. So that's just helpful to keep us accountable.

Speaker 3

And I do think today it's convenient to have our phones and a notepad on our phones that we can jog thoughts into. Like, because it's with kids, you forget like what were we fighting about? What was I so in turmoil about? So to write that down.

And the other thing is this sounds very impractical, like I'm not going to do that. But praying, if you have a 24-hour period that you're going to talk about it, to let God go before you to pray about it, that helps. God enters into it.

And even when it says, because don't give the devil a foothold, that is a real thing.

Speaker 7

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 4

And I would only add this. And they didn't even get into it. And the book doesn't get into it. But if we've learned anything in four decades of marriage, this is big time. When you're talking about anger, if you have a phone to take, notepad, I would say also you need an extension cord. And I'm joking.

But when I preached on this about anger, I had literally an extension cord wrapped around my waist with a plug dangling around. And my point was, when we get angry, whether it's in marriage, with our kids, you name it, it could be road rage, whatever it is, you gotta get to the root. There's a root that anger is plugged into something.

And most of us, even in our marriage, whether it's 10 o'clock at night or not, are yelling or the anger's coming out and we don't even know. It's not really even about this. We've never gone, "I've got a, oh, this is something that happened today at work and I'm taking it out now on her," or "this is something said yesterday and it hurt."

And I'm not dealing with the hurt, I'm dealing with the anger. And all she's getting, or he's getting, is an angry husband. It's like, if we could get to the root, or your spouse can help you get to the root, oh, my goodness, you can make some real progress. Is that true for you guys? Have you found that?

Speaker 7

And that's what changed the door locking scenario. Once we did come back to it, it was a day or two later that we sat down. I don't remember exactly, but when she explained, once I was in a place that because she had taken the first step and shown me grace, I was able to then— it shouldn't have been this way, but this was the way that the Holy Spirit worked in this situation.

I was able to enter into compassion and ask questions like, "Can you help me understand why the door is so important?" She walked me through it, and it wasn't just things that happened that day or the day before. We went back 20 years, and there were things that had happened that made that really, really important.

It took time, it took intentionality, it took compassion. And all of a sudden, now locking the door is really important. The thing that I was so worried about hearing from her—if it was important to you, you would lock the door—was true. It was true.

Speaker 4

Midge, really? If I'm important to you, you would lock the door?

Speaker 6

Well, and it's the mental load too. I carry this. I need you to carry it with me. I don't want to be alone in this.

Speaker 4

That's big.

Speaker 6

I have so much on my brain. Help me carry this.

Speaker 7

And it's gotten better.

Speaker 6

Yeah, I will say it's gotten better. I will also say that there is something to sleep and self-care that really does help.

The next morning, there are so many times I'm just overstimulated from the constant touch and the constant input of the day, and I do feel mad. There's something totally behind the anger—there's exhaustion, whatever, and so on and so forth.

It's usually going to be directed at the person closest to me, the other adult in the room.

Speaker 3

Because you're always hungry, angry, lonely, Always and always.

Speaker 6

And so oftentimes I do go to bed or I do just have some alone time, and I wake up the next day, I'm like, man, I'm glad there really wasn't anything specific to talk about other than I just need to take care of myself and see myself and say, well, of course you feel angry, of course you're feeling some kind of way because you're exhausted.

So do yourself a favor, get a snack that you love, go by yourself, take a bubble bath, and then just see what the morning looks like.

And I think that is something that I've really learned over the last nine years: to not be a slave to my emotions as well. I give myself the grace to care for myself well, and it has saved us a lot of hurt in the long run because, a lot of times, it did just make things worse.

Speaker 7

One last thought on the question of when do we have the conversation? This is probably not a great idea for everybody, but one thing, just out of necessity, is that there have been a number of date nights that have started with harder conversations.

Living in Orlando, it's going to take 25 minutes to get anywhere. So we've got the time, and we know that we're going on a date and we want to enjoy this time together, but there's something between us. That drive time to wherever we're going has often been the moment when we say, "Hey, we need to talk about this first so that we can really enjoy reconnecting with each other."

What would you add to that?

Speaker 6

I mean, I would agree. And the kids aren't there, you know, and that's huge because you can.

I mean, even after bed, let's say you reserve that hour. I mean, for us, our kids are getting up, up, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. And if it's not one kid, it's the other kid.

Speaker 4

And your husband's getting up too.

Speaker 6

Really, There are no sacred spaces unless we leave the building. And so I think that that car, being stuck in a car together is some of the greatest gifts, you know.

Speaker 4

We interviewed Deborah F. Who's a counselor, therapist, writer, author. Incredible. And her husband's an eye surgeon. And so he came with her. Right. And he doesn't do interviews. It's just Deborah's the.

Speaker 3

She's written. Are you really okay? A lot of books.

Speaker 4

Her new one, Soul Care, She's Phenomenal.

Speaker 3

And marriage book too.

Speaker 4

So he was here and we said, hey, can we bring John in the studio? And she's like, nah, he doesn't really do it. Well, he did it. He came in and he was phenomenal.

And I will never forget, one of the lessons they taught was. Ann mentioned it earlier. They have, he says on my phone, every Sunday night at 9:00, ding, ding, ding, it goes off. We have what they call couch time. And the kids are in bed. And so the house is quiet.

Every Sunday night. And again, it could be any time, but they pick their Sunday night at 9. They have four or five questions they ask. And one of them is, is there anything happening right now? Anger, sin, Is there anything dangerous that we need to talk about? How are you doing? So it's a great thing.

But here's my big learning. They said on our dates we don't do couch time. Our dates, we want to have fun.

Speaker 3

We're like, well, duh. We fought every date night, every day.

Speaker 4

That's why.

Speaker 3

Because we had no time to talk except date night. And so then it'd be half the time we're like, figuring something out. And then we'd be like, do we like each other at the end of the day, I think we do.

Speaker 4

So we've tried to apply couch science. Like, let's have those conversations and let's go have fun on the date. And again, sometimes you can't.

Speaker 7

Absolutely.

Speaker 4

Sometimes things come up. You know, the kid thing, you can't. But if you try to say, I'm going to try and separate it, it's not a bad practice. It's a secret of highly happy you guys.

Speaker 3

Thanks for being with us.

Speaker 6

It's been a lot of fun.

Speaker 4

And let me just say this marriage is wonderful, but it can be really, really hard and difficult at times. And we know that. We've shared that many times here.

But we would love to help you go to familylife.com marriage help. We put some of our best tools there for you to get some help. We would love to help you.

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