Baggage Claim
Baggage Claim is a space for blended families, marriage, and friendship.
Here, we dive into real-life conversations about the ups and downs of relationships, from navigating second marriages to unpacking the baggage we all bring. Hosted by Greg and Jessica, who both have rich experiences with love, loss, and family, this community is about sharing stories, learning together, and growing stronger as couples and individuals. Grab a drink and join us as we unpack, laugh, and claim our baggage—one conversation at a time
Baggage Claim
Beyond I Do: Creating a Shared Journey That Actually Works
Marriage is a team sport that nobody prepared us for. What happens when two different people try to build a life together? How do you create a truly functional partnership rather than just two people sharing space?
Greg and Jess dig deep into what makes relationships work as teams by examining three crucial elements: shared vision, effective communication, and the delicate balance between trust and leadership. They reveal how establishing family values created their roadmap for raising "likable, contributing members of society" and how contentment with both plenty and little stems from mutual agreement about what truly matters.
The conversation takes a fascinating turn when they explore their dramatically different communication styles. Greg's "let's try it and see what happens" approach crashes headlong into Jess's need for careful planning. Their candid stories about navigating these differences offer valuable insights for any couple struggling with similar tensions. "Your brain works way different and way faster than mine," Jess admits, highlighting how understanding these differences transformed their communication.
Perhaps most compelling is their exploration of leadership in marriage. They challenge the notion that one person must lead everything, instead advocating for recognizing individual strengths. "In every relationship, someone is leading," Greg explains, "but that doesn't mean creating a dictatorship." Their perspective on how trust and leadership function together provides a refreshing framework for couples tired of power struggles.
The episode wraps with practical application points, encouraging listeners to identify their "why" behind major life decisions and commit to being lifelong learners together. Whether you're newly married, considering marriage, or decades into partnership, you'll find actionable wisdom to strengthen your team.
Share your thoughts with us! What book has impacted your relationship journey? We'd love to hear what's helped you become a better teammate in your relationship.
Hey guys, what's up? I'm Greg. I hope you guys are ready to unpack and get into some good conversations today.
Speaker 2:And I'm Jess, and this is our podcast Baggage Claim. Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 1:Welcome to Baggage Claim. Everybody so glad you guys are here tonight or this morning or afternoon or midday, wherever it is that you're listening to us. Thank you so much for tuning in. Thank you so much for the downloads. We hit a milestone this week. We did, and we were so excited.
Speaker 2:It was a goal that you had set in your head.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this is one of those weird stupid things you set in your head. For you guys who are new here, baggage Claim is a place where we talk about marriage and relationships and we talk about it and hoping to create some community and some conversations just around relationships and marriage, coming out of marriage, going into marriage, in the middle of marriage, wherever you may be. In that we want to help create conversations around that community and just kind of just have some open conversations about it.
Speaker 2:uh, sometimes those are fun, sometimes those are sad, sometimes they're hard, sometimes they're easy, and we share what has worked for us and we share what has not worked for us yeah, our, our podcast that just came out last week is we have no idea what we're doing, so if you think, but it's okay yeah.
Speaker 1:So if you think we've got it all together, listen to last week's episode 14, and you'll realize we're working it out as we go. So thank you guys for joining us tonight and thank you for being a part.
Speaker 2:And I want to make sure and say thank you again. We have in the past said thank you to Brother Jack Woodworking who did this beautiful design on our table, which is a good buddy of mine, Wes Price, and I have not seen him in a while and I really, really miss him.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Wes does phenomenal work. If you're looking for woodworking and you're in the Georgia area, even if you're in the South Carolina, North Carolina area, this dude does phenomenal table work.
Speaker 2:Absolutely Beautiful custom designs.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he'll do just one-offs for you or he'll do something that he's done in the past. So if you don't know, if you haven't checked him out, it's Brother Jack Woodworking Wes Price, go check him out. Awesome dude does great work.
Speaker 2:He did this beautiful table that we're sitting at Great family, Just an all-around great guy.
Speaker 1:You can't go wrong with Wes, so make sure to check him out. But anyway jumping in. So Jess is wrapping up school, so she's super excited about that and so, like we said, I think before we got started on podcast we were going live just doing our question, our fun kind of year of us.
Speaker 2:We talked about I got up and went to work with you this morning. You did and thank you for that. You devoted the day to me at work today so that, and the school that I work in we can leave this like school issued furniture in the classroom because they move it out to wax and clean the flooring and that kind of thing. But we have to take out our personal furniture Like you've built several bookshelves for my classroom and then, like things that we purchased in there furniture-wise, we move it into the gym so it doesn't get damaged. So that you help me do all that and the millions of books that I have.
Speaker 1:You have a lot of books. I do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I do. But you were doing that with me today and I high-fived you at one point. I was like, hey, teamwork makes the dream work. And I was like that's what we need to talk about today.
Speaker 1:So you think we may talk about this stuff like weeks in advance. Sometimes we do, we do sometimes, sometimes we don't.
Speaker 2:Also, it was today when this whole idea came. We do have like a page, like a brainstorming page we might refer back to, and we have gosh. A lot of content A lot of things written down, like all the way back to that first weekend that our podcast journey started, that we talked about a couple weeks ago With our friends Scott and Jen.
Speaker 1:Yes, kind of like helped us kick that off.
Speaker 2:But yeah, today I was just thinking I'm grateful that we're such a good team.
Speaker 1:And so we got into the discussion right away.
Speaker 2:We did.
Speaker 1:Because you know who likes just you know, getting your room ready. Why not, let's have an in-depth conversation about what is teamwork and how does it work?
Speaker 2:in a relationship.
Speaker 1:And what does that really mean? Yeah, and is that applicable for somebody else, or does that work for somebody else?
Speaker 2:And what do we do well, what do we not do well? So then, naturally, you went back to your consulting business world.
Speaker 1:I did.
Speaker 2:And immediately you Googled what makes a how did you Google it?
Speaker 1:I don't remember what you put in there. I was like, well, there's a difference. So I said top five characteristics of high performing teams and top five characteristics of highly functioning teams. And so it's really interesting, because there is a difference and if I'm not careful I'll go down that wormhole, so I'll tap the brakes here, but there were some things that were very varied because we wanted to in the same process.
Speaker 1:Before I go down there and find those things, let's talk about what we think makes us a good team. Let me go dig around in that and let's see if there's any commonality between the two and see if we can actually find some crossover, see what that means.
Speaker 2:And we did. There's a little list that we came up with. You want me to share the list quickly, you?
Speaker 1:can, if you want. You don't have to.
Speaker 2:Or just dive into the ones that we think are.
Speaker 1:I say Liz is jumping to ours. Okay, so we took Well. Some of them were stupid.
Speaker 2:Some of them were stupid.
Speaker 1:And some of them were just like okay, yeah, that's.
Speaker 2:Like the. We just went on about the word governance. Yeah, I found the word governance and I was like who uses that word?
Speaker 1:Literally no one. If I'm with you and we're hanging out and you use the word governance, I'm probably going to get up and walk away.
Speaker 2:Okay, well, pause, that I don't even.
Speaker 1:First off, I don't even know how to say. I don't feel like I'm saying it wrong when I say it.
Speaker 2:No, but today, when we ran an errand after working together. Today you used.
Speaker 1:Well, you may. I don't know if you're making fun of me or what.
Speaker 2:I wasn't, I was literally fascinated.
Speaker 1:I was like if you triangulate these three Walmarts as the crow flies, they're probably one and a half miles apart. And you looked at me and you're like what I don't know?
Speaker 2:First I was listening intently because I was like you're exactly right. There's like 100 Walmarts it feels like right here and we were talking about how the one closest to our house has taken up most of the parking lot with their stuff where they're remodeling. Blah, blah, blah. Just a conversation.
Speaker 1:It's Walmart. I don't understand that.
Speaker 2:An exciting married people conversation about Walmart.
Speaker 1:Walmart and the pickup. Why do you need 15? Why do you? You don't 15.
Speaker 2:You literally don't.
Speaker 1:And they're all within a mile of each other.
Speaker 2:If Kroger can survive with six.
Speaker 1:Walmart. Why do you think you're so special that you need 15?
Speaker 2:I'm sorry, walmart, you're so great I don't know about that, but anyway, we shop there often, greg and I were talking about the proximity, of how close Walmarts are in our area, and he said, if you triangulate the ones, that are the three that we were talking about. Yes, and then you said, because, as a crow flies, the specific one we were at compared to one of the closer ones.
Speaker 1:And I pulled it up on a map Google Maps too, yeah.
Speaker 2:And I was just listening and I was it up on a map Google Maps too, yeah. And I was just listening and I was like, can I just say the word triangulate? I might have used that in my lifetime maybe two times, and that's because of school situation. We triangulate data for this one specific thing. I don't do it. The admin and the important people do it, and then they give me a list of my children that qualify and then I do the things I have to do. Also, the phrase as the crow flies.
Speaker 1:It's a very Southern phrase. Never have I ever used that phrase. I think it's a very Southern phrase. I used it just last week.
Speaker 2:Did you no?
Speaker 1:Producer Michael said he used it just last week. Did you Producer?
Speaker 2:Michael said he used it just last week.
Speaker 1:As the crow flies, meaning aerial straight lines, not roads. Not, it just means a straight line from one point to another. It's a very southern term, I think. I think so. I've heard that.
Speaker 2:I mean Growing up in Georgia, anyway.
Speaker 1:Well, anyways Her statement that was so funny to me and I just kind of laughed and got out of the Jeep. She goes. Your language sometimes is just fun and creative, creative, yeah, and I was like okay, I'm not sure how to respond to that.
Speaker 2:so I'm going to go with. Okay, and it was not a jab. It was like your brain works so differently than my brain does than I think.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:It's just I don't know. That was way a rabbit, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1:Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 2:So back to teamwork, back to where we're going, yeah, so you said a really fun thing of there are some spouses or partners that might would have said today when I needed your help because I knew it would speed up the process for myself. And also there's something there's some of those shelves I can't lift by myself.
Speaker 1:Well, you're thinking like, honestly, this is how the because you brought it up and you said you're thinking about and this is how my brain works. We're in this conversation and you're like thank you so much for doing this. I couldn't lift these shelves and in my mind, I'm moving in and I'm thinking okay, how much money did I give up to be here today? Not in a mean way, no, but I was like what projects, side projects could I have done that? I could have made extra money to be here, but I booked a day where I wasn't doing anything so I could go help you.
Speaker 2:And I was like you literally traded time to help me for money.
Speaker 1:Right, and that's what I always kind of look at. It's like I'm trading time for money.
Speaker 2:Because you could have told me I can't, because I need to. So and so and so and so.
Speaker 1:And probably I mean it's not like, yeah, so make sure money is always nice, but at the same time, for me I weighed out in my head and I was like, okay, I can go help Jess, which would be a huge help for her Right, which wound up having great conversations with two other of your coworkers. Yeah, that I actually loved and got to hang out with some other people.
Speaker 2:And then we helped out another coworker, my next door classroom neighbor, who was out of state until tomorrow, and we moved her furniture for her. She didn't even ask us to.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it actually turned out to be great. But that's where your mind was at. It was like, oh my gosh thank you.
Speaker 1:I was just like thank you for carrying this, literally carrying this load with me, and so far as a guy, I'm thinking would I give up to be here, and not in a bad way, but also too, it's just the way my mind works, yeah, and so I didn't say that to you until was like, yeah, we do, and here's what it cost us to be here. So just so, we know, I know, but you would have never said that, had I not.
Speaker 1:No, I would not. No, I would not have, no, because it's just a.
Speaker 2:it doesn't matter, but out of the list of things that we saw of highly functioning or highly productive teams, one of the big things was like a shared goal or shared vision.
Speaker 1:Well, for us as our and I know if you've listened to us any amount of time. If you haven't, this is your first one Thank you so much. Yeah, welcome. We've talked about creating a family culture. We have family values. We walked through how we did that. We walked through what we wanted, and those family values was our vision for what we wanted for our family, what we had in mind, and so for us, it was huge to think of as a team man if we're not hitting for the same thing.
Speaker 1:If we're not shooting for the same goal, how do you get there and not fight the entire?
Speaker 2:way, how do you expect to even make it?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's going to be kind of frustrating if you're thinking you want something else, I'm thinking I want something else and we never share that with anyone and we don't ever make that vocal. Yeah, how in the world are we ever going to know? So it's like the shared vision and values kind of goals thing was like— it kind of helped drive our purpose as a couple and then as a family too, yes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like I mean just one of the basic things. Like we've had a mutual goal of raising children, even before we met each other, like we wanted. This is a phrase we use. We wanted to raise likable, contributing members of society.
Speaker 1:Yes, I've told, I've literally told every single one of our kids that statement to their face yeah, this is my goal for you. I love you and I care about you, but this is what I want you to. This is my goal. Is it lacking? Is it beautiful? Is it romantic?
Speaker 2:No, it's not. It's very basic, because then they get to choose what they do with it. But just the basic like be a likable person because you're going to be in the world. And not only are you going to be in the world, but like you're you when you enter the adulting world. You are a reflection of how we raised you, whether you like it or not.
Speaker 1:Yeah, parents, let me let you in on a little secret. Your kids are just like you the good parts the the bad parts, whether you like it or not. Look at them and still look in the mirror.
Speaker 2:yeah, sometimes, especially when they're young adults yeah, when they're young adults and you're watching them learn how to do life, it is like a neon sign yeah the pieces and parts of you that transfer to them of what they pick up on. So that's why I was I'm still really still really thankful that that's a goal that we had and still have. I mean, we're still trying to help as much as we can navigate the adult children, yeah we have no idea what we're doing with that? We don't know, literally.
Speaker 1:Trying to figure that out. That's an episode from maybe 200. When we get there.
Speaker 2:Who knows?
Speaker 1:So allow me a moment to jump on a soapbox, okay, from maybe 200 when we get there, who knows? Allow me a moment to jump on a soapbox. Okay, because you and I both came in. You can probably speak to this too, coming from a divorced family. Now I'm a single dad with two kids.
Speaker 2:You were, you're not currently.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was yes, at some point I've saw, I've seen this, so I've seen this so many times. Uh, and I actually, if you're not careful, you can be a part of it. We have so many single parents who parent out of guilt.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Um, because their kids went through a really traumatic, horrible situation, whatever that may be, and so, as a parent, you want to try to help your kid through that. Well, you sometimes just lose all boundaries and you become like you want to be the. You want to be loved, you want to be um. A lot of times. Sometimes we parent not out of just out of guilt, but out of, like, the bad parts of who we are, like I don't want my kids to love me, I just want them to be Right, I want them to be so. I'm going to give them whatever they want. I'm going to do these things. I'm not going to correct them, if I can give you any. If you're a single parent, you're out there and you're like bro, I'm trying to figure this out and this is tough, just like you're raising your kids.
Speaker 2:You need boundaries for your own self too, correct?
Speaker 1:Yeah, Because it's almost like the kids rule the rules to everything goes whatever the kids want, the kids get and I get, I totally get it, I 100% get it.
Speaker 2:We do, because when we got married and blended our families, I could have parented out of the oh well Thomas and Aaron Grace. Their dad died, so I need to make sure, make them feel like they're the most important people in the world. You could have parented out of Callie and Cody. You know they have divorced parents. I need to make them feel like they are the most important people in the world, but and but collectively to you and I. The four, you, you people tend to go overboard when you just don't need to.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, because have some boundaries. Yes, give it some thought. If you're out there, give it a little bit of thought. Yeah, as far as your goals and as far as your vision of what you want your kids to be giving you. I always say this sometimes and my kid I heard Thomas make this statement the other day and it just made me smile because I always tell the kids, just because you can doesn't mean you should, oh yeah. And I always used to tell my kids just because you have the money to buy it doesn't mean you should buy it.
Speaker 2:Right. Just because you can go, do that doesn't mean you should do that, and he did use that phrase the other day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's just one of those things, too, that we try to instill into them is like there's boundaries for everything and so with your goals and your life, even with your kids, for us we had that shared goal with our kids to be like, hey, I love you guys, but what I'm trying to raise you to be responsible adults, contributing responsible adults, so you can go out and be a part of society and contribute, and I know you're going to leave here.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but the key word in what you just said is a shared goals and vision. Yes, Because had you been the only one that had the shared goals and vision to raise them to be likable contributing members of society to leave our nest, Meanwhile I would have been just kind of marinating in my role as mom and just been okay with being there, not even thinking about them leaving. I wouldn't have been thinking about you and I as a couple. So that was a really big shared goal and vision that we had as a couple, because we kept in the forefront of our mind that these guys are going to leave us.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I said that once. I said it a million times.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I know that we've talked about that in a different episode. I don't want to harp on this too much, but we had that shared goal and that shared vision while we were raising kids together.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we even had the shared goal and vision of financially or materialistically, where we wanted to be in life. We weren't chasing having the newest car, the biggest house.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:Those things. They never, really none of that stuff really mattered a whole lot to us.
Speaker 2:No, we've always, in the 13 years we've been together in three homes and however many vehicles or vacations or whatever, we've always been content with our standard of living. I mean, there are people that you know, you see on social media, and that is a biggest killer of a shared vision, I think, because you can see, oh, so-and-so, she just upgraded her ring or so-and-so, they just went to wherever on a vacation or they just got a new house or whatever the case may be. If you're not content and you don't share that vision and goal for yourselves as a family or a couple, that can get really cloudy.
Speaker 1:Really fast.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I think the problem with that is is that you're judging your life and your life goals and your life vision with your family off of the highlights of somebody else's highlight reel.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:So it's almost like yeah, but what's real life, right? What does it really look like and, in the grand scheme of things, what does that really mean?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we've been content with plenty and we've been content with little.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and we shared that last week about sometimes we had little Right, little little.
Speaker 2:But how did we get there though?
Speaker 1:How did we get where?
Speaker 2:To be okay with that. The contentment part how did we get there?
Speaker 1:That's a good question.
Speaker 2:I know, and how have we remained there? Not only did we get there, but we've remained there.
Speaker 1:I think for me it wasn't like I've never really been attached to stuff.
Speaker 2:No, you haven't.
Speaker 1:It's just not my. It's not a huge draw for me.
Speaker 2:I had a phase where I wanted new cars.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you went. You've had way more new cars than I have I have and I don't really care much about a car. It's like I don't care as long as it gets me some, but even my quote-unquote new car was not like luxurious no, no, no, they've always been very reasonable practical yeah and to the point.
Speaker 1:So it's been a um you know to. To that we've said, okay, we, okay, we can do those things, but also, too, it's we could. I don't I care. Here's the thing for me. I love adventure, yeah, and I love.
Speaker 2:Experiences.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love the experience. For me, the experience and the people I'm with is more valuable than any nice car, nice thing you can buy me, like you right now, if you, if you, if you made me happy and you said, hey, I got you and a few friends, I've lined up a trip for you guys to go climb Kilimanjaro in Africa for this for this time I would do.
Speaker 2:I would lose my you would lose your mind.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that that would excite me. So like that makes me excited to go have an experience with some of my friends climb this highest mountain in Africa. It's just cool. But I also love just trying new things, like I want to try new things For the adventure. It doesn't have to be the most elaborate thing, and I think for us we've just kind of shared that through our lives. I think we just when we met, we kind of shared that idea for life.
Speaker 2:What actually means something Right, and it may be because of what our life experience is.
Speaker 1:And if you're on the opposite end, you're like, bro, I love my stuff, that's okay too, love your stuff. If, on the opposite end, you're like, bro, I love my stuff, that's okay too, love your stuff.
Speaker 2:If that's where you get it, then love your stuff. And some of my friends might be my personal friends. Well, you carry a name brand purse. Well, I mean I do, but also I sell other ones and I save up for it. I mean there are things that, if you know me personally, there are things that I do like that are stuff I don't want to say like we're living in a tent.
Speaker 1:We don't we have a nice place.
Speaker 2:We do.
Speaker 1:And so that's not even what we're talking about.
Speaker 2:No, we're not poor mouthing. We're just talking about what actually holds value For us, for us.
Speaker 1:And so for you as a couple, you just need to figure out that.
Speaker 2:That balance, that value the goals yeah, what's?
Speaker 1:your purpose. What's your vision for your family? Okay, that's going to make the teamwork.
Speaker 2:So we spent longer on that one than we meant to.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we did All right Second off.
Speaker 2:The second thing about teamwork makes the dream work is communication.
Speaker 1:How many times are you going to make that's such a 90s phrase? It's so, but I can't help it.
Speaker 2:I can't help it, because it's real Communication. Duh, We've done a whole. We've done a whole. Several podcasts on that yeah of communication.
Speaker 1:If you're new here, go search back through. Look at communication.
Speaker 2:find some of those. Be okay with learning your communication style. We've talked about this too in the past too, that like I had to learn which I didn't realize it until I married a man that's really good at communicating that I sucked at it and I had to learn and be okay with that, but then I also had to learn to move forward. So you have to be okay with learning about your communication style and be okay with it. You still sometimes struggle with that.
Speaker 1:my thinking is different, like my process of thinking, not your thinking, it's your process.
Speaker 2:Process of thinking is slower than yours.
Speaker 1:It's kind of like don't take this the wrong way, oh no. So it's kind of like if you've got a macbook and you bought one of the very first macbooks that's out there and you bought the newest version of it, and it's like snappy, quick, fast, and you're sitting there waiting and you see the little rainbow circle pops up and it's just going. Sometimes, when I'm having conversations with jess, the rainbow circle pops up and I'm just like looking at her. I'm not Like how long are we going to do this? I'm not Not in a mean, I just I get it that it's frustrating for you, I'm not mentally slow, no, no, no, not at all.
Speaker 1:That's not what I mean.
Speaker 2:But it just. I need time to process and, yeah, your brain works way different and way faster than mine, but we talked about this today. We did.
Speaker 1:And this is the way we, this is how we see, this is how we process information Right. It's very, very different and if you're a couple out there and you do this, please talk about it with your spouse, please.
Speaker 2:Because it's incredibly helpful. And it can be incredibly frustrating if you don't actually talk through it.
Speaker 1:Because, Jess, when we were starting the podcast, she wanted to make sure everything was laid out, everything was done. I was like, nope, let's get some microphones, let's record one, and then afterwards let's go holy crap, what did we do wrong? Let's fix that. Let's don't do that again.
Speaker 2:Let's move forward and we tried that with the first episode and to you you're like, oh, that was awesome. And to me I was like that was a train wreck because I had no idea where we were going.
Speaker 1:And so what we do is the way I like to do things is let's do that, let's figure out what didn't work, let's make those changes, let's keep moving forward. As long as we're moving forward, as long as we're trying to, we're growing and this is for our relationship too let's try something. If that didn't work, okay, let's don't do that, let's do this and make changes as we go. You like to have everything laid out, and so that's where we butt heads. Yes, when it comes to that. So, if you're, that's where we have those tension points for us, because I'm like no, no, no, let's just try it and see. And you're like I don't want to.
Speaker 2:I don't want to because I don't know. Yes, because I don't know what's going to happen. I want to work it out before we try it. I want to have. Well, if you're watching us on YouTube, you'll see there's a notebook in front of me which I figured out after the first episode. If I could have a loose outline of kind of where we're going and the notes probably wouldn't make sense to anybody else, but they make perfect sense to me you don't need them, but I do because that's the way I think I need to know where I'm going. And you're like oh, I'll fly by the seat of my pants and it's going to be awesome.
Speaker 1:And sometimes it is and sometimes it's not.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:But I don't want to take that I enjoy that I enjoy the um the risk of. We just had this conversation. We're my mom's for memorial day, we're cooking out, doing a home memorial day thing. Yes, and we were talking about a situation, a fun situation. She goes. Well, that sounds very dangerous, sounds like you get hurt. I was like, yeah, that's what makes it exciting and like that's what makes it fun for you and I was like no, that what.
Speaker 2:That's what makes it terrifying and I would never try it for me.
Speaker 1:I'm like, if there's no risk of getting hurt, I don't really want to do that. What fun is that when?
Speaker 2:you were going to work with me. This morning we were hearing on the radio the man was talking about the tent camping you can do when you're hanging off the side of a mountain in a tent. And I was like absolutely not. And you were like that's so cool. I'm like, wow, we could not be more different. But, you got to be okay with feedback because, like I, have to be okay with you telling me that's actually called bivvying.
Speaker 1:When you bivvy on the side of a mountain, that's what it is.
Speaker 2:Again your vocabulary. Like I said, triangulate and as a crow flies. You knew that word and I never heard it in my life. So anyway, smarty pants.
Speaker 1:That's nice. I lived in that world for a while.
Speaker 2:When you're communicating, though, you've got to be okay that you think differently.
Speaker 1:Right, you process different.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you've got it. I don't know that with your consultant mind, when I'm saying think different, and you're like no process different, Like those don't mean different things to me, but they do to you.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:So let's say you have to be okay that your thinking process Does that work.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that works, I can get behind that. Okay, I can get behind that.
Speaker 2:Okay, and you have to be okay with feedback on that.
Speaker 1:Right, bad feedback and good feedback.
Speaker 2:Right, but then that brings you together to kind of collaborate on things, and teamwork makes dream work.
Speaker 1:I get to say it again oh my gosh, stop, Please stop saying that yeah.
Speaker 2:I'll try to make that be the last time.
Speaker 1:Thank you.
Speaker 2:So you had a suggestion, though for some of our friends that listen about, with some communication. I'm pointing at it on my piece of paper. I see you pointing at it Once a week in-depth conversation, oh yeah, yeah yeah, we were talking about conversation where, like, what's the—I always want to know?
Speaker 1:like and this may be just the way my mind works, because I'm like what's the standard? Like when we started a podcast, I was like, I mean, what does a podcast really do? Like how I don't know if we're okay or we're doing all right, or should we just sell all this stuff and quit? Should we not? Should we sell, like, should we keep going? And so I'm looking at like what's the standard for that? You may be thinking in your mind. You're like communication. I talk to her every day. I say hello in the morning.
Speaker 2:I say goodnight at night. Is that not enough? No, it's not, I'll tell you. Thank you.
Speaker 1:So it's almost like what's the standard and there's no set standard for how that looks.
Speaker 2:What it works for everybody.
Speaker 1:Yeah because it's different. Even, it's different for Jess and I, like Jess is at school, she's a school teacher, I do real estate and I do handyman fixture kind of stuff around, and so I don't get to spend a ton of time with people, right? And so when Jess comes home I want to use all my words, and she's used all her words already.
Speaker 2:My word bank is depleted by the time I get home.
Speaker 1:And so sometimes that's a struggle for us and that saying you should be sitting down with your significant other in this relationship, whether you're newly married, married for 25 years.
Speaker 2:Or you're just dating and trying to figure it out, yeah.
Speaker 1:You ought to be having at least one kind of like sit down in depth, deep conversation once a week, not every day, not every other day.
Speaker 1:If you're doing once a week, you're doing great, you're ahead of the curve. Just making sure. Those are the things like hey, are we okay, are we good? Tell me about your week. Tell me what was a good thing, tell me what was a good thing, tell me what was a bad thing. Tell me what could I do better, like ask the questions in the sense of not like you suck you this, you need to do this better, you need to do that. I'm like because when you go into a conversation thinking I'm asking how do?
Speaker 1:I? How am I better? How can I be a better husband? Yeah, how can I communicate better? How can I? Because I'm, if you're, if you're out there in your human, you're going to screw it up trust me, because we all screw it up yeah, uh, it's just part of who we are.
Speaker 1:so ask those questions in the sense of, and have those at least once a week. At least once a week, whatever that may look like, um, however that may work. Um, ours have changed over the years, yeah, and they've changed. Your communication style will change, your personality will change, how you do, life will change. We've been married. This is 13 years.
Speaker 2:Coming up on 13.
Speaker 1:Coming on 13 years so everything changes, so be okay with that.
Speaker 2:But then that reverts back to the shared goals and vision to grow together.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:And that's hard to do at different phases. It is hard to do so. The third area we kind of went back and forth between two so we decided to put them together.
Speaker 1:So I don't know that. We decided to put them together. We're going to you. Just wrote them on the book together.
Speaker 2:I wrote it down on my outline, because this is one of those tension points where we're butting heads.
Speaker 1:She said the third biggest thing that makes great teamwork and makes good teams is trust. I said, the thing that makes good teams work is leadership. Yes, and you said no, we, you, and so it was like which comes first.
Speaker 2:We went back and forth because it was like I have to trust you that you're going to lead our family in the right direction, and you said well, if you don't watch me lead, how are you going to trust me? It was kind of a both and you said well, it's kind of like a chicken or the egg conversation. And then producer Michael said it's kind of like if you look at a house, what's more important, the roof or the walls?
Speaker 1:Right. So you can't have one without the other.
Speaker 2:Like you, can't have chicken without egg.
Speaker 1:You can have walls with no roof, but you're going to get wet, so you can't have a roof with no walls.
Speaker 2:Right. So that's why we were like, okay, well, let's just put them together Trust and leadership. Well, I said, I said that we're going to put them together.
Speaker 1:So here's the thing about leadership. No one likes to talk about this. In a relationship, there is someone leading in your relationship, whether you've been married for five minutes or five years or 50 years somebody's leading that relationship. Now, when I say leadership, don't get the bad taste in your mouth of being like I live under a dictatorship. That's not what I'm talking about. Dictatorship and leadership are two different things, and we can dig into that one time if you'd like to but we're not tonight.
Speaker 2:Well, to refer back again to shared goals and vision, you should be okay with whoever is taking the leadership role of your family if you have a shared vision and goal.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because there are certain things that I'm probably not probably I know I'm good at. There's certain things you're really good at.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:And so you lead in certain parts of our relationship, I lead in certain parts of our relationship. The fact is is that, and then sometimes we lead together yeah, and sometimes I take more of a lead than you do when it comes to what is our shared vision. Where are we going?
Speaker 2:What are we going to do? That's because I trust you while you're having the leadership role. That's why I said we.
Speaker 1:That's why you have both, and most likely, though, like you're not going to, like I'm not going to go, man Jess is leading. I just trust her. I just trust that she's going to do what. Trust is one of those things that takes time. It takes, experience it takes and there will be lapses of trust. There will be, there'll be gaps, there'll be some of those things where you're like I trusted you and you screwed this up and that's going to happen, right, and that's just called life, that's just called being in a relationship.
Speaker 2:Well, for us, a part of the foundation of our relationship is because of your past experience. You had to learn that you can trust me, that I am who I say I am. But that was like basic before we even did life together.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So I mean trust comes in different forms.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So I mean it's okay to use the word leadership in your marriage, in your relationships.
Speaker 2:Now, whether you lean towards like the biblical, you know the husband is the head of the household and you know the wife should obey, and those things which I'm comfortable with with that role, just because that's kind of the world that we live in, where we where our marriage kind of lives, kind of where our marriage lives in a Christian marriage, but not everybody's there.
Speaker 1:That's true, but it's also one of those things too. We get caught up on those whole. I see you as me like we're one, Like if we talk about hey, when we say I do, we become one person, Right. So when I say something mean to you, I'm saying that mean thing to myself.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:It's we go back to if you want to take the biblical stance of that. In the Bible it even talks about you love your wife as you love yourself. Yeah, jesus' commandment, like even when in his commandment, where he says, hey, this is one of the greatest commandments you love your neighbor as you love yourself, mm-hmm, and that's a huge thing, like you've got to know who you are and love that.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And embrace those things, the good, the bad, the ugly.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm Love that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and embrace those things the good, the bad, the ugly but also to be open to the person you're in the relationship with, to go. This is who I am, yeah, but also, too, if you're in that relationship and it's violent and you're being hurt or you're being, that's not okay.
Speaker 2:That's not leadership.
Speaker 1:Like call and get help, get out. Yeah, Don't live in that relationship period.
Speaker 2:Because, no matter what belief system you're in, that's not okay.
Speaker 1:No, there's no reason someone should be violent toward another person. Period in that relationship, None Get out, yes. So trust and leadership are two things that we feel like are kind of hand in hand. Yeah, that move together. So talk about work through, figure those things out yeah, and let's get to our unpack session. Yeah, About how? What does this mean? What does this look like? Let's unpack it and we may roll through these pretty quick so you guys can.
Speaker 1:Yes, but if you got something you want to take notes if you want to just refer back to this.
Speaker 2:This is kind of the application portion, because we've got some not challenge points, but just some thinking points, right, if you'd like to apply anything that we've said in this episode. So back to the first point of shared goals or shared vision you were talking about. What do you want to be, as a couple or as a family? Yeah, what do you?
Speaker 1:want your like as a couple as a male as a female in your couple, whatever your couple status may look like wherever you're at.
Speaker 1:Yeah, ask yourself as a couple what do we want to be Like? What do we want to look like, do we want to have? Because here's the thing, like I had some guys that I talked to one time and he goes man, I we want to have. Because here's the thing, like I had some guys that I talked to uh one time and he goes man, I just want to go, I just want to go make six figures, I want to go make $250,000 a year. And I was like awesome.
Speaker 1:Great you can go do that. Just let me tell you there's a cost to that. There's a cost to everything Like, and it's going to cost you some time. It's going to cost you some energy, it's going to cost you time away from people and things you want. If that's what you want, then go get it. My question to you would be like why do you want it? So why Ask the question why? Simon Snick said it Sorry, not Snick, but Simon said it best. When a book we wrote is, you said, start With why, which is a phenomenal book, if you haven't read it, it's a great book. It If you haven't, read.
Speaker 2:it's a great book. It's called Start With why yes?
Speaker 1:The whole title of the book is Start With why. The whole idea is why are you doing certain things with your family? Yeah, what's the why behind that? Yeah, why are you pursuing the jobs you're pursuing? Why do you want to live in that house? Why do you want to drive that car?
Speaker 2:Why do you want to live?
Speaker 1:and have those certain vacations.
Speaker 2:Why do you want to say yes to your kids doing 500 things?
Speaker 1:Yeah, what's the why? Yeah, what's the why behind it?
Speaker 2:And the why changes as you go through life.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, it will change, mm-hmm, 100%, it will change, Just give it time and how you're going to get to the why changes too. Yeah, yeah so have that let's start with those questions. Yeah, that let's start with those questions. Yeah, like, what do we want for our family?
Speaker 2:and why do we want that? And then what are our goals? To get there and then the next area is communication. When we were talking through this, uh, we were talking about how you will mess up when you're communicating oh, a thousand percent, if you're talking you're communicating, you're listening, you're listening, or you're going to screw it up a thousand percent. But the and part of it is and reflect.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:Like I need to own when I don't communicate properly and then say, okay, how should I do that differently next time?
Speaker 1:Yeah, what did I? Because there's been times where we've had intense fellowship and we've looked back at it and communication and go, okay, why did we do that? Like, what happened? What triggered that? Yeah, what started that?
Speaker 2:Or we've picked out specific phrases or things like when you said this, what did you mean? Because what I heard was blah, blah, blah, but the intent behind it was not that, and that's happened on both of our parts.
Speaker 1:A thousand percent.
Speaker 2:A lot of times.
Speaker 1:Communication is being able to listen and reflect.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:But listen in the fact that sometimes it's not always great reflection that you may be like yeah, I screwed that up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and be patient with the listening and be patient with the reflecting.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for each other. Communication is not just talking, it's also listening.
Speaker 2:Speaking of like learning as you're going through life, because you learn while you're communicating and you're learning to be patient and you're learning each other's communication style. Yeah, that producer Michael shared too, that 42 percent of college graduates do not read another book after graduating.
Speaker 1:That stat is insane to me. I'm a learner, I love to learn.
Speaker 2:You are definitely a lifelong learner. That's the education phrase.
Speaker 1:And that's things that intrigue me. The other day I watched a thing I kept hearing AI agents, AI agents. I was like what is that? So I dug a deep dive one night into two or three nights in a row, not just one.
Speaker 2:Your sleeping patterns are not something that reverts back when we were on live earlier of the part of your routine that I would want to participate in. Your sleeping patterns are not it.
Speaker 1:No, I get intrigued in something and I can't sleep, and so I just dig, dig, dig, dig, and so I was really curious what is that? How does it work? How do you do that? How do you create that? How does it happen? I just, I'm intrigued by certain things, and so learning is a thing for me. Like I try to read a book all the time, I'm trying to read as much as I can. Mine are not fun fictional books, I love business books.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's what I was about to say. I love leadership books. Your books that you read for pleasure are always learning books.
Speaker 2:Yes it's something that I can walk away. That's applicable to my life Versus for my own self. I read a lot at work, and there are different professional learning curriculum that we do together at work that are learning books for us because we're at work. So when I get to read for pleasure, it's nonsense. It could be murder mysteries, it could be like Southern fiction. It's just literally nonsense. And so when we're, our reading patterns are very different too.
Speaker 1:You talked me into doing that one time. You're like, just read this book and I was like I don't want to read that book because there's nothing that I'm going to walk away with.
Speaker 2:That's just fun for me. I promise you you're going to love it.
Speaker 1:I need something I can go use, and what I've realized in my life as I'm getting older, I I don't say this in an arrogant way I am well-educated in what I should do. I'm lacking in the part to just go do it.
Speaker 2:For the fun of it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like there's part of me that's just like okay, I know what to do, Just go do it. Just go do some of those things it varies in different areas of your life.
Speaker 2:As far as adventure, go, do, go out in the world, go, do it right. Adventure seeking.
Speaker 1:you're all in, like I'm in my I'm this is me. I'm in my 50s, like early 50s, okay, so just give me, give me some grace. But I bought a longboard because I wanted to learn how to longboard, because it's like surfing and it just looks fun. And it's a looks fun and it's a lot of fun. Longboarding is a lot of fun and I just want to do it. So it's just weird things like that.
Speaker 2:So communicating and reflecting and learning, like be a learner, but the reason why I brought up the— Like being a T1 thing in communication is be learning.
Speaker 2:Which is why I was about to say the reason why that statistic that Michael told us about is because you got to be okay with being you. Well, you need to seek after being a lifelong learner about your own self and the world around you. Right, because if you're just stuck in who you are, it's okay to be confident in who you are, but if you're stuck there and it's not working, you've got to be okay with being a learner.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you've got to change it.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:If you don't change it, nobody's going to.
Speaker 2:Side note if you're watching and you want to participate in this we're talking about books and reading maybe send us a DM or comment somewhere.
Speaker 1:Yeah, just put a comment in one of our many platforms.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a book that's impacted you as an adult, as a lifelong learner. If there's a book that's been meaningful for you to learn about yourself or for you to learn about how the world around you and how that works, I mean, I'd love to know about it.
Speaker 1:And I know that you definitely would, because that's his jam.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, if there's a book that you would like to share with everyone, or just us, I would love to hear about that, Because I mean, I was talking about my, because Producer Michael and I were talking about because summer's coming up for me, Tomorrow's my last official working day for a few weeks, and he was like what are you going to do? Do you just do all the things? I'm like I don't do anything. Like my favorite thing to do in the summer is to go to the public library and check out books and on my tablet I have unlimited reading subscription of like I can read as much as I want to. I'll read like three or four books a week, sometimes one in a day, Like I don't want to do anything but just read and just kind of be. But anyway, side note, we want to know what you're reading.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let us know what your favorite book is.
Speaker 2:And then the last category that we talked about was trust and leadership. The big deal is that there's not really one leader in all the areas of your relationship, or there shouldn't be.
Speaker 1:Right, I don't think. I don't think so either. So, like, take some time, sit down with your significant other and just say what do we, what do you lead in, what are you good at leading?
Speaker 2:out.
Speaker 1:What do you think I'm good at leading out and let's figure it out together over, maybe finances, maybe it's leading the kids, leading the family, maybe it's whatever it may look like those areas.
Speaker 2:Like for us. I've always, from day one, I've been scheduling calendar, Like when the kids were little and they were doing four different things at four different times. I had a calendar, big calendar. Everybody was color-coded of where we needed to be and who was doing what where. And still today, when it's just you and I and we're scheduling life with all the things and the kids and now granddaughter, scheduling is my thing and you trust me with that 100%.
Speaker 1:I handle the financial part of that, the vision and where we're going direction. We kind of share that a little bit, like we constantly talk about what we want out of life, what we want to be, what we're after, what are our really goals for, like, as we get older?
Speaker 2:in life, a couple and for family, yeah.
Speaker 1:And so that's just one of those things we just share and talk through constantly, because it will change.
Speaker 2:It will. So sit down and talk about that together, because if you don't share that goal of where you're going, then why are you going there?
Speaker 1:yeah, it's gonna be rough yeah, just so you know. So with what's tonight, tonight, uh, or this afternoon. Just, thank you so much for taking time to join us as we dig into. I mean, you're on a team. If you're in a relationship, you're in a team, uh, you're in that with them. So let's figure out how to be the best at it where we're at. How can we do that better? Yeah, if there's, if you got some suggestions or something you think we missed, shoot it to us, let us know. We are all ears.
Speaker 2:Because, like we recorded the last, the previous episode, we don't know what we're doing.
Speaker 1:No, we're here to try to create community and conversations around all these different things, so please be a part of it With you.
Speaker 2:Our listener, yes, yeah.
Speaker 1:And so if you're on live and you joined us, thank you so much for joining us live. We're just trying to figure that out If there's something we're going to do and be a part of. But thank you guys, just so you know when we end. I had this ridiculous goal for myself.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:That we would hit and a thousand downloads in a hundred different cities. And so we hit that this past weekend, which is really cool.
Speaker 2:Thank you, everybody.
Speaker 1:Yes, Thanks for all the people everywhere who are listening. Please, you know, if you think it's good and you like it, share it. If not, that's OK too. So maybe it's not your cup of tea, but that's all right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's nice to me that that many people in that many places in the world in our country that actually listen to us. So thank you.
Speaker 1:Yeah and we really, really appreciate it. So, man, keep going, keep unpacking, keep digging in and we'll see you guys next time. Thank you.
