In our concluding part, I will be talking about how your marriage can move up on the level of communication and become an intimate couple. The goal in every marriage should be to know each other and be as intimate with your spouse as much as possible.
We stopped at level 3 communication. Today, we will be looking at levels 4 and 5.
Level 4: Emotional Talk.
‘Let me tell you, How I feel’.
In this fourth level of Communication, we share our feelings. When our feelings are shared, we share ourselves. Because we are what and how we feel.
We are simply making ourselves vulnerable. When we share with our mate how we feel, the intention is not whether we are right or wrong. We mostly don’t want to be judged because of how we feel. We just need our spouse to listen, understand and accept that, thats the way we feel.
We kill intimacy when we are quick to judge the feeling. Am not saying we should not correct but first acknowledge your spouse feelings.
It is difficult for most people to share their feelings than their thoughts. These are 2 very different things
‘I feel that guy is a thief’. ‘I feel, the car will break down’ ‘I am thinking the issue with the woman is not natural’.
When you share your feelings you are expressive. When you don’t share your deepest feelings, a path of you is left hidden or covered. When you share your feelings, you are vulnerable, open, unashamed, no inhibitions.
Couple should aim at growing together into this fourth level of Communication, to enjoy a higher level of intimacy.
There is still the fifth level which is highest level of Communication.
Level 5 of Communication.
Loving, Genuine Truth Talk
‘Let’s Be Honest’.
This level allows us to speak the truth in love. It is a place of honesty without condemnation.
Most couples are finding out that such open, honest and loving communication enhances a much deeper level of intimacy. Where couples can share their feelings and thoughts without feeling unsafe. Both have a sense of safety and security. This requires an attitude of acceptance.
You know your spouse understands you even if they don’t agree with you.
We can always agree to disagree without shaming ourselves or making us look like less smart.
We can have differing opinions and still be friends. No hurts, no guilt, no condemnation and we are still good to go.
We can’t be the same. Remember, acceptance is the key.
We may start out on the first level of Communication, bit please don’t let us remain there.
As a couple we should aim at moving higher in the way we relate, understand and communicate with each other.
This will require certain level of work and being intentional about getting to understand your spouse.
The higher we grow in our Kevel of communicating with ourselves the more intimate we grow with our spouse.
I pray God will grant us wisdom and grace and help is all to communicate better in Jesus name.
God bless our marriage.
CONFESSION FOR THE DAY I know how to communicate with my wife
PRAYER FOR THE DAY Lord, give me wisdom
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY Eph 5:22 KJV Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord.
We started on the topic “Five levels of communication” yesterday. We learned how important communication is in marriage. Not just anyhow communication but husbands and wives should dedicate time and attention to proper and effective ways to communicate with each other.
It can’t be over emphasised, that intimacy in marriage can only be brought as we grow from one level of communication to the other levels.
There are 5 levels of Communication.
1. The Halfway talker In this type of conversation, no intimacy is developed or worked at. This conversation doesn’t involve wanting to know the feeling or thought process or pattern of the other person. The conversation is on auto-drive.
You have a particular way of response to what is said or asked. Example, ‘How are you doing?’. ‘Fine’. ‘How are the kids?’ They have gone to school.’
The essence of communicating with each other is to develop intimacy. No deep communication, no intimacy. And intimacy is the essence of marriage. Why am I married if I can’t enjoy love, acceptance, understanding, oneness, sincerity, and transparency?
Every married couple, should aim at climbing the steps of communication to further develop the intimacy between them.
You can’t be involved in monosyllable answers and expect intimacy to be developed.
If couples are not careful or well discerning, 20 years of their married life will pass so quickly and they will discover they have not improved on their communication and that they are still in the ‘hallway’ method of communicating.
They were distracted by work, a busy schedule, distracted with the children and yet each spouse was just coping and not really pleased with each other.
The children are grown and they are now left with each other to deal with the hurts piled up for so many years and not talked about.
2. Reporter’s Talk This level is a step further than the first. Here, the conversation moves from general talks to talking or giving facts or information about events. It is a reported kind of talk.
Here, more information is given but stills this kind of conversation does not promote intimacy. In level 2 communication, we do not express our opinions, thoughts, or how we feel about the subject matter.
If you are at this level 2 communication, your aim should be to move up and climb the steps of effective communication so that intimacy could be endangered.
Remember, level 2 communication is summarised, ‘Just give me the facts’.
Level 3: Intellectual Talk At this conversation level, your spouse is given the freedom to think differently. This is an amazing gift to give each other in marriage.
It is recognising the fact that each one of you is a unique individual with different perspective, view point and way of reasoning.
Marriage is trying to bring our way of thinking into alignment without suffocating the uniqueness of each others’ thinking. Two becoming one is choosing the best of our different thinking patterns and or merging our different opinions till we arrive at the best alternative.
When we recognize our weaknesses and strengths and know that each one of us has a role and part to play and that neither of us is superior to another, we will honor each other and give each other the opportunity to air our opinions.
This type of conversation is not just limited to a ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ answer. The wife’s or husband’s opinion is needed and necessary.
Example,
‘Are the children eating rice this afternoon?’ ‘I don’t think it will be the best option for them. They need more vegetables in their diet’.
It is important to note that, the question, what do you think about….is so important in husband wife conversations.
Your husband or wife’s opinion matters and don’t want them feeling like they are not smart. If the wife is just accepting every decision made and not really a part of the decision-making process and involved in the intellectual aspect of thinking through, there will eventually be problems later on in the marriage.
I will continue on the levels of communication tomorrow by Gods grace.
May God grant us more understanding in Jesus name. God bless our marriage
CONFESSION FOR THE DAY I know how to communicate with my wife
PRAYER FOR THE DAY Lord, give me wisdom
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY Eph 5:22 KJV Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord.
There are five levels of communication in marriage. Communication is simply talking, but of cause, there are more things involved than just talking. A healthy conversation involves not just what is said but what is heard.
In essence, communication is a two-way conversation that involves speaking and hearing. The two spouses must form the conscious habit of allowing the other spouse to express himself or herself. While he/ she speaks, the other partner should be actively listening.
Not listening for pleasure, not listening for information but should practice empathic listening. This is putting yourself in the conversation. Trying to understand and feel the impulse of the speaker.
It is unhealthy to dominate a conversation without waiting at intervals to get feedback, to check whether your hearer is hearing the right thing, to know how he/she is processing the information. The aim of your conversation, especially in marriage, is for your partner to understand what you are saying and then obey you.
Listening should not also be done with the intention of giving a reply that will defend your status or what you represent in the marriage covenant.
I think we cannot also have a good conversation with our spouse if our interpretation of what marriage is, is defective. Until we see our marriage from the viewpoint of it being a covenant relationship, every other thing becomes loop-sided.
What we see most couples practicing is a contract and not covenant marriage. This is so important. It is a contract (which could be unwritten and informal) when the marriage is based on mutual benefit. That is, we are both doing something for each other.
For example, I will be nice to you, if you bring in enough money. Or, if you help out in the house, I will prepare the meals. The opposite obtains if your spouse doesn’t do what is expected. I will be very cold and unresponsive to you if you hurt my feelings. I will be uncaring to you if you disrespect me.
Marriage is a covenant in which each partner takes up his/her responsibility. The wife is to submit fully. The husband takes up his responsibility to love her like Christ does irrespective of what she does. It is the aim of a covenant relationship to please and serve the other person despite what he/ she does.
It’s kind of difficult right? Very hard. Especially if you have been to some school of hardknocks where you have been deeply hurt.
If you are starting on a clean note and you have this understanding, how blessed you are.
No matter how farther away we have gone, in Christ there is always a way out. He shows us and leads us in the way since He is the way.
We need to retrace our steps and in humility, accept what works. When a marriage is not working, both partners are responsible. It is not just one person’s fault but the two parties have their contributing factors.
Tomorrow, I will attempt to summarize the five levels of communication. A further read is encouraged on the subject of communication especially by the best-selling author Gary Chapman.
I am sure you will find it rewarding and worth your while.
God bless your marriage.
CONFESSION FOR THE DAY I know how to communicate with my wife
I have had people tell me that their husbands are too jealous, too jealous for their liking. The wives complain that this action is irritating. Well, I have come to know that if husbands are made to feel insecure, they become suspicious and may become overly jealous.
A husband is jealous because he loves and is not sure of the wife’s commitment into the relationship. When a husband is jealous or feels threatened, he begins to ask suspicious questions, snoops around, acts like a detective, scroll around the wife’s phone and does all sorts.
A husband and wife that has been away all day and hardly talk when they come home at night, gives room for such. The husband begins to feel, he is just there. No meaningful communication.
When there is no communication adequately, there is room for all kinds of unhealthy thoughts. Husbands and wives as a matter of fact must talk about everything. That is why whatever may prevent adequate communication should be avoided. The wife and husband should avoid bitterness of any sort, by talking about hurts immediately.
The issue of submission is also important. When a wife is not submissive to her husband, it gives him the opportunity to be jealous. If a wife does not adequately defer to her husband, it makes him insecure and threatened. He is insecure of his role as the husband.
A husband can take anything but if anything threatens his position as the rightful husband, he can’t take it.
The role of the wife is to always make her husband feel secured as the husband and the head of the home. She should defer to him in everything. She should feed his ego and give him his place as the head of the union between them.
She should defer to her in terms of finances, her job, her friends, her dressing, her looks, her family member, and everything in general. If your husband is not comfortable with something or someone, then let it be over with that thing, until he says it is okay.
This is a simple way to avoid problems at home and make your husband feel secure. As the wife, you have to protect him. Protect his interest and his ideals. I know of a woman who has a multinational company. By that, it means she would be in control of money, power and people. Normally, any husband married to her should feel threatened.
It is the place of the wife to make her husband feel secured. That is exactly what this woman did. The husband is so secured and contended. She placed her husband first before anyone and anything. That’s the way it should be.
I know there are some very difficult husbands and very overly jealous. How do you handle such? Well, I believe the same thing goes for every kind of husband. You make them feel secured until they feel over secured.
You cannot make your husband feel secured if you don’t talk to him. You must make communication a matter of priority. Your talking to him, means you defer to him by default. You tell him everything and ask him everything.
God bless your marriage
CONFESSION FOR THE DAY I defer to my husband
PRAYER FOR THE DAY God help me to do the right things
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY Pro 31:28Her children arise up, and call her blessed; her husband [also], and he praiseth her.
Somebody was once asked what are the three most important ingredients of a relationship or marriage that would be successful. He simply gave them:
Communication
Communication
Communication I believe he was right!
Communication is powerful and is so essential. Right from the very first few seconds of a baby’s entrance into this world, there must be communication or the baby will be given some baby smacks to give out a sound! As a matter of fact, communication, in an unexplainable way begins right from the embryonic stage of the baby in its mother’s womb. When communication in a relationship or marriage nosedives, the consequences show up immediately. In every relationship and marriage, there are levels of communication that must be explored to create a balance.
1. Communication with your maker No matter how good you are with communication or how adept you are in relating with others, if you have not first communicated with your maker, all the efforts will be futile. You see, you need to understand this, as it is fundamental. Your success in a relationship or marriage is predicated on your relationship with God as a foundation. Do you know God? If you don’t know God first, you won’t be able to know him or her. For you to understand what love is and how to love appropriately, you have to know God first because God is love! When you say something like, “I don’t want to be spiritual,” you are not being true to yourself, because you are essentially a spirit! You are a spirit who thinks with a soul and lives in a body! The body is not the real you! That is why the body is here on earth and decays after the man dies. When a man dies, the real him escapes from the body and reports to God!
Marriage itself is spiritual, from the very day that God instituted it. To succeed therefore in such, you need to first retrace your steps and establish a deliberate relationship with God. This is why we often say that it is risky to marry a man or woman that doesn’t know God! Do you know that knowing God, reading His word regularly will help you from falling into the hands of the wrong spouse? You see that in the book of Proverbs where it says specifically that He will deliver you from the evil man and from the strange woman!
To deliver thee from the way of the EVIL MAN, from the man that speaketh froward things; (Proverbs 2:12 KJV) To deliver thee from the STRANGE WOMAN, even from the stranger which flattereth with her words; (Proverbs 2:16 KJV)
2. Communication with yourself The next stage is communication with yourself. Who are you? This answers the question of identity. Why are you here? This answers the question of purpose. This stage is important because if you don’t answer these questions before venturing into a relationship or marriage, you will end up frustrating him or her.
The questions of identity and purpose, if left unanswered would weary you and bring confusion as you begin to deal with another person. True love with yourself is a personal discovery of who you are and why you are here. If you don’t have true love for yourself, you cannot love another person. A person for example, who has answered the questions of identity and purpose, would not sleep around irresponsibly. The reality of who he or she is in God and the weight of his assignment would not allow him or her to misbehave. The gloriousness of his assignment would debar him from traveling down the road of compromise. When you know who you are, you will not try to get affirmations from the opposite sex who is looking for some lustful flings. When you know God’s plan for your life, the awesomeness of your future will prevent you from opening your legs to everybody that knocks! When a sense of purpose drives you, the fear of God will keep you from deceiving that guy or girl because of some paltry sums of money. When you know who you are, you won’t end up with a gut or girl in bed who you just met a few hours ago.
I challenge you this morning to seek the face of God in fasting and prayer to answer these questions. Who are you? Why are you here? Where is your location? There is a geographical milieu where you will thrive and flourish. Where is that place? You are a seed of God and every seed doesn’t grow everywhere. Before you travel or relocate to that country, have you been led by God? These are simple questions that will solve complex equations in your lives! May God grant more understanding! Wherever you are now, you can begin by talking to God and asking him these questions!
CONFESSION FOR THE DAY I will communicate right with my maker
PRAYER FOR THE DAY Lord, help me to do it right.
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY Prov 2:11-12 (NIV) Discretion will protect you, and understanding will guard you. Wisdom will save you from the ways of wicked men, from men whose words are perverse,
ACTION PLAN FOR THE DAY Study the word “communication”
