Episode 66. Time-Starved Marriage: Fighting for Connection in a Busy World
How to Reclaim Your Marriage from the Busyness of Life
In today’s fast-paced world, many couples find themselves operating more like co-managers of a household than romantic partners. Between work deadlines, soccer practice, homework, and endless to-do lists, marriages often get pushed to the background. As researchers and educators who study relationship dynamics, we’ve seen a troubling trend emerge: the rise of what seasoned therapist and educator, Dr. Mark Ogletree, calls time-starved marriages.
We recently had the opportunity to sit down with Mark and his wife Janie. Their insights into how busyness is crowding out connection in modern marriages were as eye-opening as they were practical.
The Pervasive Challenge of Busyness
Mark described a common pattern he sees in his therapy practice: couples overwhelmed by the sheer volume of demands on their time, leaving little room for their relationship to breathe. This "time scarcity" shows up in several familiar ways:
Work Demands: Many partners are spending more hours at the office or traveling for work than ever before, carving into the time that could be spent nurturing their connection.
Children’s Schedules: Competitive sports, music lessons, and extracurriculars often take center stage in family life, unintentionally sidelining the marriage.
Tech Distractions: Phones, TVs, and laptops might help us “unwind,” but they also interrupt moments of connection—what researchers call technoference.
Over time, these small disconnections add up. The relationship becomes less of a priority, and more of a background fixture.
The Child-Centered Trap
Janie Ogletree raised a particularly important cultural observation: many modern families operate from a child-centered model. The idea is noble—wanting to give our children the best. But when kids become the central organizing principle of the family, the marriage often becomes an afterthought.
As Janie wisely put it, “Our world should revolve around the marriage.”
Her point echoes ancient wisdom. Cicero once said, “Marriage is the first bond of society.” A thriving marriage doesn’t detract from your children’s wellbeing—it enhances it. Children benefit most when they grow up witnessing love, respect, and unity between their parents. In other words, a strong marriage is the most powerful gift we can give our children.
How to Reclaim Your Marriage from the Busyness of Life
The Ogletrees offer practical, battle-tested strategies for couples who want to push back against the tide of busyness and prioritize their relationship:
Schedule with Intention
Treat your marriage like your most important meeting of the week. Put regular date nights and couple time on the calendar and protect them as non-negotiable.Establish Rituals of Connection
Rituals don’t have to be grand. A 10-minute morning coffee chat, a daily text to say “I’m thinking of you,” or a weekly couple’s meeting can create rhythm and reliability in the relationship.Set Boundaries with Work, Kids, and Screens
It’s okay to say no—to another Zoom meeting, to one more activity, or to scrolling through Instagram at dinner. Decide what matters most, and set boundaries to protect it.Practice Small, Consistent Acts of Affection
You don’t need a grand romantic gesture. A kiss goodbye, a lingering hug, or a hand on the back while you’re making dinner sends the message: You matter to me.
Warning Signs of a Time-Starved Marriage
Dr. Ogletree warns that a lack of time together doesn’t just strain the relationship—it slowly erodes it. Some red flags to watch for include:
Feeling emotionally distant or apathetic
A noticeable drop in physical affection or sexual intimacy
Not missing each other during separations
These aren’t signs of a doomed relationship—but they are signals that it's time to recalibrate.
The Power of Intentionality
At the heart of the solution is this truth: great marriages don’t just happen—they’re built, deliberately and over time. As Dr. Ogletree put it, “We have to fight for our marriages and our families every week.”
That fight doesn’t have to be exhausting or dramatic. It can look like:
Sitting down once a week to align on your schedules and shared priorities
Choosing to go for a walk together instead of watching another show
Saying “no” to a good thing in order to say “yes” to the best thing—your marriage
It’s not about being perfect. It’s about being present. Consistency over time creates trust. Intentionality creates connection.
In a world that will never stop asking more of us, we must learn to guard what matters most. Your marriage is not just a relationship—it’s the foundation of your family and, ultimately, your legacy. So schedule the date. Send the text. Put down the phone. And remember: even in the busiest seasons, love can still grow—if we make space for it.
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Welcome to Marriage iQ, the podcast for the intelligent spouse.[00:00:08 - 00:00:10]
I'm Dr. Heidi Hastings.[00:00:10 - 00:00:12]
And I'm Dr. Scott Hastings.[00:00:13 - 00:00:31]
We are two doctors, two researchers, two spouses, two lovers, and two incredibly different human beings coming together for one purpose. To transform the stinky parts of your marriage into scintillating ones. Using intelligence mixed with a little fun.[00:00:34 - 00:00:55]
Hello, everyone. Welcome back to Marriage iq. We are so excited to see you this week. We hope you've had a great weekend. We hope that you're living your most scintillating life together. And we're just so happy to have you here again today, coming back, learning more about how to live a more scintillating life.[00:00:56 - 00:01:05]
We're really excited this week to have Mark and Janie ogletree with us. Dr. Mark Ogletree was right raised in the great state of Texas.[00:01:05 - 00:01:06]
Yeehaw.[00:01:12 - 00:02:06]
He earned a master's degree in mental health counseling and a PhD in family and human development, both of which really qualify him to come and share some of his great wisdom with us. Mark worked for 20 years teaching in both Arizona and Texas, two states that we've spent most of our marriage in. And for the past 15 years, he's been a university professor teaching about family issues. Additionally, Mark has worked in private practice for over 35 years as a marriage and family therapist. He's published a plethora of books and articles on marriage and family relationships, and it was really hard to just pick a couple of topics to have him discuss with us today. Some of his books that I was really drawn to were Anxiety is your superpower, Making of a man Finding peace in difficult times. And I love this one. Babysitters are cheaper than divorce.[00:02:07 - 00:02:08]
That's true.[00:02:08 - 00:02:36]
I believe that true our whole marriage, every week, that Friday night, date night. Now, Mark wouldn't be who Mark is without his lovely wife, Janie, and she has spent much of her time, I think, raising their eight children and 27 grandchildren. We know that is equally as important, if not more important. And so sorry, Mark, but we're going to give her a big, huge kudos for that.[00:02:37 - 00:02:43]
She deserves all those degrees. She's actually more of an expert than I am on any of that stuff.[00:02:43 - 00:02:47]
So I have no initials behind my name, but he says I have street creds.[00:02:47 - 00:03:01]
That's right. Experience often is more valuable than. Than the degrees. So Mark and Janie are the hosts of a weekly podcast called Preserving Families. We're really excited to have them today on our show. And thank you so much for being with us. Welcome.[00:03:02 - 00:03:05]
Thank you for having Us always great to connect with some fellow Texans.[00:03:06 - 00:03:12]
Yeah, there's a saying that says, I wasn't born in Texas, but I got here as fast as I can. So.[00:03:12 - 00:03:15]
That's right. He has that bumper sticker on her car.[00:03:17 - 00:03:36]
So here on Marriage iq, one of our four cornerstones is identity. Just learning about who we are, who other people are who come into our lives. And so we'd like to invite both of you just to kind of give us a quick synopsis of who you are as people and how you came to be and what prompted you to go into this field. Mark?[00:03:37 - 00:04:56]
Yeah, for. You know, for me, it's just growing up in a family where there were some struggles. Right. There were some marriage problems. And I still remember the day that we learned that our mom and dad had been at a marriage counselor's office. And I thought, that's a thing. You could go do that. And I remember thinking, even as a kid in middle school, that's kind of cool. That'd be kind of a cool thing to do. But I think just growing up in that family and then seeing other great, strong families in the community where we lived and just starting to form the idea, as a probably a high school kid, of, I think I want to have a really awesome, strong family one day. And so just everything just always seemed to point that direction. It brought me into family therapy at one point. It brought me into doing a doctorate degree in that area, because my focus was on fatherhood. And so I really wanted to learn as much as I could about that and be the best dad that I could be. It was kind of probably selfish motive at first, but that has just always been our priority. When we were engaged, one of the conversations that came up a lot was, how many children do we want to have? How do we want to raise them? We just. I mean, this is how crazy we were. For dates. We would go to the hospital and look at the newborn baby. Back in those days when there was.[00:04:56 - 00:04:59]
No security, and they, like, walk up and look at the babies.[00:04:59 - 00:05:02]
Even now, even though we're saying that, I can't believe we did that, but we would.[00:05:03 - 00:05:04]
You guys are really dating.[00:05:04 - 00:05:25]
We were having our own baby. One at one at some point, you know, and anyway, so, yeah, that's kind of how it kind of started for me. And I've just really been interested because the more research that you do, you come to understand that how valuable the family is to our society and our culture. You know, strong functioning families is what makes the world go.[00:05:25 - 00:05:28]
And we agree a hundred percent Right.[00:05:28 - 00:05:49]
So it sounds to me like, Mark, you're, your decision wasn't prompted by some kind of a huge trauma. I don't hear any big trauma in your life. It was just, you had a decent life, kept growing up, no big traumas. You just, you decided, hey, this is, this is really important to me. Right? I mean, that's what I'm hearing here.[00:05:49 - 00:06:37]
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, grew up in the suburbs of Houston, had a great life, lived in a great neighborhood, swam at the country club pool, played all the sports in little league, and I went to an awesome high school. It wasn't that at all, but it was definitely, I can tell you, one experience I had where I'd watched my dad come home from his corporate job every day, just not with a smile on his face. And it got me thinking that I want to do something that I'm passionate about and that I can come home smiling and still be happy about. And anyway, and so Those, those little 10 second glimpses of life can shape the rest of your life where you just kind of think, yeah, I don't, I don't want to come home like that every day. I want to do something that I, that I love.[00:06:38 - 00:07:13]
I think this is a good point here to stop and pause and, and discuss that you don't need a huge trauma in your life to change the trajectory of your life. I think that's probably the case for a lot of people listening. They haven't had these huge traumas. Maybe, you know, maybe some have, but I'm just saying for those who haven't and they just, they want to, to just take life by the horns, right? And, and become the best version of who they are. And that's kind of what. What Mark's doing. And he wants to be passionate about what he does, and so that's why we're all sitting here.[00:07:13 - 00:07:19]
Well, I'm kind of thinking that that's, I mean, his real dad died when he was three, so this was his step.[00:07:20 - 00:07:40]
So, yeah, I mean, there were, there was some trauma, you know, where our dad died when I was three. He had been in a serious car wreck earlier in his life. And back in those days, they didn't screen blood when they gave blood transfusions. And so he was given blood full of hepatitis, and so he actually died of liver failure at the age of 30, 33.[00:07:40 - 00:07:41]
Wow.[00:07:41 - 00:08:26]
So, yeah, So I grew up with a single mom, with two. Two of us were just. My brother and I were, were young. I was three, he was one. And then my mom did Remarry, and their marriage was a little rough and rocky, you know, and so I think some of those. Some of those early on experiences definitely pointed me in a direction where I just became very interested in families that functioned at a high level. You know, I saw a lot of that around me as well, growing up, and just always wanted to have a great family. Family, it never was really as much about a profession as it was just my own personal life, you know, that I. That I hoped we would be a great, awesome family that could make a difference in our community and where we lived. And that's kind of how that started.[00:08:26 - 00:08:40]
I love that. Janie, how about you tell us a little bit about who you are and how you came to be a mother of eight children? That's incredible. That is a lot.[00:08:40 - 00:09:08]
It is a lot. Well, I'm the oldest of eight. I grew up in this daughter, four boys and four girls, and I loved having a big family. I thought it was so fun. I. It was always a party. There's always somebody to do something with. My mom was kind of super mom could do all things, you know, just always had an immaculate house. We always had fresh meals from scratch on the table. That's so not me, but that was her. And so I grew up thinking that was normal. And she made it look easy.[00:09:09 - 00:09:09]
Wow.[00:09:10 - 00:09:26]
And it wasn't easy for me, but I loved having that choice. So when I. When I met Mark and I felt his passion for family and knew that he would be a great father and a great husband and that he just wanted a great family, too. I think.[00:09:26 - 00:09:30]
You know, I think our world's collided a little bit. Worked out well.[00:09:30 - 00:09:41]
He's my guy. And I mean, originally we. We thought, oh, we want 12 children is what we started out with. And with every child, it got less than twins.[00:09:41 - 00:09:42]
So that.[00:09:42 - 00:09:55]
That sped things up a little bit. But, yeah, so we. We have. We have seven daughters and one son. And so we were so grateful to get that son. We kept trying for another one, and the Lord just kept sending his daughters, so. But at some point, we had to quit.[00:09:56 - 00:10:09]
So we have to reveal here. I have seven girls in my family and three boys. Three of them came through adoption. And Scott, they have eight children in their family, so we both come from big families as well.[00:10:09 - 00:10:10]
Yeah.[00:10:10 - 00:10:11]
Big family are fun.[00:10:12 - 00:10:12]
Yeah.[00:10:12 - 00:10:25]
I will tell you that Janie's family was so fun that when she was on dates in high school, she hates when I tell this story, but she was the original FOMO person. I think she would talk about how all she could think about is, I got to get home. I got to get home.[00:10:25 - 00:10:27]
I'm missing out on all the fun that's going on at home.[00:10:27 - 00:10:30]
Yeah. So she would rather be at home than out on these dates, right?[00:10:30 - 00:10:46]
Yeah. So I. My parents did a great job of creating a beautiful culture in our home. You know, everyone wanted to be there. And the Kool Aid house, where we would bring our friends there, and that's amazing. My dad, everyone called him the ice cream man. Anyone who came over, he'd pull out tons of ice cream all over the counter.[00:10:46 - 00:10:47]
And blue bell, as you guys know, Right?[00:10:47 - 00:10:50]
Of course, that's the only one.[00:10:51 - 00:11:20]
So we kind of came from a little opposite backgrounds, but I think we ended up seeing the world or kind of had similar views by the time that we met of how, how we wanted to create a family and go forward that way. And then now we have 29 grandchildren, now two more on the way, and that is the cherry on top. You know, I think they don't hear it's the best parent. Parenting is hard and rough, but grandparenting is awesome and amazing and just 100% joy.[00:11:20 - 00:11:31]
So we haven't experienced that yet, but we've had three weddings in the last 18 months, so hopefully it's coming too far away. Yep, that's great.[00:11:31 - 00:11:50]
So, Mark, you've been doing this, you've been at this for a long time. You've been counseling people for many years. What's. What's one of the biggest things that you see in counseling married people? One of the kind of the high view, 30,000 foot view ideas that come to mind?[00:11:51 - 00:12:57]
Yeah, no, I think that's a great question. And by the way, I get asked that a lot. I think people are really interested to know, okay, what is that one thing? And surprisingly, I would tell people, it's actually so unique. I mean, there's probably, for me, in the practice I run, there's not just one specific thing that just sticks out above everything else, but there's definitely some themes, you know, and one of them for sure is that people are so busy today, you know, that they're so busy that they don't have time or they're not taking the time to invest in the marriage or in parenting, to be honest with you. And so the way that we make that up is, okay, we're going to go have some fun in some way. So parents are having a lot of fun with their children, but a lot of children aren't being taught the values of work. And some of the, you know the core values of honesty and, and obedience and things like that. But in a marriage setting, I would say definitely almost everyone is fighting for this time balance, right. They're just trying to figure out how to fit it all in and, and not have their marriage be last on the list.[00:12:57 - 00:13:10]
So what are some of the most common ways that couples unintentionally drift apart through time? Scarcity, I guess we can call it time scarcity. I've seen you use that term in some of your writings and research.[00:13:11 - 00:14:47]
Yeah, no, I think that's a great question. I'm gonna tell my wife to chime in anytime you want to because she's, she has the good cracker barrel wisdom, you know. But sometimes we see people getting hyper involved in work, right. And so we know that men and women who work now travel a lot more. I don't remember my dad ever going on a business trip except maybe once a year where people do that now every week. In fact, we lived in Dallas with you guys. We were very aware that our neighbors were leaving on Monday morning and flying in on Friday evening. And that was a typical work week, you know. And so now we have that. We're trying to, we're, you know, we're trying to balance the work schedule. We're trying to balance children's activities, which are more crazier now than ever. I remember growing up as a kid in Texas and we had a little league baseball game once or twice a week or whatever. But now we're on club teams and we travel. I mean, we're aware of multiple children, not just. Yeah, multiple children. And we're, we just had. My wife's brother was just telling us that they were just in South Carolina for one of their kids baseball tournaments and they live out here in the west with us. I mean, this is, this is the new culture we've created of just this crazy ultra busyness. And now maybe there's no more, I don't know, maybe there's more work at school. The idea with all the technology now that was supposed to make our lives easier has now made it more complex because now I can be in my home office answering emails. Like last night at 11 o' clock at night, right. And so they called the global village, but it just expanded. The time demands have expanded more than ever.[00:14:47 - 00:15:38]
Well, I think in some ways, though, all of these conveniences that we have now, I think we should probably take a moment and say, you know, I can do a lot more than I used to. I can get through a whole lot more Information faster. I can become a better physician because I have more knowledge at my fingertips. News on down the line, the type of glasses I have, you know, the grocery stores we go to, it's all. It's all pointed toward making our lives more efficient. And yet, I guess if we don't acknowledge that all of our free time is being taken up, right, we're not gonna. We're not gonna stop and say, whoa, wait a minute, we gotta take some time here. Right?[00:15:38 - 00:16:14]
Because you can become obsessed with. With the technology. In other words, it's one thing to have now. We can make plane reservations right, on our phones. So that's incredible. But now why am I on my phone at three in the morning making a plane reservation? You know, I could have done that four hours ago, but we're becoming obsessed, I think, with some of the technology. But you're right. The technology has made our lives incredible. You know, Scott, to your point of your profession, I could now write a chapter for a book in a day easily where it used to take a month. I don't have to go to a library anymore. I can use some artificial intelligence help for research. You know, I could. We have research at our fingertips.[00:16:14 - 00:16:14]
Yeah.[00:16:14 - 00:16:15]
Yeah.[00:16:15 - 00:16:16]
It's amazing.[00:16:17 - 00:16:21]
But none of this translates to better marriages, though, right? Is that what you're seeing?[00:16:22 - 00:16:56]
I love this term. Coined by a great researcher out of the University of Illinois. Techno ference is what they call it in marriage that there's so much techno ference today. And we see it. We see evidence of husbands and wives who aren't communicating that well because they're both on their phones. We've seen those pictures and those memes of the couple laying in bed at night together, and they're both on their phones facing the opposite direction. We see children tugging at their parents, shirts and pants, trying to get their attention. But mom or dad are on their phone. So techno ference is alive and well, right?[00:16:56 - 00:17:07]
Yeah. Janie, from your perspective, do you think all of this busyness, that part of it might be focusing on the children more than on the marriage?[00:17:07 - 00:17:09]
Absolutely. I really do.[00:17:10 - 00:17:21]
Wait, wait, no, we can't say that. No. You're supposed to pay attention to your children. We're supposed to love your children.[00:17:21 - 00:17:34]
Yeah, we're supposed to love our children and. But I think in a lot of families, the children are the center, and we go around the children where it shouldn't. Our world should revolve around the marriage.[00:17:34 - 00:17:35]
Wait, wait.[00:17:35 - 00:17:35]
Why?[00:17:35 - 00:17:40]
This is a radical concept. Janie, can you please repeat that for our audience?[00:17:42 - 00:18:03]
Yes, Our children are not the universe. The center of our universe. Or should it be? I mean, there was back, you know, many, many years ago where children were supposed to be seen but not heard. But now I really feel like, like our culture has changed where the children are all of a sudden now rule the roost. They get to pick what restaurants we go to. They get to rule, make the rules in the house. They everything.[00:18:03 - 00:18:17]
They decided where the vacation's going to be. In fact, there's great historical stories of the children looking through the keyhole into the kitchen, watching the parents with other adults eat dinner. Can you imagine that now?[00:18:18 - 00:18:27]
I totally remember that. Except it wasn't through the keyhole. It was at the top of the stairs. We would be peering down, watching my parents and their friends. Yeah, dinner.[00:18:27 - 00:18:36]
Yes. And now it's us peering down, watching our kids and all their friends, you know, take over the house and us hoping that maybe we can get in bed by one o' clock tonight.[00:18:36 - 00:18:38]
Definitely a child centered society. Right.[00:18:38 - 00:18:47]
So what is your reasoning? That marriage should be the center relationship, the primary relationship, instead of the role as parents?[00:18:48 - 00:19:13]
You can't have a stronger family than you have a marriage. Right. Everything comes out of the marriage. I love the quote from the Roman orator Cicero that marriage is the first bond of society. As the marriage goes, so goes the family. But also so goes what? Our world. Yeah, the world that we live in. And so everything kind of comes out of that. I love union. That's the central piece to all of it.[00:19:13 - 00:19:19]
Okay. So this is gonna, I think, take a lot of people a lot of time to wrap their head around this idea.[00:19:19 - 00:19:21]
Although we've talked about the same.[00:19:21 - 00:19:30]
We've talked about it, yes. In other episodes. But I think to intentionally put the marriage first. Right. How does that look?[00:19:30 - 00:19:30]
How do you do that?[00:19:31 - 00:19:55]
We, we love the word intentional. We use that a lot in our home. Use it a lot on our podcast too, because I think it doesn't just magically happen. Nothing magically happens. You have to be intentional and you have to be intentional about your marriage. Keeping it. The soil fertile, keeping it growing, keeping it. Making sure that you set aside time for that or it will just. Your time will just get sucked.[00:19:55 - 00:20:02]
Everything will take over. Yeah, yeah. There was a book by Bill Dougherty. I don't know if you guys are aware of him. He's so great. He's just.[00:20:03 - 00:20:04]
I think it might be the book.[00:20:04 - 00:20:48]
I have take back your marriage. But he's the one that said we didn't do everything right as a couple. We didn't do everything right as parents, but he said, but the one thing we did that was right was that we taught our children that in the solar system of the family, that our marriage was the sun and that everything went around that, that they were the planets that were far out there and that they were not going to be the center of the family. And I think that's probably what the stake in the ground that every couple has to, you know, lay down and drive in with their hammer a little bit to make a claim that, you know what, we're even going to set some boundaries with our own kids. And now we may have to set some boundaries with our adult children because we have to make time for ourselves every so often. We've got to renew and strengthen our own marriage.[00:20:49 - 00:21:15]
I love that. So we've talked about how the busyness factor of children can cause this time starved marriage and how the busyness of technology and work can also contribute to that. So what are some of the antidotes to creating intentionally a marriage that can surpass all of the busyness that the world that we live in now presents to us?[00:21:16 - 00:21:38]
Again, it's being intentional, it's carving out, you know, maybe having a small meeting saying, okay, here's what our week is looking like. But Friday night we're going out, just the two of us, so and so needs a ride to their ball game because we're going on a date or hey, let's take a vacation two months from now, let's get that plan. But we're spending time. For us, I think it's that intentionally again, because if we don't, it's not gonna happen.[00:21:39 - 00:22:43]
It isn't. Yeah. It gets creeped upon. Our time gets just sucked away. I love what you said. Another thing back to Bill Dodery. He's really big on rituals. If we don't have rituals in our marriages, we're gonna lose em because the time factor is so massively invasive today. If we don't have rituals to hold our marriage together, it's just not gonna last. And so he talks about several types of rituals. One is a greeting ritual. So there's some of the. A lot of these things are small and simple, right? It's not going on a cruise or anything. It's the simple thing of that we don't leave the house before we hug and kiss each other and have some kind of form of affection. It's a connection ritual where we talk every day or go on walks. His prescription, which I've always loved, was every couple should have a hot tub, which I thought was great. I think every couple should have done that. Yeah, I think every couple should have a boat. But hot tub is just as great. But. But he said that was one of their rituals, is that every night at 10 o' clock in Minneapolis, Minnesota, they would go out on their deck, listen to jazz music, talk about their day, and sit in the hot tub together. And I love it.[00:22:43 - 00:22:46]
I guarantee you, if I lived in Minneapolis, that's what I would be doing.[00:22:47 - 00:22:48]
I could get behind that easily.[00:22:49 - 00:22:51]
Most people do have at least a bathtub.[00:22:52 - 00:23:13]
We could start small. Right. But some kind of rituals of connection and greeting and of communication. You know, how we talk together, how we make time for each other. And these are all, once again, simple. These are simple acts of. I can call my wife every day from work to check in. You know, just little things like that.[00:23:13 - 00:23:13]
Yeah.[00:23:13 - 00:23:16]
I think those. How. That's how we reclaim our marriages.[00:23:17 - 00:23:36]
We heard the story recently of a man who can he come in the house. He would go find his wife first before he did anything, before he greeted any of the children. He'd go find his wife, kiss her, and then go find the kids. And they knew that. They knew that they mom was the priority. And then they came next. But I think that just setting those little subtle examples.[00:23:37 - 00:23:38]
Yeah. Connecting points.[00:23:38 - 00:23:56]
I love the example, Janie, that you gave about holding a little meeting. And we did an episode on what we call couples councils that we do every week. And that really is, to us, the key to being intentional, to plan some of these things like you're talking about.[00:23:56 - 00:24:00]
We've had some people accuse us of living a corporate marriage.[00:24:00 - 00:24:03]
That's right. Because we have so many meetings.[00:24:03 - 00:24:06]
If you don't use a PowerPoint during that meeting, you should be okay.[00:24:06 - 00:24:07]
Right.[00:24:08 - 00:24:10]
I thought. Thank you.[00:24:10 - 00:24:11]
Yeah.[00:24:11 - 00:24:11]
Right.[00:24:11 - 00:24:27]
And here's the thing. I. I think that consistently showing up for these meetings every week, it makes a difference. It's not something that is corporate in. In my opinion.[00:24:27 - 00:24:28]
It's intimate.[00:24:29 - 00:24:31]
It's building intimacy. It's being intentional.[00:24:31 - 00:24:32]
It's shared power.[00:24:32 - 00:26:01]
And here's the thing, Mark. All these things you talked about, these rituals are really important. We. We totally support that as well. There will be times. I know this because it happens to me. And I teach this stuff where I don't want to text my wife during the middle of the day because I'm ticked off or I have something else going on that's. I'm really busy or whatever. You fill in the blank because I'm a human and we all have our moments, or I don't want to hug my wife, or I forget to do that, which probably happens the most of the time. I just simply forget. I think it's important to take the moment for. For everyone listening to say, that's okay, that happens. That happens to the best of us. And that's why we have these councils, like you said, these meetings is so we can get back on track. Because life is like a wave. And sometimes we're going to be really like, let's do this thing, you know? And then a week later, it's everything. Wait, what were we doing again? And so by putting in these obligatory, mandatory little powwows, touch points, correction meetings.[00:26:01 - 00:26:02]
Yeah, yeah.[00:26:02 - 00:26:11]
That you talked about the phone call or the. A lot of times if I can't call Heidi during lunch, I'll just send her a little emoji that has little hearts around it.[00:26:11 - 00:26:12]
Yeah.[00:26:12 - 00:26:15]
And that's all it takes. That's all it takes. One second.[00:26:15 - 00:26:15]
Boom.[00:26:15 - 00:26:16]
Boom.[00:26:17 - 00:26:18]
And she knows I love her.[00:26:18 - 00:26:19]
You're thinking about me.[00:26:20 - 00:26:37]
So anyway, just a little pause there, because I love what you're saying. I know a lot of people get excited, and then life happens right again. It's this wave, the frequency of life, and we just. We get back on, get moving again, say, oh, yeah, Boom.[00:26:37 - 00:27:05]
And I think that's so crucial because we live in a world that's pulling families apart and marriages apart. And so if we think that we're just going to not do a thing and just kind of sit in our boat and just go where the river takes us, so to speak, that doesn't end up in a great place. We have to fight for our marriages and our families every week. And one of the great ways to do that is how you guys are talking about just having a little couples meeting, couples council every week just to make sure that we're staying on track.[00:27:06 - 00:27:29]
And I love what you were talking about, too, because, I mean, none of us are going to be perfect, but we're not shooting for perfection. We're just shooting for trying to be consistent and intentional, I think. And we always laugh, too, because we try to have those meetings, but we are so busy that sometimes we can't even get a meeting in because we're being pulled in so many directions, you know? And so I don't. We just keep fighting. You just have to keep fighting and fighting.[00:27:29 - 00:27:30]
Fight for your marriage.[00:27:30 - 00:27:31]
Yeah.[00:27:31 - 00:27:46]
Are there any warning signs for those couples who are hearing this and saying, I wonder if that's me. Are there any warning signs that this might be an issue, this time starved territory.[00:27:46 - 00:27:48]
I think that's just about every marriage, honey.[00:27:48 - 00:27:49]
Yeah, Yeah.[00:27:49 - 00:28:24]
I think, I mean, Heidi, my answer to that would be, I think when you start noticing the apathy when you're just not connecting and you're really in this sterile type relationship and you realize that the intimacy part of your life, the affectionate part, the emoji part that you just talked about, Scott, it's just kind of died off and waned and you just find yourself not even carrying that much. That'd be one of the things I would say that we have to guard against so much is just the feeling of apathy that could creep in. I don't know, Janie, if that sounds right to you.[00:28:25 - 00:28:27]
Yeah, that's really good.[00:28:27 - 00:28:37]
Another bad sign is if you don't miss each other when you're away, right? You go, one of you goes away on some kind of trip and you're like, yeah, that was awesome. I did. That's not a good sign. Right. For your marriage.[00:28:38 - 00:29:36]
We are at the end of our time here for this part of our episode, but we would like to invite our listeners to keep listening because we're going to talk about how time star marriage can impact and be impacted by some mental health issues. Since Dr. Marco Gultree has been working as a marriage and family therapist for 35 years, he has a lot of great experience both professionally and personally with this topic. And so we invite our listeners to hang tight and watch Friday where we continue this topic of time starved marriages and how that is impacted by mental health. So thanks everybody for joining us today. Thanks so much both Janie and Mark and hope our listeners will join us for part two. So everybody, that's a wrap for this episode of Marriage iq.[00:29:36 - 00:29:43]
And remember that the intelligent spouse knows a scintillating marriage starts with first changing themselves.[00:29:44 - 00:29:50]
If you want to know more, join Marriage IQ on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.[00:29:50 - 00:30:11]
And grab your free ebook. Sign up for exclusive tips@marriageiq.com and please, please, please take a moment to rate, subscribe, follow Marriage IQ wherever you listen or watch. That would really, we'd love that. Email us at hello@marrigeiq. And we will answer you.[00:30:12 - 00:30:27]
And we would love to hear suggestions that you have for future episodes as well. Invite your friends and family to join the marriage IQ community too. So everybody, we'll see you next time on another exciting episode of Marriage iQ!
