When I was a teenager, or maybe just a little younger, I went on a white water rafting trip down the New River Gorge with a youth group from our church. The trip was more than a little out of my element as I wasn’t a big thrill seeker and not a fan of boats, but there was a super cute rafting guide so I managed to play it cool. I acted like I could get down with the class IV rapids and tried to suppress the anti-adventurous part of my brain that wished I was laying out at the beach.
I don’t really remember too much about that trip except that there was a big red raft, some friends, a cute rafting guide that I was secretly hoping would confess his undying love for me in a few years, and this part called the “toilet bowl.” The toilet bowl was a place on the trip where we were allowed to get out of the raft and float downstream into a portion of the water on the left side of the river that was sucking people in and popping them up downstream. I’m sure this sounds like a huge blast to most of you who are reading this, but for me, if it’s between floating into a rapid or slowly coasting down a calm river in an inter-tube with a drink in hand, I’d go for the latter.
I guess I should have known then that I’m a coaster. I don’t have this huge sense of adventure, and I definitely get super comfortable in my coasting element. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think any of this is bad. I actually hope it means I am a little laid back and I enjoy life where I am, but do you one place where you definitely shouldn’t coast? It’s in your marriage. You see, the problem with coasting in your marriage is that you MISS all the adventure. I’m not talking white water rafting or skydiving, I’m talking the adventure you are making just by being married. You lose that drive to actively love one another like you had when you were just dating or newly wed. Weeks, months, and sometimes years go by until you notice your rafts have drifted apart and are nearly impossible to bring back together.
I notice this happens to me in my own marriage. I get in these comfort zones where all my focus is on my kids, my job, the house, and things of this world. Then, all of the sudden, I’m coasting along thinking everything is okay with me and Steve when it’s not. Things are not okay because coasting leads to complacency, which leads to bitterness, which eventually leads to a relationship that ends up on the left side of the river in the toilet bowl.
In my first marriage I had this idea that you could fall IN and OUT of love. I had this fairytale fantasy about love being a feeling you can be in one day and not the next. Just like being sad or angry. Well, when the days of coasting turned to weeks and then months, I was convinced my feelings for my husband had changed. But now I know that LOVE is an action. And I am not making that up based on experience. It’s actually in the bible. All throughout the bible God tells us that we should LOVE one another. He never says that we will always feel the emotion of love. He tells us to get out there and LOVE. Love in your marriage requires an action. It requires work.
A few weeks ago I texted Steve and I told him that I missed him. Even though we see each other every day, I just felt like something was off. He said he missed me too and shared with me that he thought I wasn’t happy. Heart sinking feeling, right? After a few minutes of convincing him I was completely fine, I realized I was coasting. I was drifting so far downstream and he wasn’t even with me. He was ready to take the adventurous course. The one that produced more stories and made more memories for our marriage. The one that looked like awesome conversation while cooking in the kitchen together, or holding hands on family walks. I was taking the one that just allowed me to drift forward and do what I needed to do each day. All said and done, I was a little too comfortable and not actively loving him. He needs action and I need action to produce that emotion we had in the beginning of our relationship. And why do you think we had it so easily at the beginning? Because we were working every day to love each other and prove we were the right ones for each other. Love isn’t how your spouse makes you feel, but what you desire to actively do for your spouse. Love through action! I promise you will see results.
“Let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions” (1 John 3:18 NLT)
XOXO,
Stacy Hart
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