Related Articles from the News
Be the Change You Want to See in Your Marriage
Are you facing conflict in your marriage? Make the first move. Change your mindset, respond with compassion, dwell on the positives. Change begins with you. All changes in our relationships should start with ourselves. It may be comforting to blame our spouse for the inadequacies of our marriage and expect them to change and meet our demands. But this approach ...
International Men’s Day is Making a Difference!
The celebration of International Men's Day is saving men's lives by the tens of thousands every year that it is celebrated. Read about some of the awesome events that took place this year. International Men's Day is exploding around the world. So firstly, thank you for your support for Internationals Men's Day and Dads4Kids. Without your help, we could not ...
Yesterday was International Men’s Day – and Gender Reconciliation is in the News
International Men's Day was celebrated on the 19th of November, 2021. Its message was stopping the gender war and bringing men and women together. This theme was a welcome change to the media provocation of the tensions between men and women. For so long, the cultural elites and some strains of feminism (and masculinism) have fuelled the divisions between the sexes ...
The Daily ‘I Do’ When You’d Rather Not
Think about your “I do” and make it a daily one. Ask, what will “I do” for my marriage today? It’s a powerful strategy for both the good times and the bad. At a recent business conference, a speaker made an offhand remark about having to recommit to her marriage vows every day. It was in the context of a discussion ...
International Men’s Day: An Idea Whose Time is Come
Life is an adventure. Coordinating International Men’s Day (IMD) for the world is a super adventure. For starters, it is a relatively new concept on the world stage of ideas, but as Victor Hugo once said, “Nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time is come.” International Men’s Day has a big future. Ultimately, it will peak, but not ...
Triggered: A Little Restraint Goes a Long Way
It happens all the time: one of us does or says something and the other is triggered, reacting harshly. To break the habit of reactivity, try this mindfulness tool to develop the virtue of restraint. While it is often associated with Buddhist meditation, mindfulness has actually been a feature of many religions under different names, including Christianity. It has also ...
International Men’s Day is a Defence for Men and Women
International Men's Day is more relevant than ever. Celebrating this important day is the key, not just to defending men – but women, children and families as well. In two weeks we will mark International Men's Day, on Friday 19th November. So why should we celebrate International Men's Day? The Revolution is Here Ten years ago, its celebration was an ...
3 Tips on How to Forgive
There are always ample opportunities to forgive others, especially in a marriage. But sometimes we don't know how. Consider three tips to help you forgive more easily in the context of a covenant relationship. We remember those long nights in the first year of our marriage. In the infancy of his career, Byron was often late home from work as he juggled ...
The First Person I Need to Change is Me!
The desire to change other people is natural but it will only lead to frustration. You will enjoy the most success and contentment in life when you focus not on changing people but changing yourself. If only my children were more helpful and cooperative… If only I had a smaller behind and a prettier face… If only they understood me ...
Building Trust Through Clear Expectations
The key to building trust in relationships is for both people to make their expectations clear and then commit to meeting those expectations. When we look back on our early romance, we note how quick we were to trust each other, even recklessly so. We dived into the relationship with ready abandon and little thought for the risks of rejection ...
Anger is Your Enemy, Not Your Friend
Anger feels right in the moment, but no child wants an angry parent. Below is some great advice on how to deal with your anger to become more effective and loving as you raise your kids. To be honest, I still struggle with anger sometimes, especially when I’m tired. Every time I think I’m making progress, I find myself yelling ...
It Takes One to Tango
Many people believe that a good relationship requires equal effort from both husband and wife. And so, if your spouse is unwilling to change or invest more in the marriage then the relationship is doomed to lack-lustre intimacy or even steady deterioration. This is not necessarily the case, however. It only takes one person to tango! While it is certainly ...
Why Your Marriage Matters
Have you ever stopped to think about the importance of your marriage? Marriage is hard; is it worth it? In this post, Guy looks at why your marriage matters and gives you some thoughts you would be wise to ponder... When I got married at 22 years old, I had the wrong idea about marriage. I don’t think it was ...
Is Marriage Outdated? Five Myths That May Surprise You
Marriage gets a pretty bad rap these days. Celebrity bust-ups, high profile infidelity and a cohabitation takeover seem destined to put marriage into retirement. If it’s not already dead, it’s fast heading for extinction. Or so you might think. The truth is, despite these grim media representations, marriage is still rather popular. Weddings are at an all-time high and divorce has ...
A Wounded Heart: From Perfectionism to Peace
Let me begin this article by saying to you that the journey that healed my wounded heart has only ever happened once to me, and I believe it was for a very specific reason. I am by no means a spiritual visionary! The Healing of A Wounded Heart As I mentioned in my introduction, the first big cracks in my façade ...
Cherish
Cherish is a seven letter word and full of meaning. My first thought of the word is the way the NRL Grand Final winning team held onto the winners’ trophy, a trophy highly treasured by one and all. Perhaps the real meaning of the word cherish happened at the same event when Brian To’o put love into action. News.com.au puts ...
Respect & Cherishment: How Men & Women Receive Love
What’s the Difference Between Respect and Cherishment? While everyone experiences love uniquely, some clear gender patterns have emerged through relationship research. In one study, when given the option between the negative choices of being ‘alone and unloved in all the world’ or ‘inadequate and disrespected by everyone’, 74% of men preferred being alone and unloved, compared to only a minority ...
A Widow’s Not-So-Simple Marriage Advice to Newly Weds: Cherish!
The best marriage advice I have ever received came from an 80-year-old, Scottish widow. Sitting beside her a few weeks before my wedding she told me, “The only marriage advice I’ll give you is this: cherish.” The word didn’t come with any commentary, and I would spend the next 23 years unpacking its meaning and value. My wife and I ...
Marriage Lessons from a Dog Trainer
A few months ago, our young Australian Shepherd went to doggie boot camp. Over five weeks she was trained by professional dog-handlers to walk calmly, socialise nicely and keep her focus under the pressure of distractions. Video footage taken by the trainers proved she was capable. What really remained was the question: can her owners be similarly trained? When the time came to do the pickup, the trainer talked ...
Don’t Turn Blessings Into Curses
Have you ever dreamed a dream, had all the steps fall into place and suddenly you’re living your dream and it’s nothing like how you imagined it? Welcome to Parenthood We dream of the baby, but have no idea how that little person will change the rest of our lives. We then have that baby who turns our dream of becoming ...
Conflict Resolution: Uncover the Keys
Do you have the right skills to resolve the conflicts in your life? In this podcast episode, Brian Noble shares a simple but powerful 4-step process to resolving conflicts. Resolving Conflict Podcast What do you do when you find yourself in conflict with someone, either personally or within or part of an organisation? How do you resolve conflict properly so ...
Mothering Myths: Perfectionism
I honestly believe that a lot of the struggles with our children have to do with the pressure we put on ourselves. We have set the bar so high that we hate ourselves if we don’t get it ALL done today.
Say a Little Prayer for Marriage
In October a few years ago, the Australian bishops called the entire Catholic community to pray for marriage and family. The initiative was joined by around thirty other Christian churches making it the largest ever prayer campaign in the nation. It raises the question: does prayer really make a difference? Cynics might say that a prayer campaign is just a ...
A Life of No Regrets
Have you ever shared how ridiculous a particular situation is with a friend to find that they think it’s crazy too but their predicament is actually worse than yours and you really have nothing to complain about? That happened to me on the weekend. Lately, I’ve been having little reminders sent in the way of a status from an inspiring ...
Making the Connection: Communication is Easy With These 3 Tips
We recently analysed the feedback from 400 participants in our online marriage preparation course. The results to the question, “On which of the following areas would you like more formation/education”, surprised us; the most requested item among eleven options was, ‘Improving Communication’. Communication and Relationships Why the surprise? Everybody knows that communication is foundational to happy relationships. The surprise is ...
