30 May 2016

How to Be a True Power Couple



My church offers a workshop that helps you discover your unique personality and gifts, which can then be used to find your perfect place in ministry. Through the online assessment, I realized my hubby and I have completely different personalities in the DISC profile. If you are familiar with that test, he has a lot of "D" and "I," whereas I have all "S" and "C." We also have completely different spiritual gifts. He is masterful in teaching and preaching, whereas I would never volunteer myself for public speaking. However, apparently one of my main gifts is encouragement, which is so perfectly matched for being a pastor's wife. They never receive any criticism, right? Ha!

At first, I was worried that our opposite personality results meant we were incompatible in some way. But that couldn't be further from the truth. I now see that in a marriage, it's best to specialize yourself so that together as a couple you get the benefits of the best traits from each person. Let me explain. For as long as we've been together, I've been the one to push the calendar. From the beginning of our relationship getting our dates on the calendar, to wedding planning coordination of schedules, to managing our day-to-day family operations, I'm big on using our google calendar. I don't know how people function without it! But to my surprise, hubby didn't seem to have the same appreciation for keeping his calendar items up to date like I did. And this messed up my schedule not knowing what I should be planning around. I tried explaining why it's so important. I tried giving him tips on how I pull up my calendar immediately when I receive an event invite so that I don't forget to add it later. I even tried nagging (I don't recommend this!). I thought he just didn't care, or worse - he wasn't keeping his calendar up to annoy me on purpose. I realize now how crazy that sounds, but maybe you can relate on some level.

I finally had an epiphany. Maybe I'm the only one that needs to be the one keeping up the calendar in our relationship. Maybe it's okay that he's not perfect in that area. Maybe that is something that I can offer to our relationship since it comes so naturally to me. And maybe, just maybe, my hubby brings a thousand other strengths to our marriage that I don't have. I can be "calendar girl" and he can be "fix-it guy." I can be the designated toilet paper roll changer extraordinaire since that is something I naturally notice needs to be done, and he can be the trash taker-outer. Don't act like you aren't excited to make up equally ridiculous role names for your own tasks! But just think about it. If you both had the exact same personalities, strengths, and interests, one of you would be redundant, and thus, unnecessary in the relationship.

Another way to look at it  - if you were going to start a small business, you would never just hire three accountants and call it a day. If you were the creative brains behind the operation you might hire one accountant, one business development person, someone else to do the tech side, etc. It makes you and your business stronger surrounding yourself with people that have different strengths to bring to the table. And you certainly don't need to chastise your tech person for not being creative. You have that covered already.

Thus, in a marriage, if you focus on the strengths that you each bring to your relationship and specialize yourself in those areas, you can be a true power couple. You will be stronger together than you are apart. Those differences can be exactly what make you extra powerful and successful in ministry, careers, your household, and other areas of life. So go ahead, release your spouse from those expectations that you already have masterfully covered, and rock those strengths that you have!

Which areas of your marriage do you excel at, that you can fully take on as "your thing"? What is an area that your spouse is skillful at that makes your life easier?

3 comments :

  1. YES!!! God is teaching me so much about this right now. I am beginning to learn how to appreciate our differences instead of fight them! It has been so freeing and this is only the beginning! Joseph is on the D and I side meaning he is very driven, task oriented with a lot of qualities that make him a good leader. I am on the completely opposite side, meaning I am more of a sensitive free spirit who is people oriented. I'm actually so thankful that Joseph has some of those qualities I don't possess because it only makes our team stronger!! (remind me I said this later ;) ) I know God can use our oppositeness for greatness, if we allow Him!

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    1. That's awesome how your different strengths complement each other so well! God knew what he was doing when he paired you both together. It's just human nature to get frustrated when someone has a weakness we don't have, and to not fully appreciate the strengths that we don't have ourselves.

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  2. This is so funny! My hubby and I have been trying to figure out the calendar thing for 10 years. We have a kitchen calendar, a Google calendar, my pocket calendar. It's nuts. We've come to the conclusion that it's neither one of our strengths, so we have to work on it.

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