Day 4 …. The power of “Sure” <3

As I type this one today, I am well aware that I may have to swallow my words later. Because I have a whole list of things to do with a free day ahead and it may get interrupted. 

My next little life skill I have learned was gleaned from an article I read in some magazine, I think, maybe a decade into our marriage. 

The author was writing much as I am this week, little things she had learned along the way. One of them was to answer, as much as possible, any invitation from her husband to run an errand with him, or go to an unscheduled dinner or movie, or take a walk or a vacation idea with “sure”.

Friends, this is both incredibly easy and extremely difficult for someone like me. 

The difficult part is that my brain is constantly in planning, execution and evaluation mode. I start out every day with a to do list that exceeds the hours I have to accomplish it. 

As I move through the day, I am making lists either mentally or physically, and checking off boxes. I am also recalibrating as I add tasks and reprioritize and analyzing how I did. I am CEO of my own schedule and a micromanager to boot. 

So a random invitation to run to Mentard’s throws a wrench in the cogs of this overactive brain and my first natural response would not be…”sure’.  

Yet, knowing in advance that it is GOING to be my response, makes it easy. 

Even though my mind is flashing all kinds of alarms and trying to stabilize with  this unexpected option of changed plans, my mouth is saying, “Sure!” 

Sometimes Russ will realize I was in the middle of something and offer me an out. WE take a minute to figure out if I can afford the time and go from there. 

Sometimes we adjust the timing so I can finish a project. He asks when it would be better for me to leave and we compromise. 

Sometimes I just climb in the truck or put on my tennis shoes or ask off work or whatever it takes to make it happen and it always turns out that the time with him was better than the plans I thought needed to be done. 

However it works out, it is a lot more peaceful in our marriage and in my heart and soul if my first response is in agreement and not resistance. 

I have a sweet friend who shares that her mom’s advice was, anytime he opens the car door…get in. There is far more to that love story than I can share without crossing boundaries into my friend’s story but I cry knowing that her mom was very right. 

So my advice is simply consider your first response to be :sure: when the car door opens, or the walk/bike ride is offered, or the trip is being planned…together is always better and in the end that will be the things remembered…not the load of laundry folded.