When Your Attitude is Hurting Your Marriage
Attitude is something I struggle with more days than not. I attribute it to the work I do every day – dealing with other women’s struggles, anger, grief and pain can really leave a mark on you by the end of the day.
Perhaps for you it is a house that never seems to get completely clean and organized, children that spend more time quarreling than enjoying each other, or friends who don’t always seem like friends.
Whatever the cause, our attitudes can suffer. And who pays the price when we have poor attitudes? More often than not our husbands get the brunt of our negativity.
So how do we navigate around the reality of life being difficult and often feeling overwhelmed and uncared for? How can we safeguard our marriage against us bringing our attitudes into our marriage?
Choose your focus. Philippians 4:8 shares some truly sound advice on where our thoughts should be: Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.
At the end of a hard day, can you find something good to think about? Something praiseworthy? Whatever is on our mind affects our hearts. Whatever is on our hearts is what comes out of our mouths. So if we can focus on something praiseworthy, we can change the course of our thoughts and speak positively to our spouse. We have the ability and the choice to decide where our thoughts go – and we can…so aim for the good.
Another powerful tool is prayer. Lift your poor attitude to God and ask him to help you overcome negativity with positive thoughts. Ask him for patience, grace, compassion, and love for your hubby and ask him to take from you those things that have caused you anxiety and stress.
It takes time to pray and ask God to change our attitudes. It takes time to focus on the good and praiseworthy instead of the ugly. But ladies, our husbands and our marriages are worth the time. Be willing to make the investment and just watch what the Lord can do!
Wife Step: Before you meet up with your husband after a day of work, managing your home, or whatever it is God has called you to do, take a minute and check your attitude. Do you need to change the direction of your thoughts toward something good and praiseworthy? Do you need to pray and ask God to help you shed your day and greet your hubby with a kind heart? If so, take the time to do it. It can make all the difference in your attitude.
Betty Predmore is an author, speaker, blogger, and ministry leader. Betty has experienced broken homes, divorce, abuse, grief, being a single mother, blended families, and adoption. Betty uses the broken places and movement of God in her own life to share God’s Word in an inspiring way, sprinkled with honesty, humor, and encouragement, and reflecting the love of Jesus to all she meets.
Betty is the Founding Director of two community faith-based ministries. Mom-Sense helps women overcome life struggles through small group classes with biblical curriculum, individual counseling, bibles studies, and other areas of support. The Imperial Valley Coalition for Life is a pro-life organization that values the sanctity of life and encourages women to choose life by offering various means of support throughout pregnancy and infancy.
Betty has published two devotionals: Pondering Virtue and Whispered Grace. Betty is honored to be a part of the A Wife Like Me contributor team. She has also contributed to other publications such as Southern Faith Magazine, Purposeful Life, and Aspiring Woman Magazine. She is also a contributor for several online Christian blogging sites.
Of all her roles in life, Betty is most honored to be wife to Jim and mama to a brood of 7, which includes biological and adopted children.
So helpful. Thank you. I’m a supervisor at work and I come home with my supervisor hat on too often. I have a 25 minute drive so I will definitely give this a try. I think it will really help our marriage.