Podcast: https://bit.ly/3JXfS61
This week we’re looking at fear. Fear is the strongest motivator for humans, and none of us are immune. The fear response God gave can and does save our lives. But it can also cause a lot of problems. Some of what you do or don’t do in your marriage is a result of fear. The fear might be realistic, or it might not. It might be motivated by your spouse, but it could be because of someone or something from your distant past. And it feels the same regardless of why you feel it or if it’s reasonable.
We live in a world full of fear. We hear about horrible things happening half a world away, and it affects us. A friend gets divorced, their spouse cheats on them, or their child gets sick, and we fear the same might happen to us.
Healthy fear can serve us by causing us to avoid things that can harm us. But when fear is ongoing with no solution, it can lead to anxiety, paralysis, depression, or tunnel vision. These things harm us and our relationships.
Fear can cause us to lash out. We might lash out at the source of our fear, but often we attack someone unrelated. Spouses are an easy target for anger or paranoia that has nothing to do with them. When we live in fear, it’s always there just below the surface. If our spouse does something that causes fear or anger, all of that pent-up emotion may come out in an explosion that is way out of proportion to what triggered it.
Fear will limit and damage your marriage if you don’t deal with it. The rest of the week we will discuss the source of our fear, and what we can do about it.
~ This is Paul, and fear makes it difficult to Do Marriage Well.
There are no clouds in this image, that’s smoke.
It’s worse north of us, but bad enough here we have to limit our time outside.
Image Credit: © Paul H Byerly created with ideogram.ai & Paul Byerly
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