Marriage Challenge | Read Together
Welcome the New Kids on the Blog: Marriage Challenges!
I recently read Crushing It by Gary Vee, and was inspired by a married couple he discovered on Youtube. They are an older married couple who retired and found themselves feeling bored. So, they started making videos of themselves trying new things together. Their videos went viral, and what’s more— they said they grew closer, got out of their comfort zones, and found they really valued their time together in ways they hadn’t before. My first thought when I read about them was, Why wait till I’m old to grow my marriage or try new things? I wondered how I could adapt their “try new things” mentality to keep my marriage meaningful.
What you may or may not see of my marriage behind the Social Media curtain, is that Brett and I are very independent/individualistic spouses. It’s important we schedule time together (especially without work) and it’s important we schedule intentional and meaningful experiences together and with other people— or else our time together becomes sitting in front of the television or work-filled!
The more I considered what this could look like for us and you, my blogging and Vow Collective community, the more I got excited about some sort of marriage challenge. Each challenge lasting either one week or one month, depending on what the challenge is.
February’s marriage challenge is to 1) slow down together, 2) pick a book (or audio book) of poems, a novel, a biography, a religious text, or a handful of children’s books, and 3) Make time to Read Together once a day every work day. This could last anywhere from 10-30 minutes. A few questions you could potentially ask one another if your’e super into dialogue— What does this passage bring out in you? What do you think about that paragraph? What did you like about that chapter?
How the challenge is practically playing out for us: Brett and I have chosen to snuggle in bed and read next to one another around 10PM every night. We read our own books separately most of the time, but we spend about 10-15 minute reading the Bible together because it’s important to us. Sometimes we discuss it, sometimes we don’t. We’ve missed some nights and don’t guilt trip ourselves or one another if we do. That never ends well for us. Knowing we have this challenge ahead of us, motivates to follow through more often than if we didn’t challenge ourselves to do this at all.