Growth Marriage

Nate sits down to talk with David York to talk about values and how they can make or break your relationship. How to determine what your values are. And why they're so freaking important and powerful. You'll love it. I promise.

True Love Exists...You Just Have To Listen

True Love exists...you just have to listen.

True Love Exists...You Just Have to Listen

True Love Exists...You Just Have to Listen

True Love Exists...You Just Have To Listen

True love exists...you just have to listen

True love exists...you just have to listen.

True Love Exists...you just have to listen

True Love Exists, you just have to listen

True Love Exists, you just have to listen

In this episode, Nate sits down with Dr. Nerd Love

In this episode, Nate sits down with Cherie (from last week's episode) in a more professional setting.

True Love Exists....you just have to listen.

True Love still exists...you just have to listen.

True love still exists...you just have to listen.

True Love Exists. You just have to listen.

True Love Exists. You just have to listen.

True love exists, you just have to listen.

True Love Exists...you just have to listen.

True Love Exists, you just have to listen.

True Love Exists, you just have to listen.

True Love exists, you just have to listen.

True Love exists, you just have to listen.

True Love exists, you just have to listen.

In this episode, Nate and Melissa sit down with Lexie and Lune. Remember...True Love exists, you just have to listen.

In this episode, Nate and Melissa sit down with Michelle and Rich. Remember...True Love exists, you just have to listen.

In this episode, Nate and Melissa sit down with Mike and Becky. Remember...True Love exists, you just have to listen.

In this episode, Nate and Melissa sit down with Sung and Christina. Remember...True Love exists, you just have to listen.

I hope you enjoy today's amazing conversation with Don and Jan Gibson. Their love story is the stuff of legends.

On this week's episode, Melissa and I sit down with Dr. Ali Binazir, author of The Tao of Dating: The Smart Woman's Guide to Being Absolutely Irresistible and several other books. He's a super insightful guy, and we cover a lot of different topics in this interview including: The 5 Principles of the Tao of Dating The Principle of Abundance Don't think scarcity Be. Do. Have. Be the kind of person. Do the kind of things. Have what you want. Enlightened Self-Interest Good decision making = The decision that serves the most amount of people for the longest amount of time. How do you fill your life with the things and people that will have positive long-term effects on you. Yin Yang You must have polarity in your relationships. Masculine and feminine. Giving and receiving. Different roles are essential to a dynamic relationship. Get Out of Your Own Way Often times the only thing standing in the way of what you want is you. The power women have to bring light into a relationship, act as a goddess, and inspire men. By mentally wishing happiness upon others, you can completely change your neurology. "May you be happy." The gift of appreciation and gratitude will make others feel valued and give you power in your relationships. The men determine the direction of the relationship. The women determine the depth. How meditation will transform your life and your relationships. "Bring your mind back from distraction." The destructive notion of Soulmates. A great way to tell whether or not you're a good fit for the person you're with is to notice what kind of person you become when you're around the other person. The Magic Question - What's important to you about that? "Remember that in life, everything that you want is outside of your comfort zone. Because if something is inside your comfort zone, it's either something you already have or something so trivial as to be undesirable: you don't want something you already have. So in order to get what you want but don't yet have, you have no choice but to venture outside of your comfort zone." -Dr. Ali Binazir

On this week's episode, we finish our conversation with Steve and Natalie from the 'burbs of Chicago. - What do you do to keep the love alive after having kids? - What advice would you give to people who want to have a relationship like yours? -"Go in with the mindset that you are not #1 anymore." -Natalie - Taking a leap of faith. "The bigger the promise, the bigger the leap." -Melissa Joy Kong - Loving people needs to become a habit, or a default. If love always has to be a conscious act, it's unsustainable. - Can divorce be an option? If so, what are the grounds for divorce? - "I don't believe in marriage for the sake of marriage. I believe in loving." -Steve What separates an average marriage from an amazing marriage?

On today's episode, Melissa and I sit down with Natalie and Steve of the suburbs of Chicago. We talk about their courtship, how it ended in breakup, then they got back together, then almost broke up again. We learn about why their belief in God is essential to the type of marriage they enjoy. And we talk a lot about trust and taking risks, and a lot of other awesome stuff like: - Blind dates - Favorite things - Dating so long you get to the point where you either get married or break up. - Sometimes the relationships that don't work prepare you for, and lead you to the one that does. - Learning to trust after you've had your heart broken. - Using the Bible's definition of love as the foundation for marriage.

In part 2 we wrap up last week's conversation with Jim and Cindy Wigdahl. Jim and Cindy have been friends for over 30 years, but have only been married for 4 or 5 years. Their story is amazing and sad and full of hope all at the same time. It will open your heart. I hope you love it.

In this week's episode we sit down with Jim and Cindy Wigdahl. Jim and Cindy have been friends for over 30 years, but have only been married for 4 or 5 years. Their story is amazing and sad and full of hope all at the same time. It will open your heart. I hope you love it.

In this conversation, we discuss: -Love at first sight. -The importance and meaningfulness of the "little things." -Managing finances and overcoming debt. -Marriage rituals. -Living your faith inside your marriage. -Marriage takes work every day... want to know what that work looks like? Good. We talk about it here. -Love will find you when you're least expecting it.

Jackson Dunn with Focus on the Family talks about how busyness is the enemy to love, and how you can measure the quality of a man by the radiance of his wife.

Listen as Tom and Beth describe how they have been able to create such a beautiful and simple love despite having to overcome many of life's trials, including merging families, traveling for work, losing pets, and much more.

Some of the most powerful lessons I've learned as I've interviewed hundreds of couples have come from some of the least common relationships. This interview was no exception. You'll quickly see the deep, abiding, and unique love that can be created even if you don't date before marriage. Here are 5 lessons I took away from interviewing Iskara and Baldev. Don't just read them... apply them. It could transform your relationship: http://loveumentary.com/5-important-relationship-lessons-you-can-learn-from-an-arranged-marriage

On a scale from 1-10, how is your love life? Many people, maybe even most people will answer between a 6 and 8. I'd say a solid 7 would be considered acceptable, livable, and even relatively enjoyable for most people. Liz and Ryan are my kind of people. They decided that there is no place in their life for a mere 7/10. And so, they started their project, Amazing Life Together. Together they are talking to experts, interviewing real couples, and opening up the kimono to share their own story on their journey to a 10/10 relationship. Read the full blog here: http://loveumentary.com/episode-43-amazing-life-together-with-liz-and-ryan

Buy Seth's book, "Marriage Isn't For You" here: http://goo.gl/wFSZlR Buy the full interview here, and support the Anasazi Foundation and The Loveumentary: http://goo.gl/XopAZ2 "When you're looking for solutions, they have odd ways of making themselves appear." -Seth "You never lose by loving. You never lose out by choosing to love somebody else." -Kim "You live when you give." -Seth "To love is always going to be the right decision." -Seth "The more you understand someone, the more you love them." -Seth

I grew up playing sports. Ever since I was a kid I played soccer, basketball, ran track, and one season of little league baseball (which is how I found out I desperately needed glasses. Thanks for realizing that the reason I missed every ball was because I couldn't see it, Mr. Davis!). My favorite sport was always soccer. When I played recreation soccer my team would practice once – maybe twice a week if we were lucky. I wasn't a great player until I became a teenager and decided that I wanted to play on the high school team. I started practicing more frequently. I'd dribble and shoot the ball in the back yard, and practice using my left foot. I joined a competitive soccer league and played with a bunch of guys who played at a much higher level than I did. It pushed me outside my comfort zone, and helped me grow. Then I tried out for the high school team. By some miracle I snuck under the bar and made the team. It was immediately obvious that I was out of my comfort zone. I was smaller, in worse shape, and had less experience than almost everyone on the team. I was nervous, but I decided to just show up every day and put in the work. I've never improved so quickly. Being thrown onto a team where everyone was so much better, and expected me to be better, did wonders for my soccer skills. We practiced every day for hours. I got in shape. I learned skills like how to use my body to gain position, or how to time my runs to be the first one to the ball. I learned how to shoot with more power, and how to read the field and predict the best place to put the ball. Every noticeable improvement in my skills over the years could really be traced back to the frequency, the level of intensity, and the intentionality of my practice. You see where this is going, don't you? When talking with Hank and Sueann, Hank mentioned something that has always stayed with me. He said, In relationships, we practice at the level of the league we end up playing for. In other words, if you always want to be playing in the relationship little leagues, it requires little effort. It's not hard to swipe right on tinder, or find casual hookups every few weeks. It's easy to walk away from something when it gets hard. It's easy to find excuses to not invest every day. On the other hand, there are only a few people in the world who get to experience the World Series kind of love… but they're the ones who fall in love with the practice. They push themselves every day to be better. They work to push their partners to grow and improve. They watch each others backs and pick up each others slack without complaining. They swing for the fences when they're up to bat, and sprint to every base. There are no vacations. There are no days off. And they love it. It's not necessarily a bad thing to want to play in the little leagues… but playing at this level, you'll never know the glory of the world series. If you want that can't-eat, can't-sleep, reach-for-the-stars, over-the-fence, World Series kind of love, you have to be willing to put in the practice. What are some of the things you do regularly to put in the practice? What can you do to elevate your game?

All the experiences that we have in our life - good, bad, neutral - they all turn us into who we are. So if you take those away, you aren't going to be the same person.

"Your relationship could be so much easier if you just stopped expecting the other person to be who you are." -Bradford "If you're trying to get into an open, honest relationship, it has to start with you. You be open and honest in your dealings with everyone. It shouldn't start with the person you're attracted to. It should start with your everyday life." -Kendall

The price of sex has dropped from, in our grandmother's generation, it was probably a year of dating, in my generation it was 3 dates. We had a thing called the 3-date Rule in the 80's. Now the price of sex has dropped down to the barrel-bottom price of one well-worded text. What it takes to grow a long term bond isn't sex. It's everything else! It's communication skills, conflict resolution skills, empathy, compassion. It's really hard to develop those when your brain is being assaulted with a dopamine rush not unlike the one you get from heroine that you get from a new sexual relationship. Men can have sex with the same woman every week for 6 months and not like her any more after 6 months than they did on the first day. Just because you're having sex, doesn't mean you're in love.

Valentines Day Surprise! - Gary Chapman (Author of "The 5 Love Languages") For 24 hours you can listen to, download, and enjoy this one hour interview with Gary Chapman, author of The 5 Love Languages. Sorry the sound quality is a little rough... my bad. -Nate

Forgiveness isn't fair. If somebody really hurt you, you don't want to let them off the hook because what they did was wrong. And if you have a high sense of justice, you think "I can't, because it's not fair." He hasn't suffered enough. He hasn't paid for his wrongs enough. And sometimes he hasn't even admitted he's wrong and said, "forgive me." But it's not dependent on any of that. It's a choice that you make. "Unforgiveness is like drinking poison and hoping the other person dies." -Anne Graham

Favorite quote from this episode: You become what the most important person in your life thinks that you are. "At the end of Ty's life, I want him to be able to say, 'Terri was the greatest earthly blessing in my life - the best thing that ever happened to me - and that I'm a better man because of how she loved me. And that's the goal that I live with every day. That's how I want to love this man.'"

Jay and Lara have been together for over 20 years. We met with them on Jay's 49th birthday. They took us into their home, fed us, and gave us beds to sleep in. Last year Jay retired early so he could take time to reconnect with his wife. So now they're selling their house, buying an RV, and they're going to spend a decade exploring the world, and experiencing adventure.

What does it take to have an amazing relationship? What does it take to not only avoid a disaster, but to rise above the mediocrity and complacency that has infected most modern-day relationships? Here are two tips from Jenna McCarthy that will help you elevate your game. Click here to read the blog post for this episode: http://www.loveumentary.com/episode-34-you-get-what-you-settle-for-with-jenna-mccarthy/