Marriage "Fallenness vss. Aloneness"

In Marriage listening is one of the best skills we can learn to
develop. Just listening isn't enough though. Two ways you can
listen; in order to speak or in order to understand. Too often I
listen in order to speak. When I do speak without really
understanding I read my story, experiences, insecurities into my
wife's heart and in doing so miss her heart. If I could learn to
listen to understand her heart I would speak to it differently.

Two ways to speak; to fallenness or to aloneness. It is amazing how
often we speak to a person's fallenness when what they are really
experiencing is aloneness. Fallenness means speaking to the problem.
Aloneness means speaking to the person's emotions. I can't tell you
how many times I have wanted to fix my wife's problem when she just
wanted me to enter into her hurt and live there with her for a while.

Here is how you can do it. 1. Listen to understand. 2. Don't
speak. 3. When she asks you to speak, enter her hurt by echoing her
hurt in your own words and telling her how sorry you are for the pain
she is experiencing. Take care of her, not the problem and she will
love you for it.