Marriage Monday: The Three Keys to Successful Decision Making

When you're married, making decisions is a lot trickier than when you live life as a solo act. Everything must be discussed, or at the very least mentioned to your partner in order to maintain an open connection and prioritize honesty.

Hopefully in your marriage - and usually in ours - the big decisions are actually the easy ones to come to terms on together. Typically, a couple will get married after they have decided and agreed on the most important values in life: what type of family they'd like to have, what type of life they'd like to live, how they want their careers to impact them. The big things are the easy things because beliefs in these values are the ones that tend to draw people together.

But... then there's the smaller decisions. Sure, you can agree on the neighbourhood, but what about the house? Of course you want five kids, but what kind of TV exposure will they have? We know we need to eat, but what will we have for dinner tonight? (This question once kept us up until 3 AM - see last week's post. How lame is that?)

When we were first married, the small decisions dominated us. We would go from zero to sixty in small-time debates (I don't even think it's fair to call them arguments) over the really small stuff. Bickering became a part of our daily chores, much like the stereotypical "old couple" would have us expect of them.

And you know what? That's unhealthy. It's exhausting. And it's pointless. Why do we let the small things have such a big impact on our daily life?

This was a question we had begun to ask ourselves as we grew weary of being proven right - or wrong - and getting our way - or not - until we discovered the three keys to successful decision making:

Rock.
Paper.
And scissors.
 



If my opinion and John's opinion differed, we began to duke it out in a heated 3 out of 5. Whoever's "way" won, it won fair and square. Sometimes, getting our "way" had us realize we didn't our "way" at all. However it worked out, our lives simplified as a result of not sweating the small stuff.

If you've hung out with us before, you've probably seen us make decisions this way. A lot of people have laughed at us over it (go ahead!) but then again, I can't help but think how much bickering we've saved along the way just by playing this amazing childhood game.

Case in point: The Caterpillar's middle name. For MONTHS, The Caterpillar-Mae was not The Caterpillar-Mae - she was The Caterpillar-Something-Else. Something-Else was my choice. But then, one fateful day in February, John entered Mae in the running. I had nothing against Mae, but it wasn't my first pick, so we decided to hold probably the most weighted Rock Paper Scissors tournament in the course of our marriage in order to pick her middle name . This tournament would be out of ten and would run the length of time from Mae becoming an option, to a few days prior to her birth date.

Possibly because I am a champ at this game, Something-Else won out by a landslide. And I felt pretty good. Until I realized that somewhere in the back of my mind I actually wanted John to win. His choice was secretly mine, too. But the thing is, I'm not sure I would have had this realization had I lost the game.

So, The Caterpillar-Something-Else became The Caterpillar-Mae as she is now, all thanks to the three keys to successful decision making.

This life is short. Wasting our energy on the little things - the ones that really won't be changing our lives in a noticeable way - is to ignore how precious our time really is. If you find your marriage being spent on the "little things", I would definitely encourage you to try this out - even if just for a month. See how it changes you. I can guarantee that a tense mood will soften. That the small stuff will seem small. And that the decision that is best for your marriage will become clear.

(I want to note: This post is really only about the small stuff. When it comes to big decisions, making a choice with the help of a game is not your best bet. In this case, approach carefully with prayer, respect, honesty and love, and remember to seek the wisdom of those who care for you.)

To learn how to include this technique in your marriage, visit this Wiki How link.