Three Rules To Keeping Your Sanity In Marriage

About a year into our marriage, Beth & I both quit our jobs and started working together as insurance adjusters. We did this for several years, and I absolutely LOVED it.

Before the change, our separate jobs naturally created space in our relationship. Eight to nine hours of every working day was spent apart from each other. But a few weeks into to our new careers together we discovered a new need in our marriage that we hadn’t had before:

Alone Time.

At first, we almost felt guilty admitting to each other…”hey, do you mind if I go (fishing, shopping, hang out with the guys/girls, etc) by myself?”

But now, especially with children in the mix, we understand that part of our week’s schedule needs to be a 3-4 hour chunk where Beth can go off by herself somewhere (usually shopping) and I can go spend some alone time as well (usually Barnes & Noble or kayaking).

My goal with this post is to set you free.

It’s OKAY if you need some alone time from your spouse and kids each week. Especially if you’re more introverted than extroverted you may NEED some alone time in order to feel rejuvenated. Here’s three rules to set you up for success.

Three Rules of Alone Time

Rule #1: Plan in Advance. The key is to know yourself well enough to know when you’re going to need some alone time. In other words, plan on getting gas before the tank is empty.

Communicate with your spouse a day or two in advance so you can cover meals, watching kids, etc. It’s not fair to your spouse to run yourself into the ground and then leave at the last-minute shouting “I just need some alone time!!”

Rule #2: Do something Life-Giving. What activities bring you energy and put a smile on your face? The goal is to get refilled, not to just check-out. I don’t recommend flipping channels or spending three hours on Facebook.

Rule #3: Be Considerate of Your Spouse: “Alone Time” doesn’t mean you go to the Bahamas for a week by yourself. This should be obvious, but I’ve seen people do some stupid things. There may be times when you need a personal retreat, but that’s for a different post. What I’m advocating here is a 3-4 hour time of doing something refreshing by yourself each week.

Beware the temptation to feel like you’re being selfish. Taking care of your emotional health is called being responsible, not selfish. You can serve your family much better out of a place of wholeness than you can out of exhaustion.

Written by Wesley