5 Marriage Retreat Takeaways!

I am a lucky girl in the sense that almost everything I ask my husband to do, he is open-minded about. So, in July when I saw our church was doing a marriage retreat (which we have never done) I asked my husband if he wanted us to attend and he said, “Sure!” I thought his enthusiasm was adorable and I’m very thankful. So what did we learn and why might a marriage retreat help you?

Well we attended First Presbyterian Church’s retreat in early November. More info at https://www.firstprescos.org/ and the retreat took place in Estes Park, Colorado; a beautiful little mountain town famous for the Stanley Hotel from Stephen King’s 1980’s movie, The Shining. https://www.stanleyhotel.com/. Our church is not so Bougie so we did not stay somewhere with fancy pants like The Stanley, but we did stay in some cute cabins on the YMCA property in Estes Park and we were literally in the forest. Why does this matter? Well because we had nature to bond with, our partners to bond with, some cool outdoor activities and that’s about it. No TV in the room, no bars on site, literally after our sessions we would go back to the room, drink a glass of wine from our Yeti cooler in plastic cups and chat about what we had learned. So what did we learn? My key takeaways are the following

How to avoid codependency: I learned about reaching out to God for strength in your marriage and filling your own cup through your faith, not depending on your partner to fill your cup.
If you pray and ask for guidance, make time to listen for an answer. If you are always on the go and never open to some quiet devotional time to just listen, you may be missing the answer to your prayers.
Forgiveness will change your life and your marriage. I learned about the power and healing of forgiveness and was reminded that first and foremost we must forgive ourselves and let go of toxic shame.
Words of Affirmation are a love language for a reason: Verbalize your partner’s worth to you and don’t keep a record of wrongs. Remember you are on the same team.
The Pain and Peace Cycle: This one was a doozy and reinforced much of the cognitive behavioral therapy around negative core beliefs that I work on with my clients. Essentially because we are human and inherently flawed, we all have negative coping skills we attach to feelings that cause pain. Many of these negative core beliefs are rooted in our childhood experiences. It is important to identify those for what they are and challenge the negative thoughts (pain cycle) with positive thoughts (peace cycle) to eventually change the feeling and then the behavior tied in. Long story short, if you can shift your narrative about past experiences that caused you pain, you can work through those negative core beliefs with an understanding that they are lies and do not truly reflect who you are as a person.

On our drive home from Estes back to Colorado Springs, my husband and I stopped at Wibby Brewing in Longmont https://www.wibbybrewing.com/ to sample some beer and reflect on our weekend. We had done a good thing for our marriage, we decided. It was a proactive step in becoming closer, finding ways to be honest and vulnerable with one another, and finding the right words to which we both can be receptive. We are on a secret but not-so-secret mission to be the best we can be for one another but most importantly for ourselves. This retreat was a space for guidance in this particular area by two incredible speakers who do marriage intensives all over the country.

If you want to spice up your connection in a way that’s deeper and more long-lasting than just vacationing with your partner or going on a fun date, a marriage retreat might be in your future. I would encourage you to give it a shot and see what sticks!