TRANSCRIPT
Matthew: (00:01)
Welcome to the kick couples podcast. This is the place where we help committed couples who want to level up their marriage experience, newfound, clarity, hope, and confidence. We’re Matthew and Kim co-host and husband and wife
Kim: (00:16)
In 26 years together, we’ve seen a lot and never thought it could be as good as it is right now. We’re here to help you successfully navigate the messy, dirty, and wonderful world of marriage.
Matthew: (00:29)
We believe all couples deserve and are capable of experiencing an extraordinary and fulfilling marriage. And each week we’re bringing you life lessons from real life successful couples to help you grow and strengthen your relationship.
Kim: (00:43)
And now let’s dive into today’s episode. So
Matthew: (00:47)
Grateful to be here with Brad and Stephanie White today. It’s
Stephanie: (00:51)
The commitment to
Brad: (00:53)
Doing the hard stuff. That’s what marriage is, is two people that learn how to forgive. I
Stephanie: (00:58)
Didn’t want to be driven. I didn’t want to be too hold what
Brad: (01:02)
I was supposed to do. I don’t wanna live in friction. I
Stephanie: (01:06)
Think the fights should be fighting for our marriage.
Kim: (01:10)
We’ll get started right after this message. If you wanna learn how to experience the best, most fulfilling year of your marriage, invite you to pre-order. Matthew’s new book, kick husband, winning at life, marriage, and sex. You can get it@matthewehoffman.com. Again, that’s Matthew hoffman.com. And now back to the show
Matthew: (01:35)
And we are here with the wonderful Stephanie, do you go by Stephanie? I hear him say S step. I dunno if that’s a term of endearment of like that private name kind of thing. So we’ll call you Stephanie, if that’s, what is that? What you prefer? Yeah, that’s what I like. All right, great. I, I I’m. I go by Matthew too, but people call me Matt. So it’s all good. We are so grateful to be here with Brad and Stephanie White today. And you know, we’re gonna have a lot of fun. It’s an easy casual conversation. And the whole goal of the kick couples podcast is just to share, uh, with other couples what works and what doesn’t work and kind of what your focus points are and how long you guys have been able to do it. How, how long have the two of you been together? How long have you been married?
Brad: (02:18)
You don’t know. I know. I don’t wanna be the one to speak. You go ahead. 25 years in November, remember 30th, be 25 years. Nice.
Matthew: (02:26)
Well done. So that’s a big one. So, Brad, have you been planning big time for number 25? What do they call 25? Is that the that’s the silver, silver. Silver, right? Silver man.
Brad: (02:36)
How about you guys? How long Y been
Kim: (02:39)
So 26 years we’ve been married. Congratulations.
Matthew: (02:41)
27, 27 in November two as well. No,
Brad: (02:44)
November yet. Wow. That’s awesome. Yeah. So it’ll be 25 years.
Matthew: (02:48)
Congratulations. Yeah.
Brad: (02:49)
Thank you very much.
Matthew: (02:50)
Same to you. Absolutely. Well, so we wanna know, we think we know, but we wanna hear you guys say in your own words, what makes you two, a kick couple
Stephanie: (03:01)
I would say it’s the commitment to doing the hard stuff to forgiving when you don’t wanna for forgive to forgetting when you don’t wanna forget to just keep moving forward.
Brad: (03:17)
I would say it’s sent believe that Steph is a great forgiver and you know, that’s what marriage is, is two people that learn how to forgive. Mm-hmm that’s what, that’s what, that’s just, that’s what it is. That’s great. But
Matthew: (03:32)
Yeah, no, I, I, I, I agree. Gotta gotta forgive. Cuz if we hold on to stuff, man, it’s like poison, right,
Brad: (03:39)
Exactly. Right. I mean, anybody that lasts a long time in marriage and have a good marriage. They’re too great. Forgivers yeah, that’s just, that’s just what it takes.
Stephanie: (03:49)
And I think too, for, you know, it’s learning to, to see the good, when you don’t wanna see the good it’s learning to passed and see the good and, and keep remembering why you fell in love and how you fell in love, what you like about that person. Mm-hmm, what you really enjoy. Why you enjoy being with them. Mm-hmm , you know, why you became friends and lovers in the first place, how you fell and keep that spark going. Yeah,
Kim: (04:23)
That’s beautiful. Very nice. Um, I, I’m a firm believer that we bring to our marriage. Um, a lot of our history and a lot of our past mm-hmm and, um, our families of origins play a really big role in who we are when we come to a relationship. And sometimes it’s wonderful. Sometimes it’s been challenging. Um, we’ve, we’ve witnessed challenging things and sometimes it’s even been trauma. And so I’m curious, and either one of you can go first, but I’d love to know a little bit about your family of origin. What love look like in your family growing up? You
Stephanie: (05:04)
Go first okay. Um, I was raised Brad and I both come from pastors homes and we are pastors. His, my dad was a very firm type, a driven, and he was a Marine and a pastor. So he was driven and my mom took the backseat. So I was used to that, but I am a type a, so I didn’t want to be driven. I didn’t want to be told what I was supposed to do. I didn’t want that in my life. And then, so we had a lot of rubs when he wanted to, Brad wanted to take the lead in our marriage, which the Bible clearly states that there needs to be one. And I mean, even everybody knows there needs to be one head in a household. I mean, there needs to be one person that, that makes a, the ultimate decision. So it’s, it was very hard at first trying to find the rhythm of life for our home. And so I would, I kind of fought that a little bit and, and tried to, um, buck the saddle, so to speak. And, and so the upbringing kind of, we had to go through some rough up and downs with, with my upbringing. I didn’t want to be told, no, we, we really don’t need to be. And Brad is very gracious with it, but, but I didn’t wanna be told no pretty much.
Brad: (06:36)
Yeah. And I grew up, you know, just like her mom and dad have been married a long time and been faithfully committed. I grew up in a home the same way. It was just the opposite of roles. Mm-hmm my dad was a pastor and was a, was a, was a great pastor. My dad had a very laid back personality. He was incredibly wise, incredibly fun, ful godly, man. But my mom was very, very strong. Um, great girl. Awesome. But just very strong. And my dad would often take a backseat. Now my dad would draw lines on critically important things but I grew up seeing my dad lay down so much, um, on restaurants or we’re gonna do this or that. And it was all the time. Dad just would mom just ruled the roost on a lot of things. And so that brought, or I brought into marriage.
Brad: (07:38)
Mm. Somewhat of a disrespect, uh, for women, not, not, not in the sense of, I didn’t respect women at all, but like, I just, I was not gonna be, I was not gonna bring you, I was not gonna be a doormat that just chased my wife around in my whole goal in life 24 7, Evan was that she was happy if that meant. I couldn’t. If I had to come home and say, I, I would watch my dad, cuz I worked with my dad in my adult life before I moved to Tampa and my mom would call the office. If there was, you know, something wrong at the house, you know, there’s a cockroach or she wants to do something and he would just leave the office and just go home and spend the afternoon. I mean, he would do that regularly. And I was like, people just can’t do that.
Brad: (08:23)
Like, I mean, you can’t, you just can’t do that all the time. You gotta work. You know what I mean? And so I determined I’m not, I’m not gonna do that. So that brought that baggage in which means like Steph said, she didn’t want to be led and I wanted to do all the leading . So that sounds like, that sounds like a recipe. Good recipe. Very combustible. So, so we had to learn, you know, and I made lots of mistakes and, and she may have made a few, but , but we’ve uh, you know, you learn man, and I’ve, you know, Steph is, I I’m a better man because of Steph and, and because of what I’ve learned from her and um, you know, that’s that, that’s our family. I mean that, you know, um, I don’t have any like direct trauma from my, from my family, my, my mom and dad or, or I mean, family, I don’t, do you have any?
Stephanie: (09:12)
No, I just think because as we both are, we’re both type A’s. Yeah. It’s hard for one of us to back down. Yeah. So we really have to put our relationship first. Mm-hmm when, when we want to put our relationship first. Yeah. You know, you have to say what is more important me saying this you’re more important are my opinion. Yeah. So we really have to, and it took maturity growing up, you know, because we weren’t, you know, we were older when we got married. We weren’t babies. When we got married, took a lot of growing in our relationship to say this isn’t as important as I feel like it is.
Brad: (10:03)
yeah. Just learning how to communicate. I mean, I, I think, you know, yeah. I mean, just, it was trying to get my, my words right on this. Cause I wanna say it correctly, but, but like Steph, one of the things I struggled with was Steph had an opinion on everything and so don’t, we all that’s right. Verbalizing and opinions on everything. And even on things that I would think you don’t even, how do you even, you know, I just couldn’t get it.
Stephanie: (10:32)
And I like to be contrary
Brad: (10:35)
And Steph likes to give the other side of it. So if I’m, if I think we need to make a right turn, she’s gonna talk about why left turn should be thought about . And so, um, and me, my weakness is when I decide on a right turn, I don’t want to hear anything. I wanna take a right turn. You know what I’m saying? so it just says learning. I mean, that’s just, those are things that been the bumps and that, that, that boil down to where we’re what family we’re gonna spend Christmas with. Mm-hmm Thanksgiving with and who’s this and in the will, who gets the kids and da, da, da, da, and you know, all that kind of stuff. Sure. All that fun stuff.
Matthew: (11:10)
So it sounds like you guys each brought some stuff from your families of origin that a, you said no way in heck, are we doing it this way? right, right. Or exactly. We’re absolutely gonna, you know, we, we seem to take good and bad, right. And helps form who we are and bring it together. And that leads, you know, um, one of the first things you said, Stephanie, uh, you mentioned about commitment when we said, what makes you kick? And that’s one of our three CS. And we want to kind of jump into that a little bit. So Stephanie, I’d love to hear from you. What does commitment look like to you in your relationship?
Stephanie: (11:43)
Commitment is not letting go. Like Brad says, it’s a bulldog on a, it’s a bull dog on a dish rag. We are not gonna give up on our relationship. We go to counseling, we are avid believers in counseling. We are not gonna give up on our relation on our marriage, on our kids, on our friendships, on our family. We are not gonna give up whether it takes work money, whatever it takes, whatever we need to do, our, our marriage is worth it. And so the commitment to get better to better ourselves mm-hmm cause I can’t change him. Cause you know, after 25 years I finally learned, I cannot change him, but I can change me. And so the commitment to do better, how can I make a better Stephanie? How can I do better? Even if I don’t like what he’s doing, but I can do better. Yeah. So the commitment to just do better to get better.
Brad: (12:49)
Yeah. I agree. And I think for us, divorce is never on the table. And so I think if it is an option, it will be an option. Yeah. And so it’s not even on the table. I mean, like we don’t, don’t go there. We’re gonna work this out and we’re in it. And so for us, this is like the, this is something and I’ve taught this too, is at the end of the day, I try to make the 75 year decision. Yeah. So I’m 49, just turn 49 a week ago when I’m 75 and my kids are grown and they have families of their own and I’m in that season of life. What decision will I be glad that I made, because by then your looks are gone, your all that. And so what are you looking back on? I look back, what do I want to hand to my kids, to my grandkids when I’m 75 years of age, um, cuz we make dumb decisions when we’re 35 and we think we’ll be 35 forever. Yeah. But see, I pastor people of all different ages and when you’re 75, 85, that’s where you’re living with the compound interest of the decisions that you’ve made. Right. And so for us in those moments when our kids were little and we had twins and a two year old at the same time and, and it was starting a church from scratch and it was nuts. We went back to that, like this will not be forever. What at 75, will I be glad? Or what will we at 75 be glad that we did mm-hmm
Kim: (14:35)
Yeah. I love hearing about the way you are both proactive in your marriage. Mm-hmm in terms of seeking counseling or getting what you need to be a better couple. I think it’s really important for our listeners to know and to hear that that’s okay. And so absolutely it’s really good to do that. It’s healthy.
Brad: (14:56)
Yeah. Well I like to see it, like you get the oil changed on your car, right? I mean, you don’t doesn’t mean you have a bad car. It doesn’t mean you’re that you didn’t make a good investment. It means you’re taking care of your car. Every car needs an oil change, you know, every, every step the tires need to be rotated. Right? Sure. It’s a two mm-hmm exactly right. And so you need that. And I think one of the biggest hallmarks of maturity is self-awareness mm-hmm and so like counseling helps you grow and self awareness and being aware, oh, this is why I’m responding. The way I am. This is, these are tendencies in my life. These are, these are triggers in my life. Cuz maturity. I mean, what makes a parent more mature than their child is not their age is their awareness. Their aware of certain dangers. They’re aware of what financial decisions like this, uh, turn into relationship. They have awareness. And so that’s what makes that’s what brings maturity. I think counseling brings that and listen we’re pastors and listen, I so believe in counseling. I’m too much for one counselor. I need like a whole team. Yeah. They gotta have a team approach with me. I got, I got so many issues. Like one person just, they end up like quitting. Yeah, you exhausted. They can’t take it
Stephanie: (16:23)
Anymore. but, but when you get, when you get counseling and you realize your deficiencies or, and you can work on your or weaknesses, then you can communicate with your spouse. Right. This is where I’m struggling and your spouse, the openness that it brings mm-hmm when you realize yeah, that’s a, that is a weakness. Mm-hmm I see that. But it, it bonds your marriage so much more
Brad: (16:53)
In counseling. A good counselor will help you with a strategy mm-hmm so it doesn’t remove problems, but okay, so we’re facing this problem again. Now with counseling, we have a game plan. Yeah. So like with Steph and I, one of the things we learned is we are not gonna hold anything in. We’re gonna talk about it. Mm-hmm and we’ve learned, so we’ve learned like there’s a, there’s a good way to deal with things. Mm-hmm so like one of the ways we do it is we go out to dinner and we don’t do it at night. Before we go to bed, we don’t do it during the middle of the work day. I mean, we’re gonna go to dinner, we’re gonna talk about it. Have a good dinner in a well lit place. It’s not dark and oppressive. Um, and we, we talk it out and so learning those strategies and not doing it screaming and hollering before you go to bed and yeah, you know, you’re just like in a restaurant, you know, you’re gonna be more respectful. You just are. And it’s just, it’s just a little, and I, I encourage people too. Like if they gotta have, if you can go to lunch at a restaurant or the sun is shining into the restaurant and have a difficult conversation, you’re gonna be in a better mood. You’re gonna be more receptive. It’s a better atmosphere than sitting there with your kids running around . And the dish is full of, I mean the sink full of dishes and laundry style piled up on the couch and, and all the above, you know, when
Matthew: (18:26)
It comes to creating a kick marriage, do you ever wonder how you’re doing? We found that there are 13 key components that make up a thriving relationship, which is why we’ve created the kick assessment in this powerful free tool. You’ll learn what they are and how you and your spouse are ranking in each one. And you’ll get recommendations that will help you start improving today to get your results. Simply visit Matthew E hoffman.com. Again, that’s Matthew E hoffman.com. It’s time to start kicking. Let’s go.
Kim: (19:05)
Yeah. We’re firm believers that, um, communication is really important. I mean, after commitment, we really think that that communication is next and you, yes, you, you, we’ve kind of segued into that a little bit already, but tell me, tell me a little bit more about how you communicate. I know you go out to, to have a nice meal together in a well lit place and mm-hmm, , it’s a time for you each to connect. What else do you do throughout the day or throughout the week to communicate with each other? You go,
Stephanie: (19:37)
We usually, we try to set aside some space to be together by ourselves. We’ve got now, even, even when our kids were little, every day, we would have time like a timeout space just for Brad and I, because we do, we have a, now our kids are, our twins are 20 and our son is 23 and he’s out of the house. But our, our twins are back from college, but we have time where it’s just he and I, where we get to look at each other in the face and kind of go through our day and what’s coming up and things that we, he and I need to plan out and talk about, but that face to face, you know, flip your phone over. So you don’t see the front. And, and it’s where, because that’s, that’s a, that’s a, a love language for me is the attention where I can see your eyeballs.
Stephanie: (20:29)
Listening. Focus is a big one for me or I, I want your focus. I want your eyes. And you know, almost the McDonald’s where you repeat after me, uh, you know, my order, what did I just say? Are you listening to me? So you know, where he and I sit together and say, okay, this is coming up. This is what we’ve got to do. And this is, and, but if it’s a big conversation, we do go out and, and say, this is what I’m feeling. I, my feelings, I was when you said this, and the reason why I was hurt, cuz I mean, we all know that guys say some things that, that will hurt your feelings and they, it completely goes over their head. So I will, you know, we will have those moments where we sit by, we try to bring the kids involved, you know? So they’re not, they don’t have to be witnesses. They’re not in the jury, but where, whereas just he and I, and you know, my feelings were hurt when you said that and you know, most of the time you MEA culpa, I, it, I didn’t even note that no, that would’ve hurt your feelings. Like yeah. When you said that, uh, you don’t have sisters, you don’t know. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, right. But we’ve had, we’ve had several conversations like that.
Brad: (21:57)
Yeah. And I think, you know, for us, um, I think for me learning how to really apologize is a key part of communication. So, you know, not saying, so Seth says to me that hurt my feelings. You know, I used to say, well, I’m sorry that you’re hurting and I’m sorry that you’re hurting. Well, that’s not an apology that is, I’m really don’t agree with the fact that you’re hurting and it’s kind of getting under my skin that you brought it to me. So I’m gonna give you a patronizing statement. Mm-hmm um, where the right way is, I am so sorry for what I said, what I said was wrong. I disrespected you. I took you for granted in that. I am sorry. I own that. And what I’m gonna do to change on that is this. And I ask you to forgive with me and owning.
Brad: (22:51)
I mean, I, I just think that’s, that’s huge. I mean, we’ve put out a lot of little fires that could have become dumpster fires. Mm-hmm , um, with that and owning it and stuff’s been gracious to forgive and, you know, we just, we just talk it out. I mean, we, I think, I know that sounds simple, but we don’t let things fester. Like mm-hmm, if, if she’s, if she’s irritated me on something now I’m not talking about, there was a dish left out or something, something small. But I mean, if, if it’s really something, um, I’m gonna deal with it. Mm-hmm , I’m gonna, I’m gonna bring it up. I’m gonna, we’re gonna talk about it. Um, I’m gonna tell her how I feel. And she does the same with me, I think. Yeah. So much just gets buried, man. You, you, you stuff, stuff down. And it was a level two that you could have dealt with and it’s a level 15 when it comes out. Sure. Cause you’re sitting at
Kim: (23:45)
Stewing and you know, as it builds into a mountainous issue.
Matthew: (23:49)
Yeah. Correct. So you guys, it sounds like you’ve been pretty successful in not letting things become those mountains, but agreed with each other that you each have the right and permission to have those difficult conversations, which could be directed at one individual with the other.
Brad: (24:05)
Yeah. And I think, you know,
Stephanie: (24:06)
We’re not perfect because I mean, back to I, some of it I’ve had to learn to apologize cuz back I did not grow up with good apologizers like my parents did not, they did things. They, they were acting, they acted out their apologies. Like they would do something to hurt the others feelings and they would, um, make a, a dessert or they would go buy a gift. And I’ve had to learn how to say, I’m sorry, you know, cuz I always say, I’m sorry, that would be it. Yeah. But I’ve had to learn to really own my junk to say I’m sorry. I didn’t mean, I didn’t mean the way that sounded. I was, I was thoughtless when I said that. I didn’t mean what I said. I should have said it a different way. I don’t feel the way I said, I don’t feel about you what I said. So I’ve had to learn how to own up to my junk on that. Cause I was not an apologizer.
Brad: (25:14)
Yeah. And for me, I mean an immature thing that I’ll do from time to time, I gotta work on it. I’ll just I’ll so over something, you know, I’ll just like, I’ll get, I’ll get angry and I’ll just like, I’ll not want to talk about it. I’ll just want, I’ll want to stew about it. I want to stew on it. And then I have to say, no, no, no, this is not right. This is not mature. You gotta, you gotta step up and deal with this and
Kim: (25:38)
On it. Well, and that’s a great way to, um, get into our next question, which is conflict resolution. You know, we all have whether, or it’s something very big or something very small, there’s gonna be conflict and it may even be daily. Um, mm-hmm how do you handle, how do you handle the blowups? How do you handle when something has really gone wrong? And um, you guys need to get back to being a couple because now you’re, you’re in different corners, right? you’re fighting corners. Um, what is the, what does it look like in your relationship to resolve conflict?
Stephanie: (26:15)
Again, I think the communication piece, trying to see the most important thing, the priorities, your couple priorities have to be in line. What is the most important thing to you as a couple and your priorities have to line up and, and then you discuss, you know, you see where the, the disagreement is. Isn’t that big of a deal, you know, once you’re discussing it, like, you know, if, if he hurts your feelings and it just continues to metastasize, you know, it just grows, but you’ve got to, you’ve gotta rip the bandaid off. You’ve got to just say honey, I’ve, I’ve gotta tell you when you said this, it hurt my feelings. Or when you did not do this, it caused this, it caused animosity. But when you confront in love and their, their receiving of it, it’s what I found is the manner in which I do it is the manner in which he receives it.
Brad: (27:25)
Yeah. And, and I think it starts to, with two people that in their heart want to resolve this mm-hmm that we, at the end of the day, I don’t wanna live in friction with Stephanie. I don’t wanna live of where we don’t have peace. Um, we can disagree on something and not be disagreeable mm-hmm and we can disagree on something and still have a great relationship. Um, you know, it’s just it’s I, I genuinely know she goes, well, we wanna resolve things. Mm-hmm I mean, we get upset. We do have blow ups. You know, we just went through a major change in our life where I felt like we needed to sell our home mm-hmm and, um, downsize because of COVID and other things. And, um, that was major, man. That’s probably the biggest, most difficult mm-hmm leadership move in our marriage.
Brad: (28:27)
I mean, I didn’t force it mean we worked on it together, but I mean, I, I cashed in a lot of chips on that a lot. I mean, that was, that was a huge move for her massive, massive, massive move. And there was, you know, we had to walk through a lot of things, I mean, and still walk through a lot of things. Um, and you just gotta, you gotta talk it and you gotta resolve it and you gotta work through it. And, and mm-hmm , you know, that’s how we do with it. Like I said, we do a lot of meals. Mm-hmm um, and Steph genuinely, I always know Steph wants to resolve mm-hmm
Stephanie: (29:04)
and at the end of the day, it’s about the commitment mm-hmm what’s the most important thing to you mm-hmm is it the fight and being right? Mm-hmm or is it your spouse and the going the distance?
Brad: (29:20)
Yeah. And you know, marriage, if you’ll think on this, marriage is a journey of learning to do what you don’t want to do. that if you boil Mary down, that’s what it is. It’s learning to do what you don’t wanna do. It’s learning to eat foods that you didn’t want to eat to go to places, to, to be in a family with people that you didn’t grow up with. And you don’t even like them necessarily, but you, but they’re your WIS or your husband’s family. And you learn to, do you learn to watch ed them exactly.
Matthew: (29:55)
The Outlaws, right?
Brad: (29:58)
The Outlaws, but you just, it’s just what it is. I mean, it’s, it’s that, and one of the things that we don’t want to do is we don’t want to admit what we’re wrong. Mm-hmm we don’t want to give up ground. Um, but once again, what, what are you gonna be glad you did at 75? Yeah.
Matthew: (30:19)
So what I hear you, what I, I kind of, I hear a theme popping out here and I hear you saying, you know, a lot of it comes back to commitment, right? And Stephanie, you said, which I love what’s most important to you. Right? Mm-hmm and you know, one of the, I think a tenant, I bet you all would agree with is that the number one relationship human relationship that you guys have is with each other. And, and if you give it that priority, then you’re gonna make those decisions for what’s best for the us, not for the I or the you necessarily. And it seems like you guys are walking that, uh, talk and also in the conflict resolution, as we’ve been talking about for a couple of minutes here, if you have the commitment you prob you, I would do you guys both feel safe? That, that argument, that decision isn’t gonna have ending power because you’re in it. Yeah. There’s no, the concept there’s no nuclear scenario here.
Brad: (31:13)
That’s right. There’s no, there’s no rip cord. No. Um, we’re in it, we’re in it for the long haul. And um, I, we want our, our kids mm-hmm that have a mom and dad that stay committed. Mm-hmm want our grandkids to have that. We we’ve benefited. Yeah. From parents that stay together. My, my mom and dad were married 46 years when my dad passed away, her parents have been married. What? 50 something years. Yeah. You know, 54, 54 years. So, I mean, that’s just a lot of, it’s just a huge stabilizing factor in our life. And we want to, we want to give that. And there’s just nothing. I mean, there are grounds, of course we’re Christ followers and follow the teachings of the Bible. But I mean, there are biblical grounds for divorce, and then there are times I think that it’s warranted, but those should be the exception, not the rule. Right? Sure. Yeah. I think the fights should be fighting for our marriage. Yeah.
Matthew: (32:11)
That’s the right thing to fight for. So mm-hmm, , we’ve been talking about three of our 13 pillars here, the commitment, communication, and conflict resolution. And there’s another 10 on that list. If you all have it or if not, I can re remind you of it.
Brad: (32:24)
I’ve got it on my phone, but I didn’t bring my phone over here. No,
Matthew: (32:26)
No worries. So I’m gonna, I’m gonna read these out to you and then you all tell just as I read, ’em just think about ’em for a minute. We’ve got trust and honesty, patience, intimacy, lasting love, selflessness, unity, servant leadership, faith, and moral code, appreciation and security. As I read those out to you, I’m curious, Stephanie, which one of those kind of jumps out at you? You go, oh yeah. That, that one’s important to me. And to your relationship.
Stephanie: (33:01)
I think for me, it’s the, the daily patience, the walking it through, but what does it really mean to walk every day and love to really love your spouse? The patience of it, because it takes patience, love somebody to really stay with ’em to, to patiently love somebody. You know, I think that that’s. So when you’re really staying with someone, it takes patience throughout the day, throughout the week, throughout the month throughout life, you’re you are loving the same person through the ups and downs of their life, of your life. You know, whether they’re sick, healthy, you know, it’s just patience. You’re staying with them. Okay. You’re loving them.
Matthew: (33:52)
So for last love, yeah. There’s gotta be a lot of patience is what I hear you saying for that love to laugh. Yes. Right?
Brad: (33:57)
Yeah. Go ahead, Brian. I think trust and honesty. You know, one of the things I love about Steph, I love a lot about her, but one of the things that’s been such a, such a blessing to me is I’ve never one moment that we’ve been married ever not been able to trust her completely. Like when I’m on the road, mm-hmm, when we’ve gone through tough times when we’ve gone through difficult times financially, like I’ve never had that worry that, that I better get this fixed or she’s going, or who is, I, I didn’t get her. I didn’t get, I couldn’t reach her by phone. What is she doing? I’ve never, ever, ever had to worry about that. And that she is just, I know she’s solid. I know that then she’s honest and she’s loyal stuff is so loyal, man. She’s the most loyal friend of anybody. Like, I mean, I would walk away from friendships year before staff step is the most loyal. Like, I mean, she’s just like, she’s awesome with that. And um, I think it’s just huge that honesty, that trust that that is just, you can, you can, you can sleep well at night. You can get through a lot of things because trust is the foundation of every relationship. If you don’t have trust, I mean, you, you’re not gonna have anything else. Yeah. There’s
Kim: (35:30)
So much security in a relationship when there is true trust and honesty.
Brad: (35:36)
Mm-hmm yeah.
Kim: (35:37)
Yep. We have this idea that we, um, that we talk about in our podcast and it’s called spill overthinking. And we really believe that when you’re having success in one area of your life, and for instance, as a, as a couple, and you have, when you’re having really true success and you a relationship with one another, that, that just spills over into everything else that you do and you touch. Can you talk to me a little bit about that and how mm-hmm maybe some spillover, um, has occurred in your relationship?
Stephanie: (36:12)
I feel like our kids are, are part of the spillover. Like I feel like in it’s, it’s, it’s a legacy for, that’s a part of our, I mean, they’re doing so, I mean, knock on wood they’re they are they’re young yet, but they are really, they’re good kids. And I’m, I’m very grateful for our kids that they, they love us. And they like to be with us, which is amazing to me that they like to be around us. And they’re our friend, not, you know, not BU buddies buddies, cuz they’re still two of ’em are under our roof, but they like to be with us. And that’s part of the blessing of being together as a married couple and being able to laugh and have fun and being friends. I feel like being a married couple, the best part is being your best friend, being with your best friend and being able to laugh mm-hmm and, and I feel like having our kids around us and they see us laugh together that the spillover is our kids will wanna be with us. Yeah. They don’t wanna just be with their buddies, but they kind of wanna be with mom and dad cuz they’re a little fun and they enjoy being with us. That that to me is the best spillover that we’ve experience
Kim: (37:31)
That’s to you all, as parents, definitely a Testament that they wanna hang out with you, they wanna be with you that says a lot about how you have been with them and how you’ve raised them. Can you think of other areas that some spillover has, has occurred?
Brad: (37:45)
I think, I think in, in our, in our ministry mm-hmm um, you know, step and I have always been very honest and, and with our kids, you know, they saw us argue mm-hmm and they’ve seen us resolve things. Right. They did not see a perfect marriage. We did not keep everything away from them, obviously some things, but we lived it out in the open. And so they, they see that they’ve seen us be open and all that. Now, as far as fill over in our ministry, take that same principle. Like we’ve just been honest with people for 20 years. Mm-hmm that we don’t have a perfect marriage and here are things that we’ve learned. And I think it gives hope to people and spill over to people that there is no perfect marriage. There is like, I’ve been honest in front of thousands of people, honest about, um, counseling, going to counseling, honest about mistakes.
Brad: (38:40)
I’ve made and honest about how we resolve certain things. Lots of humor with it. And it empowers people. There’s a spillover that people are empowered that it’s okay to get help. And like they that this, this, these, this couple Brad and Stephanie, they don’t have it all together. Mm-hmm and they don’t have it. All right. And, and they don’t go with a, a, a mayor that never argues in fights. I even will tell people, listen, if you say you never argue a fight, I think you’re lying. Yeah. I think you either lying or one of you’s just a doormat and just enables the other one. So I think it’s just, we just, we just, it just spills over like that. Yeah.
Kim: (39:21)
We would just wanna say thank you so much and express our gratitude for who you are and what you do in the Tampa community as pastors. We’re, we’re really grateful to you today, especially for open up and being vulnerable with us, with our listeners and giving us a little bit of insight into what makes you kick and what, what, you know, what makes love last, right?
Matthew: (39:46)
Yeah. It’s been great. Great to get to know you, Stephanie, I’m excited. Brad, always good to reconnect with you. It’s been a fun, a fun journey and it’s so grateful for you guys being vulnerable and sharing and yeah. A lot of great pearls. So we look forward to, uh, bringing it back to you so you can share with others too. Absolutely.
Brad: (40:04)
I love it. And you you’re very welcome for and for what you said, but thank you. Thank you for inviting us for having us and just that you would give your time and energy and resources to make stuff like this happen is awesome. Build mayor. And we’re so proud of you guys. This is awesome. We love the Hoffmans man. Thank you. All right.
Matthew: (40:21)
We’ll keep it going, man. Thanks. Right man. Track. We’ll speak to you. Thank you. See you. Bye-bye byebye.
Kim: (40:29)
That’s all we’ve got for this episode of the kick couple’s podcast. If you like the content of this show, you’ll love Matthew upcoming book, kick husband, winning at life marriage insects to receive a digital mini book of quotes and images from the book. All you have to do is rate this show and leave a review and apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you tune in to listen. Then email us a screenshot of your review at podcast at kick as couples, podcast.com. And we’ll get it over to you right away
Matthew: (41:04)
Until next time. Remember happily ever after doesn’t just happen. It’s on purpose.