Last night was an awesome night. I tried out some of my own advice from a little earlier…I took care of getting a baby sitter, I asked my wife to go out on a date, made a plan, picked up some flowers and took her out for a “night on the town.” Actually our night on the town was an awesome dinner at The Melting Pot!
It was the first time in longer than I can remember that we went on an actual date. I feel like such a chump for not thinking about doing something like this sooner. Maybe it is laziness or complacency, or maybe because we have been together for such a long time (we started dating almost 11 years ago). The truth is, though, if you want something to be great you have to work at it!
When I got to work this morning I had an “inspirational quote” in my e-mail inbox that I thought hammered home my night last night. Here is it:
”There are two primary choices in life: to accept conditions as they exist, or accept the responsibility for changing them.”
- Denis Waitley
For so long, I have made excuses: we’re too busy at work and when I get home we just need to rest; we have a new baby and he exhausts us and once we get him to sleep we need to sleep; we just don’t have the extra money; and on and on. The trust is I just tried to accept the conditions as they were. I felt like we had a good marriage and that I didn’t have to work too hard to keep things going. After having our son, and I lost the full attention of my wife, I felt like that wasn’t acceptable. I can’t imagine how she feels, because I’m sure that she has felt like this for a long time – long before we were blessed with Cole.
So last night was my first step in accepting the responsibility for situation as it is, and taking affirmative action to change it. I think it worked. At least step one was a total success. I’ll keep you updated!