God made us for connection and for healthy relationships. In Scripture, God tells us that His design for marriage is for a man to leave his mother and father and cleave to his wife, allowing husband and wife to become one flesh. “Therefore, shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh” (Genesis 2:24 KJV).This principle sounds great in theory, but often both “leaving” and “cleaving” can be difficult to implement in real time. In this article, I will offer you some practical tips to help you live out the challenging first part of this principle—leaving and cleaving.  

Leaving and cleaving to your spouse is quite a transition in marriage; you leave behind singleness, accountability and connectedness to your family of origin—of mother, father and possibly siblings. So far family relationships have mainly influenced your thinking and point of view, but now a major transition will occur. In marriage, two individuals come together to forge their own adult union—a union without interference from the outside world. Forging this union is a difficult process, and often requires two mature adults with similar values able to manage conflict and learn to appreciate each other’s unique gifts and contributions to the relationship.  

If you’re in a new marriage, here are some principles to help you effectively leave and cleave:

1. Establish that you’re on the same team. A good illustration is a sports team: When a team is trying to reach successful goals, they communicate with each other; there’s back and forth between the coach and the players. They don’t tell the opposing team what their winning plays are. In a marriage, one partner doesn’t disrespect the other by going outside of their circle and telling unfamiliar people negative information about their partner (unless, of course, there is abuse, abandonment, or a dangerous situation at play).

• Work through normal conflict by talking things out; communicate your differences without overreacting emotionally. Remember, all us have been given a unique, God-given voice to express our feelings. It takes a mature person to appreciate and value someone else’s perspective if it conflicts with their own. Learning to listen in a relationship is a skill that all of us must cultivate. Controlling your emotions and responding to someone you disagree with civilly and respectfully can be a difficult skill to learn. Often, triggers from our past hurts can hinder us from responding in a calm and civil way. 

• Encourage and support each other to achieve personal goals. Marriage requires—not co-dependency, or severe dependence upon one another—but interdependency. This means we’re two independent people who come together with our own uniqueness, personal preferences, and goals. But we can learn to establish both individual and collective goals in our marriage. It’s so important for us to support and encourage each another in our achievement of goals that are practical, realistic, and promote harmony and unity within our marriage. Most of the time, people want to get their own emotional needs met in a relationship. But taking the high road of modeling love and respect, even when things don’t go your way, can be a winning prescription for achieving a productive, successful, and satisfying marriage.

Life is filled with both good and bad surprises!  

It’s nice when everything in our lives is going well. When we make plans and dream, and do business as usual. But what happens when adversity weighs in and seems to take over our lives? When the pain seems paralyzing?  

That’s what recently happened to me. I was working in my clinical practice, enjoying pouring into people’s lives and basking in an abundance of physical energy that I’ve always taken for granted.

It started with a dry cough—that was all. No other symptoms. My husband noticed it and suggested that I go in and get checked. But I dismissed it as lung irritation from all the wildfire smoke we were being exposed to in Southern California. 

At the time I actually felt great—having just lost some weight and keeping up with my 10,000 steps per day—so I wasn’t concerned. 

We went on vacation to Texas and enjoyed family time, and I had no idea I was about to face such a serious illness. The coughing increased upon our return from Texas, so my husband took me to the emergency room. They took an X-ray immediately and discovered that I had bilateral pneumonia in both lungs. The doctor admitted me to the hospital in order to fight this illness aggressively. He described my condition as a “big pneumonia” and said it could take three to six months to recover.

Usually I’m a pretty healthy person. I recover quickly and hit the ground running like a rabbit. But this time my “big pneumonia” eventually became an auto-immune problem that would take some time to heal and force me to rest. 

Rest—that’s a word that I’m not used to, either. I like keeping busy and feeling productive. And though I’m grateful I will recover from this illness, I’ve felt so many losses from not being able to keep up with my normal routine. I’ve discovered that dealing with losses in income, energy and feeling purposeless and unproductive can lead easily to discouragement and depression, and result in the cultivation of daily pity parties.  

Thankfully, when I do get discouraged, I can look back at past experiences and remember how God has seen me through much adversity. I’ve had my share of pain. I’ve survived breast cancer twice, and my husband had a subdural hematoma in 2012 which came with a lot of uncertainty. But he’s doing quite well now with no residual affects! A few years ago, my daughter had a surgery that became serious and life threating. She is doing great now, and we are grateful that she’s healthy!

God has been faithful through all of this adversity. I’ve learned how to lean on Him for His peace, love, comfort and direction and to really cry out to Him for His amazing grace and mercy in my circumstances. 

Below are some principles that have helped me in my recovery. My prayer is that they will help you also. Recovery from an illness or loss usually involves a marathon, not a sprint. In other words, it takes time. 

Here are a few short principles:

• Prioritize what is most valuable – that’s YOU! Slow down and take care of yourself.   Slowing down requires letting go and surrendering to what is directly in front of you and taking one step at a time. It means redefining priorities and rethinking what is most important (instead of merely what you think is important). It means giving yourself permission to let go of whatever drains your time, finances, and energy.  

• Reframe your thinking – Often when we don’t feel well, we can dwell on all the negative aspects of a situation. But are you also able to recognize the positive aspects? Are you open to learning some great lessons that might propel you forward into a better quality of life? If you are entrenched in seeing the negative, it will be difficult to embrace the changes that can invite a new season into your life.    

• Grieve the losses – Experiencing an illness can bring about great loss—loss of time, loss of resources, loss of independence. Sometimes we need help grieving our losses with a clergy member, a therapist, or a friend. Grieving helps us let go of and forgive the past and enables us to accept a new normal. 

• Rely and lean on the One who promises to never leave or forsake you, the One who knows the days that He has ordained for you. Cultivate a personal relationship with Jesus and believe that God loves you and wants the best for your life!