Laugh When Things Go Wrong

Help show kids the importance of marriage, family, and faith in Christ.

Support focus on the family as we launch the animated film Adventures in Odyssey journey

into the impossible.

Over 9,000 children each year make decisions for Christ after listening to Adventures in

Odyssey, and you can help by donating to the film's launch.

There's a dollar for dollar match until May 1st, so your gift will be doubled when you

give today.

Simply go to focus on the family dot com slash impossible.

In the Old Testament, a book of Proverbs of all places were told that a merry heart is like

medicine.

And we're so glad you've joined us today because we have some laughter in store.

I'm John Fuller joined by Greg and Aaron Smalley, and we're going to kick off today with

Ted Cunningham, he spoke with Jim Daly to share about ways that he and his wife Amy have

found some reasons to laugh.

Let's go back to you and Amy and your differences.

I think New York, you had something go on in a New York restaurant, which is an example

of how to manage something.

I was born in the corn fields outside of Chicago, Illinois, Northern Illinois, and so my favorite

meal was meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and corn, and then take, that's just I can eat that

every day.

My wife is a foodie, so the first time she took us to a foodie restaurant, and you know

when I mean by foodie, it means you're going to spend some money and you're going to need

a snack when you leave.

It's a small plate of food for a lot of money.

You're not going to leave full.

And so I already had all sorts of attitude going into it, but one of the things I love

about humor is you can enjoy your spouse's activity or hobby without actually enjoying

your spouse's activity or hobby because you're having fun along the way.

We walked into this restaurant and I don't make up one word of this.

The waiter comes over with a plank, like a cedar plank, and he's got a mint leaf sticking

out of both sides of it.

And I look at Amy, I said, is that the salad?

Is this where we're starting with this thing?

And this waiter, deadpan, I mean he's a serious can be, says, no, the chef picked this

earlier today in New Jersey, like I'm supposed to be impressed with New Jersey, man.

I don't know what New Jersey is, but he was very proud of where they got the mint.

And he said, the chef recommends that you rub this over your lips and under your nose

and on your chin.

I am rolling my eyes and I'm in a restaurant and he's not joking.

He wants us to prepare ourselves by cleaning our face with this mint.

And I look over at my wife, she's chuckling because she knows what I'm thinking, which

is that's the fun part of being married a long time.

You don't even have to have conversation and you can laugh because you know how your

spouse is processing something.

I always fully into it.

She is rubbing this leaf all over her lips and under her nose and fully into it.

And I told the guy, I said, you know where I'm from, we grew a lot of produce.

We just never once thought about rubbing it on our faces.

And I think if a husband and wife are going to be rubbing produce on their faces, this

is something we should have some little bit of privacy for.

I'm going to need you to back away from this one a little bit, buddy.

And he stood there, I wore that mint leaf out, I rubbed it everywhere.

I was given, and he knew I was not appreciating it.

But those are those moments, like I've only had one massage in my life.

My wife loves massages.

We were in an event and I'm just going to say we were in California.

So the event gifted us a couple's massage and I hated every single minute of that 60

minute massage.

I felt violated and uncomfortable.

I didn't like anything.

And the entire time coming from underneath the other table, this is all I heard from my

wife, because she knew we didn't have to say a word, but she was laughing and having

a good time because she knew I was miserable through the whole thing.

And that's what I love about humor and marriage.

It's like Amy doesn't even have to be here right now and I can tell you completely, you

throw any scenario at me.

I can tell you how she's going to react to it.

And that's where you find the fun.

You know Ted, again, some married couples that may not go down as well and I want to explore

that a little bit where even in that scenario, you know, the wife's chuckling because she knows

and the husband's getting mad, not he's not laughing about it.

Yeah.

And why would you put me in this position?

We're not talking about humor that's biting.

We're not talking about humor that's sarcastic that's like tearing up the flesh.

We're not talking about mean, hurtful, constantly ribbing.

It's that lightheartedness that I just see missing in so many marriages and I'll be

honest with you.

I think most couples start off lighthearted.

Yeah.

You know, I listen to your broadcast.

I hear a lot of great stories of couples early on, but then something happens.

And I think that's something that happens is drift.

They drift away.

It was natural.

We say this often in marriage teaching.

It was natural early in the relationship, but you drifted away from it and all you need

to do to make it natural again is become intentional.

It was natural.

You now need to be intentional with 10, 20, 30 years in.

And if you become intentional, it can become natural again to where it's just the ebb and

flow of your daily life as a couple.

And that's the goal of this one.

Right.

So if you're listening and you're really struggling here, chill out.

Just give it a try and let's listen to some of the ways you can apply that.

It leads us to what you're calling the callback.

Now, I've never heard this term before, but in the book, you describe the callback.

What is it?

The callback is why you love your favorite comedians because you've heard the callback a

lot.

You just didn't know the name of it because the callback is when there's a punchline

earlier in a set and he brings it back up or she brings it back up off of a different

story or a different premise.

It usually gets a bigger laugh because you didn't see it coming, but it just because what

comedy is, it's the jostling of the brain, right?

It's the shocking of the brain.

Like, I didn't see that one coming.

So for Amy and I, that New York restaurant, I'm not leaving that restaurant without a callback.

And now my callback is whenever we're at my favorite restaurant, which is Lake Cracker

Barrel.

You take a lettuce leave.

I take broccoli off her plate and start rubbing it on my cheek.

And we have a laugh from something that happened six years ago, yeah.

And that's why in the book, we want couples to figure out what their callbacks are, write

them down at the end, put them in that journal so that you can keep going back to them.

I might call them an inside joke, but they're, they're the callbacks and we have so many

callbacks in our marriage, taking everything that's irritating, frustrating, annoying that

would just usually grade on us.

And we just, the key with all of this is we've made the decision we're going to enjoy

life together.

Enjoy life.

Yeah.

That's what I like about that.

You have to make the decision and I just want to put this out there first because if

a couple comes into my office and conflict, if they're, if they're in need of hope restored

and I need to send them to a marriage intensive, I'm not teaching them how to be funny with

each other in that moment.

I'm not teaching them to tell jokes and all that.

But after they go through the marriage intensive, which is what we hear from couples coming

out of the marriage intensive years later, we're experiencing levels of marital satisfaction.

We never dreamed possible.

Then it's at that point you begin to teach them how not to get back into the drift that

took you into that.

And that's when I would begin teaching that couple quality couple time enjoying life together

and bringing more humor into your marriage.

That plays a role.

Well, Greg, I loved what Ted was talking about.

He's so transparent about the relationship he has with Amy and so fun.

So we've found in the fuller home that laughter helps kind of dissipate a little bit of the

stress.

How about you and Aaron?

I know you laugh here in the studio.

I see you laughing in meetings.

Do you laugh at home?

Oh, all the time.

Never.

Right.

I was thinking about it.

And even just the other day, like Aaron just recently defended her first chapter of her

dissertation.

It was a big deal.

It is.

And so she passed that stage in her process of getting her doctorate.

And so we were just just the other day just talking about the week and how crazy it was

and stressful and just everything going on.

And you know, Aaron has so much more to her life than simply just writing a dissertation.

And we just got laugh and like, this is crazy.

Like, whoa, we didn't think this week would sort of turn out this way.

Because I'm stuck at what was funny about defending a dissertation.

Yeah.

And what was fun about it.

I'm not quite getting it, but and I'm certainly not saying any part of that was fun.

But I think there was a just a natural kind of laughter like, oh my goodness.

And so I think we have to be able to laugh.

It just our circumstances without marginalizing, minimizing, without, you know, using that

as a way to avoid dealing with it and in, but there is that.

I mean, the stuff that we get into, the stuff that happens, you know, that there are moments

looking back that we can share a chuckle or two.

And so I think we do that.

I think some of the other things that over the years that have really helped us is that

we're pretty good about sharing fun, kind of weird, you know, just crazy things that happen

to us throughout the day.

And so we, you know, rather it's, you know, you find in a hilarious, you know, real from

social media or something, but we like to do that.

So I'll tell our stories to show me a real.

Well, it was even our daughter, our 18 year old came home from work this morning.

She gets up at four, she has to be to work at 4.45 AM.

And she was laughing at a control when she got back.

And I literally, I was like, you get this from your father because he does such a great

job of telling stories, but she was talking about a plugged up toilet at work and almost

on the ground crying laughing.

Oh my goodness.

You're laughing, but it's just those simple things.

When you look at it through a different lens on the flip side, they can be funny.

Yeah.

And so I think, I think doing that, I think finding places that help you laugh, rather

that's, you know, watching comedy on some streaming show or just seeing every night

you watch clean comedy clips, something just to laugh together in the midst of just all

the craziness.

I think an overlooked one is reminiscing.

And that's when we look back and go, you know, man, that reminds me of 20 years ago,

a member when this happened or just, we try to regularly do that now.

It's kind of a cheat sort of hack for us because, you know, we speak for living.

So we have to have funny stories.

And so we keep a good list.

But that's something, though, that as a couple of you guys can do is, is

Jotsef Dan, put it on the computer, save it as a document, put on your notes,

whatever.

And then just every once in a while, pull those out and go, oh my gosh, I totally

forgot, member, like last year with this, have all of that in combination just

creates just a fun laughter that creates a safety because what it does for

me to recognize that when we go through the hard times, when we face the difficulties,

when we grieve, all of that, like we don't avoid the hard, painful, difficult emotions.

We lean into those, like we'll process and talk, and that's not a time for humor per

say, you know, we face conflict, but there, there also has to be that part of your relationship

to where you're, you're being intentional like Ted was talking about to really create

some of these elements that provides that, that laughter, and I think for us, it sends

the message that, you know what, in spite of the craziness of life, we're pretty good

together.

Yeah.

Well, that's good stuff.

And so appreciate your insights and the reminder to keep laughing as Ted indicated

earlier.

In fact, if you enjoyed what you heard from Ted today, we've got a link to the entire

conversation he had with Focus President Jim Daly.

He had stories and insights like that dinner in New York, all available for free, the link

is in the notes.

We're also going to link over to Ted's book called A Love That Laughs, Lighting Up, Cut

Loose, and Enjoy Together.

Make a one-time gift or a monthly pledge of any amount today, we'll send that book

to you.

It's our way of saying thank you for supporting this show and the ministry of Focus on the

Family.

Next time we'll hear from Dave and Ann Wilson about the need for wives to encourage

their husbands and how you can do that.

I'm John Fuller and on behalf of Greg and Aaron and the rest of the team, thanks for tuning

in for the Focus on the Family, Strengthening Marriage Podcast.

Live your truth.

A lot of people say that, don't they?

But truth isn't something we decide.

God has decided it for us and it's our job as believers to share his truth with a world

in need.

I'll encourage you to do that through my podcast, Refocus with Jim Daily.

I visit with fascinating guests about important topics like gender confusion, cancel culture,

and more, while helping you share God's love with others.

Listen at Refocus with JimDaily.com.