Marriage Jiu Jitsu: Submitting Your Spouse

Jiu Jitsu is one of the few environments where the word "submission" does not cause women everywhere to start shouting "oh no you did-ehhn" as they start triple snapping a 'z' pattern while shaking their heads back and forth. Husbands, if you've ever wondered how to get your wife to submit to you, a study in basic jiu jitsu might offer some very helpful advice.

One of the concepts that is taught early on in the study of jiu jitsu is "position before submission" which basically means that you should never attempt a submission on your opponent until you have first established a strong base position to work from. The reason that "position before submission" is important is because if you do not have a good base position and you attempt a submission, your opponent can reverse your submission attempt and put themselves in the offensive position while forcing you to a defensive position.

So how does that translate to marriage? What is the base position that a husband needs to be in before he can go for the 'submission'? Amazingly, this base jiu jitsu position for husbands is described in the book of Ephesians.."Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her" (Eph. 5:25). Oh yeah husbands, I totally just sucker punched you. The 'offensive' position that you need to establish before you expect your wife's submission is the position of a servant...like Jesus. It is the position where you are willing to not only give up your life for her (which all husbands are theoretically willing to do) but you are even willing to do the hard things like give up the t.v. remote or give up your fantasy league obsession or give up Saturday to hang with the kids while she has a chance to get out and have some alone time. It's a position that looks very much like you are washing your opponents feet or even worse, it's a position that looks like you are actually giving in to the will of your opponent.

The sneaky thing about the whole "position before submission" concept is that she'll never feel like she's being "submitted". She'll want to do what you want once you have established the position of loving her just like Christ loved His church.

There is a catch. though,....once you start loving her like Jesus loves the church, the only time that you'll attempt the "submission" is when you are truly looking out for her own good and benefit... better stated, out of love for her..

and then once your position is based from selfless love for her, you can go for the "submission"...and you probably won't get a lot of triple snap reactions...

"If You Want More Love, Why Don't You Say So?"...a little marital advice from John Mayer's Heartbreak Warfare

I'm not quite sure where I learned it or how it happened, but somewhere along the way, I decided that directly communicating my wants and needs to my wife would either bore her or offend her so I had to come up with a whole different set of tactics. The possibilities were endless. I could pout and mope around and hopefully, if I looked angry enough and focused hard enough on what need she wasn't meeting, then she would supernaturally gain the ability to read my mind. Or I could think of something that she needs me to do and not do it until she is finally forced to ask me about it and then I could totally unload the incredible rebuttal that I had already rehearsed in my head..."sure honey, I'd be glad to do that for you but it makes it really hard to do (fill in the blank) WHEN YOU NEVER DO (fill in the blank) FOR ME!!!!!" (The rebuttal never plays out in real life the same way that it plays out so effectively in my head.)

John Mayer presents a very novel idea in his Heartbreak Warfare lyric..."if you want more love, why don't you say so?". My wife and I, through the wisdom of a counselor, picked up two words that resonate with Mayer's lyric. We started learning to use statements that started with the words "I need...". If she was starting to get frustrated with me not noticing things that needed to be done around the house she would just say "I need you to take out the trash" or "I need you to do the dishes" or "I need you to see if you can be more aware of things that need to be done so that I don't feel like I'm always having to tell you what to do." As a guy, I don't ever mind being needed by my wife to do anything. It is a much more effective tactic than her being cold and irritated until I start asking "what's wrong?" over and over again until she finally tells me and then by that time we're both so irritated that we break out our lists of needs that aren't being met and begin to reduce our marriage to a list of contractual "I will, If you..." clauses.

Setting a couple of boundaries will help keep you both from going to legal language land. The first is that you are not allowed to immediately break out your list of needs in response to the other's "I need" statement. Allow the need that is being presented to be the focus of the conversation. At a later time, you can present your need but it cannot feel like an "I will, if you.." response.

The second boundary is that you have to fight off the temptation to immediately put up a defense for why that need is not getting met. If you truly have a valid reason for why you are not able to meet that need, you might just want to give it some time before you bring that up. One of the more important dynamics going on is that the person with the "I need.." statement just wants to be heard without an immediate defense.

My wife and I have been able to communicate using "I need.." through a lot of different issues ranging from lighter issues such as the need to help out with simple chores (ex: "Honey, I need you to help me out today and vacuum the den and dust the tables.") to much heavier issues such as the need for more sexual intimacy (ex: "Honey, I need to feel wanted so I would appreciate it if you would initiate us being intimate more often.")

Through this type of communication, we have actually been able to find improvements and solutions verses having the same fight every two or three weeks that never seems to get resolved. It has also allowed us to have an environment in our marriage where we really do feel like we can "say so" when we need or want something from each other.

What Tiger Can Teach All Men About Having A Great Marriage..

Tiger Woods is very familiar with greatness. As we all know, he wouldn't necessarily be associated with marital greatness as of late, but he is still a great golfer and knows how to return to greatness even when his golf game seems to be imploding. In fact, had Tiger approached his marriage with some of the same principles with which he approaches his golf game, the outcome might have been very different (and by the way, we're all vulnerable to the same marital mistakes that Tiger made so none of us should be standing in judgement).

Last weekend at the Bridgestone Invitational, Tiger Woods had a terrible weekend of golf. In the post tournament interview, he said something along these lines, "I'm gonna have someone take a look at my swing and see what's going on and see if we can fix it..". This weekend at the PGA Championship, his game has dramatically improved and he is in the running to do well, though it is early in the weekend.

Here's what amazes me. The best golfer, arguably ever, still gets help ('coaching' for those who are too proud to use the word help) when he gets into a rut. He is still smart enough to realize that he has blind spots and he needs someone else to take an objective look at what is going on with his motion.

So if we as men say we want to have a great marriage (which I have yet to meet a man who would say that he wants to have anything less than a great marriage), how is it that we think that we can achieve greatness in a way any different than the greatest achieve it. Greatness requires hard work. It also requires constant maintenance and even coaching (help) from time to time. We (speaking on behalf of all who have ever tossed or broken a golf club) all know what to expect on the golf course when we have not been playing regularly....less-than-mediocre golf ..which leads to great frustration and disappointment. We also know that our game will not improve unless we spend some time purifying our swing motion by either reading golf blogs, books, and magazines, watching instructional videos, or actually going to a pro and getting help. And all of those steps then require time on the driving range to build them into habits (and the adjustments always feel awkward at first).

Why would we expect to have anything other than a less-than-mediocre marriage if we are not constantly working and seeking to improve our game? And if Tiger, being the greatest at his chosen field, is not above getting help when he is in a rut, then how can we think that we don't need help when our marriage is in a rut?