January 2, 2024 • 24 mins
This episode of "Amplified Marriage" is all about setting goals for the new year that you can actually achieve. Forget those big, flashy resolutions that are hard to keep. We're talking about real, practical goals that make a difference. We'll share our own stories to show you what's worked for us.
Find out why it's better to focus on solid goals instead of just feeling motivated for a short time. We'll explain why doing the same old things won't get you new results. Let's make this new year a time for real change and improvement.
So join us, get pumped up, and let's tackle this new year with goals that matter!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Bryan (00:00):
It's the start of a new year and you know what that
means.
New Year's resolutions.
It's that time when we promiseto turn into superheroes
overnight.
By February, our gym cards arejust fancy bookmarks, and our
health eating plans, well, lessto say the chocolate didn't eat
itself.
But let's face it, ifresolutions were that effective,
I'd be a piano playing, novelwriting, astronaut, and a
(00:23):
fitness guru.
Instead, I'm still figuring outwhich is the E chord on the
piano.
This year, let's do something alittle bit different.
Let's not set all these big,grand resolutions.
Instead, let's focus on beingour best selves, our best
husbands, best wives, and withall of our quirks.
After all, being married isabout loving and growing old
together, not about who canavoid the cookie jar the
(00:46):
longest.
Natalie (01:09):
Welcome to another episode of Amplified Marriage.
I'm Natalie.
And I'm Bryan.
Wherever you are, whateveryou're doing, as you heard us
say.
countless times.
Grab a tea, grab a coffee, acookie and a blanket.
Get ready for our chat.
And 1st of January, 2024.
Bryan (01:26):
Boom.
Are we ready for this new year?
Yes, we are, man.
I am excited to talk about thistoday, but here's the thing is
that Natalie and I are not huge,uh, resolution people, even
though the opening was all aboutgrand resolutions, we're not
resolution people were actuallyabout setting goals.
And I know people are like,well, what's the difference
(01:47):
there actually is a differencebetween a resolution in my mind
is oftentimes just a, um, a bigidea.
Right.
It's just a big idea.
And so when I look at goals thisyear, this is how Natalie and I
have broken down this 2024.
And it's something that we,every year we improve upon a
little bit, but it's somethingthat I even do with our, our
(02:09):
team that I lead at, at thechurch.
Um, it's called smart goals.
And the very first thing aboutthe smart goals is that it, the
S stands for specific.
Right.
And when we're going into ourgoals, Natalie and I have
specific, say weight loss goals.
Mm-Hmm.
specific finance goals.
Speci specific, specific goalsfor the children, specific goals
(02:30):
for each other.
Um, all but they're all have tobe specific.
And that's the difference Ithink between a goal and a
resolution.
A resolution is just a, a bigidea, right?
I want to lose weight by June20th.
Exactly.
But there's no strategy on how,but there's no strategy to do
that, how to do that.
And there's no.
There's no way you can do it.
So we just want to, we want totalk to you today.
Just a little bit of the thingsthat we've learned that we've
done over the last 25 years ofbeing together
Natalie (02:53):
and what we've really implemented in the last nine ish
Bryan (02:56):
years.
And, and we'll be honest rightfrom the beginning, the truth
about goals is that even what Isaid in the opening, if goals
were easy and it was easy toachieve a resolution, but if our
goals were easy to do.
Um, everyone will be doing themexactly.
And so there's a reason that youhave to have a system.
The things you put in place, um,like parameter, uh, parameters
(03:20):
and boundaries for each goal.
And one of the things that Ihaven't written down further
down, but I'm actually going toread it right now.
This is what Habakkuk, uh,chapter two versus two and three
says, is right, right.
The vision.
Make it plain on tablets so hemay run who reads it.
All this means is that when youhave a vision and a goal,
Natalie and I have startedputting our goals down regularly
(03:40):
onto paper.
So we have them written out.
Sometimes we forget where we putthe paper.
So now we do digitally becausewe're in 2024.
Ooh, we're in 2024.
Yeah.
Right.
But we want to have specificthings that we want to do with
our family this year.
What we want to accomplishpersonally and all has to be
specific and then written downon the system.
Natalie (04:00):
That's right.
Because I don't know about you,but I forget, well, yeah, I
forget things that I havewritten and writing them on
paper gives you a referencepoint.
Um, for those times when you'relike, I don't want to do this, I
don't want to do this.
And then you can reflect back onit.
Or that's the hope.
Anyways, we're not alwaysperfect at reflecting back until
the end of the year, but I'mreally trying to get into the
(04:22):
habit of doing that selfreflection, that goal
reflection, even throughout theyear of like, where are, how on
track are we?
And not just waiting till theend of the year to reflect on
whether or not we were orweren't on track.
Bryan (04:37):
Well, and, and I would say to like, um, I say this to
people when they first startgoing to the gym, because I, at
this point I built a fairly gooddiscipline.
I go frequently on a, on aschedule that we've determined.
And I say this to new people, assoon as they start, I said, um,
it's, it's not about thefrequency.
(04:57):
It's about the consistency.
Yeah.
So I will tell you straight upthat I would say 95 percent of
the time that I go to the gymand I do a 35, 45 minute
workout.
I honestly.
Most of the time I'm notmotivated and I don't really
feel like going to the gym.
Like after Christmas, we'regoing, we're going, we're going
after this podcast.
(05:17):
As soon as we finished recordingthis, we're heading over to the
gym.
I don't really want to go now,but the thing is, is that when
you begin putting things into asystem.
And so this is specific.
You start writing out what youwant to do.
You turn that motivation into adiscipline.
So what happens is, is that thediscipline becomes part of what
you do.
That's right.
Part of what you do every day,part of your morning or part of
(05:39):
your afternoon, wherever youchoose to add the discipline
that that's about.
I'm using the gym as well,working out as an example
because I've had to fight withthis one for a long time.
Right.
But it becomes easier.
It becomes, it becomes easy.
Easier to go and do it.
That's what I mean.
Because you're disciplined, butthe motivation, this is the
thing.
Are we always going to bemotivated for anything?
(06:00):
No.
Right.
If you have kids in your housefrom zero to 25 years old and
they're living with you, you'renot motivated every night to
make dinner.
Nope.
Right.
And there's, and you're notmotivated every day to do
laundry or every day that youhave to do.
So the motivation, if you baseyour whole future, if you base
2024 off the motivation to doit, your motivation is going to
(06:22):
fail.
That's right.
Natalie (06:23):
But I think, I think creating habits and making them
like, you know, in, inprinciples and things like that,
we're all like baby steps, babysteps.
If you have a giant goal, youhave to have baby steps in order
to get there because the momentthat you.
Miss fire or you, um, try tojump ahead and you fall.
(06:49):
Figuratively speaking, you'regoing to get discouraged.
And so yes, you know, um, beingon a routine, I think that's the
key is setting a routine that ismanageable in small increments.
And then as you, as you canfulfill the routine or fulfill
the habit, then you can increasethe frequency and you can
(07:10):
increase all of that once itbecomes ingrained, so to speak.
So for us, like you're, eventhough.
I hate going to the gym.
It does not bring me joywhatsoever.
I always feel the joy of havinggone after the fact.
So if I can remember that afterthis, I will be so thankful that
(07:31):
I went.
And then as I start to see likethe pounds drop off or the
ounces drop off or I start tofeel just better where I'm not
so.
tired.
I find myself making bettereating choices and, and all like
it's a, it's a domino effect ineither direction.
You
Bryan (07:50):
know, there's a, a writer that I have read his book now
twice called atomic habits byJames clear.
And he says something in thebook that has stuck with me that
I use with our team that Iprobably have said on this
podcast before he said, youdon't.
Uh, rise to the level of yourgoals.
You fall to the level of yoursystems, right?
And so much of what we do is aseries of small steps, small
(08:14):
decisions, small things thattake us to the lead.
Like when you're, you're doinglike Bible study or you're doing
school study, you're settingyourself with knowledge that
will benefit you five yearsafter school is finished.
When you finally found that job.
And actually implement thethings that you've learned,
right?
The physical aspect of your jobor eating differently and
getting the sugar out of yoursystem if that's what you're
(08:34):
doing or stopping caffeine orquitting smoking or what any one
of these things, all of themtake steps and things with a
goal in mind, but also with asystem and how we're going to
get there.
I remember.
Uh, listening to a podcast, um,I can't remember the name of the
podcast, but he, he, he said inthere, he said, there's a
gentleman that he was coaching,um, new year hit.
(08:55):
And he's like, I need to losesome weight.
I'm 150 pounds overweight.
He was a big guy.
And the guy said, I didn't knowhow I was going to do this, but
what he started doing every dayis that he got in his car and he
drove to the gym and he said,and he said, remember I told you
this, he sat outside for fiveminutes and then he went home
and he did that day after dayfor like two weeks.
(09:17):
And then he started going to thegym, um, the, the next week a
little bit longer.
So it was 10 minutes.
He did that for a couple moreweeks.
And then after that for fourweeks later, he started going
into the gym, stepping into thefront door, sitting on the
bench, talking with the personat the front.
And then he would go in his carand he would drive home.
And I think I can't remember theexact length of time, but it
took like.
Six weeks or eight weeks beforehe stepped and stayed into the
(09:39):
gym and then he got onto thetreadmill, right?
And then it was like six oreight months later He had lost
like 20 pounds or 15 pounds ofweight and he was going towards
his goals because he dideverything in small incremental
steps To get to where you wantto go celebrating the wins along
the way celebrating the highsand then taking the lows What
can you learn from it and movingon?
Natalie (09:59):
So I think that's a great segue into here are some
of the things that we implementand we have done and we just did
today actually, uh, whichhopefully will be sort of like.
Uh, small baby steps that if youare starting from square one or
if, if what you've currentlybeen doing isn't working,
perhaps this method, uh, mightbe useful.
Bryan (10:22):
So my mom about, Oh, nine years ago, nine years ago,
started doing something with meand her, or sorry, me and
Natalie, my brother.
And sister in law, or wow, I'mscrewing this up, my brother in
law and my sister, uh, Katie andJeremy and Natalie and I, and my
mom would sit down and we wouldwrite down, um, the highs and
(10:43):
lows of the year that we were inand then the goals for the next
year.
And so for the last nine years,the day after we've rarely
missed that the day after newyear, January 1st, January 1st,
we get together and we discussthe highs and lows of the last
year.
Um, and then we.
We talked to each other aboutthe goals that we have set for
this, this next year coming up.
Natalie (11:03):
Yeah.
And we share, we share with eachother because there have been
years that have been really goodand we've, we've shared in the
joy of that year.
And there have been other yearsthat have been absolute crap.
And Um, feeling incredibly lowand discouraged and just
vocalizing the discontentfeeling and whatnot.
(11:27):
They have been such a, um, avoice of encouragement or, or
another perspective to speakinto.
It has been so valuable to me.
Bryan (11:37):
Well, and, and I think even today, even with some of
the notes that we have for todayis that where, where, where are
your main focuses?
And I think when we, it's easy,like any other goal.
Um, that when you are in themiddle of life to get wrapped up
into and forget what the mainfocus is.
And I think even today kind ofreset us and it showed us where
our main focuses was for lastyear.
(11:58):
And we were happy with most ofthem.
Um, but there's a, some thatwe're going to do is do a
realignment and change theirperspective and we're going to
shift where we want to go, um,with the family, with the kids.
Where's our next trip?
Where's the next goalspiritually?
Where do we want the kids?
That kind of thing.
You know what I mean?
And like when you're
Natalie (12:13):
talking about the highs of the year.
Yeah.
People might be like, what areyou even talking about?
But like, what are the thingsthat were awesome?
What, what of your children'saccomplishments, um, were you
celebrating?
That's a high.
Um, some of the goals that youhad set for the previous year,
looking back, okay, yes, I wasable to do that.
(12:34):
Like I balanced my, my budget.
Like that was huge.
That's a win, right?
That's a high.
What are, what are your thingsthat you set out for yourself?
Um, in self reflecting that wereincredible, right?
Like what in your marriage, Hey,I want to be a better
communicator.
Bryan (12:54):
Yeah.
Well, like it's one of the goalsthat we had last year was we
wanted to date more.
Yes.
One of the goals, I think weboth put it on separately and
then we discussed it after likewe want to, we want to have more
dates.
And so we have learned that thekids are at this age where they
can either stay at home or whenthey're out doing things, Nat
and I will just go literally foran hour, go have an ice cream
from McDonald's or we'll go fora coffee and we'll sit in a
(13:16):
Starbucks or Tim Hortons andwe'll just chat for an hour,
hour and a half and then, andthen go home.
But to have more of those dates.
It actually makes a difference.
And so we looked at that thisyear and we're like, Oh man, we
actually did that.
That was something we foughtfor, for the whole year and it
was a, it was a win.
And
Natalie (13:31):
now it's a goal for next year.
And it's really exciting that wepiggyback off of what, what
worked this year and we thencan, um, Together, work towards
making that more often, more
Bryan (13:46):
frequent and more part of our, of our core values as a
husband and wife that we want tolike, here's the thing, our kids
are getting to the age now, Iwon't say too much because
Natalie might start crying,which has happened in the last
few weeks, but our kids aregetting at the age where within
the next 10, eight years, sevento six to eight years, probably
all of the kids will be out ofthe house.
Our goal.
And all of this is so that whenthe kids are gone, that I still
(14:09):
love her and she still loves me.
Exactly.
She still knows me and I stillknow her so many times.
Maybe this is you if you'relistening, whatever country
you're listening from.
Maybe this is you, but you areso focused on your kids that you
don't remember who your spousewas.
Yeah.
And that is, is actually sad.
It's sad because you get to theage where all of a sudden.
Now that the kids are out of thehouse, you don't know each other
(14:31):
and then you actually startfighting and then divorces
happen because now your wholefocus is on your kids.
Can I tell you a simple, simpletruth that our culture would
have you deny is that your kidsare not your whole world.
Mic drop.
I wish I would've had the.
thing though.
Natalie (14:48):
Exactly.
But Hey, we set that standard,um, because you know what?
Let's face it.
My husband was here before mychildren were, my husband needs
to remain a priority in my
Bryan (14:57):
life.
And so in all of these thingsthat we're saying on the highs
and talking about the, the thingabout, we didn't talk about the
lows was the lows actually helpyou determine it.
Was it, and here's the thing Ipreached yesterday at church or
this last Sunday.
And I said, there's two thingsthat you, you see in scripture
when the Bible talks in Matthewabout being, uh, those of you
(15:18):
who are burdened and heavy ladenare, there's what happens is
that there's one you put onyourself.
Like these are burdens that youput on yourself and then the
heavy laden is people thatthings that other people put on
you.
And so in our relationship.
What is the pressure that you'reputting on yourself?
And I would say that needs to goagainst is, um, is that a
realistic pressure?
(15:38):
Is that an abnormal pressure?
Is it something you can evenreach?
Is it a standard that you canmeet?
And then you look at your lowsthrough the lens of, Hey, I can
accomplish this.
This year was tough and we cameclose, but it was a mess.
But how can we make that bettergoing into the next year?
Natalie (15:52):
Exactly.
And like what, here's the thingof being able to do a spiritual
audit and doing a spiritualreflection of like, where.
Has my walk with the Lord, wherehas that been on a scale of one
to 10 for me this past year?
Um, is that a priority for me?
Absolutely.
(16:13):
What, what do I want?
Um, for, for that element of it,do I want to be doing more
devotions?
Do I want to be more intentionalduring my prayer time?
Do I want to be more intentionalin reading the Bible?
Whatever it might be.
That also plays a thing becauselisten, for me, a huge gauge of
my emotional.
(16:34):
And, um, physical wellbeing, ifI find myself super snappy and
whatever, it's one of twothings.
One, I need to connect with myhusband or you're hungry while,
or maybe three things, but.
I can definitely tell when I'vemade the Lord a priority and
when I have sort of had otherthings come in the way.
So doing a spiritual audit isalso incredibly important as far
(16:57):
as it being a low, but that'snot a bad, like having a low
doesn't mean that you'refailing.
No,
Bryan (17:05):
no.
And I think sometimes like
Natalie (17:06):
things happen and death happens in family or the death
of a friendship or, or, um, atragedy of some sort or, you
know, uh, An unmet expectationcan be a low, right?
So I think it's a really goodindicator for me.
Where is my emotional level at?
Where's my mental health at?
(17:28):
Where's my, um, where's myheart?
Bryan (17:32):
Right.
Absolutely.
And I think, um, Even our nextapplication was a goal setting,
not resolutions.
And I think we kind of, we'vecovered that all the way through
is that we are more aboutsetting the goals with steps to
reach those goals.
So you, and have it written downand work on it as a couple and
know each other and help eachother be accountable to each
(17:54):
other to make it, make it work,um, to, to build yourself up
into a place where you'redisciplined to be able to move,
move forward.
And whatever your goals are,exactly.
Natalie (18:03):
And yes, you have, we have goals as a couple, but when
we do this whole new year'sthing with our family, it is a
very individual basis.
Right.
And so we're all writing in ourown, we have books that we write
in.
So we're all doing that.
Yeah.
Individually.
Yeah.
Right.
And what we choose to bring outinto the open to discuss is up
(18:24):
to us, but, um, I mean, for themost part we're pretty open,
right?
So the things that are on mygoal list, you know, oftentimes
line up with the things on yourgoal list.
Yeah.
Right.
And we've not prediscussed thisor whatever.
I have
Bryan (18:38):
some other ones like riding motorcycle and that's not
on yours.
That's not on
Natalie (18:41):
mine.
Right.
But I think, you know, now thatwe have a goal, what is this,
what are some of the strategiesthat we can do?
And, and right there, I justsaid, writing it down in a book,
in a journal, um, havingsomething to reference when, and
go back to it regularly.
Exactly.
Like our, my mom in law keepsall of our books, um, and she
lives downstairs.
(19:01):
So I mean, I could just go, mom,can I have my book?
I really need.
A reset.
Can we?
Yeah.
Right.
And any one of us could, right?
Just mum holds on.
We
Bryan (19:10):
have it written down.
The ones that we want to keep onour, our, we have a list.
Otherwise, these are the goalsthat we're going for.
This is the stuff that we'redoing there, there, and this is
the thing, like even when you'relooking at any one of these
things.
It's really hard to, tomaintain, not some people can do
it, but it's hard to maintainthe discipline of the goal on
(19:31):
your own.
Exactly.
So it's so important that youactually engage your, your
spouse or a really close friendor someone who's going to push
you.
Like it's a one say one of yougoes to the gym, but the other
one doesn't yeah, right Then youfind someone who is gonna
challenge you and say hey Thisis where you got to go say like
I have I have a series of men inmy life that challenged me in
(19:54):
Just in life Yeah right thatthey look at the things I'm
doing or saying or how I'mmoving or the things that I'm
teaching and just be like Bryan,you can't say that, or that was
really good.
Or what did you mean by this orchallenge?
No, that's not right.
You have to have those people inyour life.
You can't just have a bunch ofyes people around you.
No.
And
Natalie (20:10):
like for me, my sister in law, like she was so great,
uh, lean like over thisChristmas season of like really
maintaining a gym schedule.
And I was not, but I was like,ah, gosh, I should, I should get
on this because not that it's,and it's not a competition
because we all have the samegoal of being right.
Right.
Like the best selves for movingforward physically, right?
(20:35):
Because if we're, if I'm healthyphysically, my emotional health
benefits from it.
My mental health benefits fromit.
My spiritual health benefitsfrom it.
So I'm of like motivating,right?
Right.
Where she's like, you know, ifit wasn't for her, we would not
have done the ninja parkour acourse that we did and we paid
for it, but it was like qualitytime that we could invest with
Bryan (20:57):
our kids.
When Natalie says we paid forit, not only do we pay for it
with finances, which it was justa small fee, but we paid for it
physically for several daysafterwards because I am not a
young and or speedy or agilelike I used to
Natalie (21:11):
be.
Exactly.
So like.
Encouraging each other, likecome on, we are on, we might be
in different lanes as far as ourphysical health goes, but
motivating each other to keepgoing.
Bryan (21:22):
And I would say, um, don't reflect just once a year
on Christmas Eve like we do, wereflect Regularly throughout the
year.
And we have just, we
Natalie (21:32):
have like weekly
Bryan (21:34):
debriefs where we just sit and we'll chat about the
week and when things are goingand work the calendars out and
things like that.
And it's, these are just some ofthe things that we do.
We hope that it all makes, makessense.
We also didn't want to be sobroad that it didn't make, it
didn't land, but also there'sjust so many.
The thing is, is that this is anew year.
(21:55):
You're going to start seeingcontent from every influencer on
the planet coming up with a,here's your five step strategy
in order to lose weight.
Here's your final, the sevensteps to financial freedom.
Here's the, the eight steps youneed for pride, for the best
mental health, like all of thesethings, you're going to start
getting bombarded by thesethings.
And we.
Because we're, we're believers,these things are based in
(22:18):
scripture, like that scripture,right?
These things make them plain,right?
I'm on tablets.
Make it plain.
Simple.
It's simple.
Doesn't mean it's easy.
It just means it's simple.
And the, the, this is the, thesystem you make doesn't need to
be so complex.
Natalie (22:31):
No.
And I think my final thoughtwould be making sure that you
find some community.
Right.
So whether that's a churchgroup, uh, you know, putting
your kids in youth group or somekind of, um, after school
program or whatnot where they,um, can learn and grow.
Absolutely.
Um, we weren't meant to do lifealone.
(22:52):
And so oftentimes if we'restruggling, uh, we have a
community and I don't know whatwe could do without it.
Right.
Bryan (22:59):
I don't know where we would be, our kids would be if
we didn't have our churchcommunity around us, our friends
and our family, the, the, thefriends that had become family
because of, of the relationshipsthat we've built through the
church over these last manyyears.
And so.
There's so many differentoptions where you can find
community.
I know sometimes it's reallytough, especially if you're a
bit more introverted, butthere's people out there.
(23:20):
There's good churches whereveryou're listening to find a good
church.
We can't, I can't honestly, it'sone of those things I can't talk
about church enough because Ithink it's so incredibly
valuable.
And
Natalie (23:30):
it's such
Bryan (23:31):
an important part of our life, but also of, of the
development and spiritual growthand mental health and just being
around people.
So there's one thing I wanted toask all of you that are
listening to this, um, we knowthat you live in the podcast
cause you keep listening to it,but if you have a.
Tip or a trick or a hack or asomething that you want to share
(23:53):
specifically about keeping trackof your progress or how do you
discipline yourself to, to, togrow?
How do you discipline yourselffor the 20?
We want to hear about it.
So send us an email.
If you like this podcast, justshare it with all of your
friends, all of your family.
Facebook.
That's where you can let usknow.
You can also email if you have.
Any of those things you want toshare with us at amplified
(24:15):
marriage at gmail.
com.
And as you hear us say everysingle time, we believe that
your marriage can be reset,refreshed, recharged, and
restored.
Thank you so much for listening.
Talk to you soon.
It's the start of a new year and you know what that
means.
New Year's resolutions.
It's that time when we promiseto turn into superheroes
overnight.
By February, our gym cards arejust fancy bookmarks, and our
health eating plans, well, lessto say the chocolate didn't eat
itself.
But let's face it, ifresolutions were that effective,
I'd be a piano playing, novelwriting, astronaut, and a
(00:23):
fitness guru.
Instead, I'm still figuring outwhich is the E chord on the
piano.
This year, let's do something alittle bit different.
Let's not set all these big,grand resolutions.
Instead, let's focus on beingour best selves, our best
husbands, best wives, and withall of our quirks.
After all, being married isabout loving and growing old
together, not about who canavoid the cookie jar the
(00:46):
longest.
Natalie (01:09):
Welcome to another episode of Amplified Marriage.
I'm Natalie.
And I'm Bryan.
Wherever you are, whateveryou're doing, as you heard us
say.
countless times.
Grab a tea, grab a coffee, acookie and a blanket.
Get ready for our chat.
And 1st of January, 2024.
Bryan (01:26):
Boom.
Are we ready for this new year?
Yes, we are, man.
I am excited to talk about thistoday, but here's the thing is
that Natalie and I are not huge,uh, resolution people, even
though the opening was all aboutgrand resolutions, we're not
resolution people were actuallyabout setting goals.
And I know people are like,well, what's the difference
(01:47):
there actually is a differencebetween a resolution in my mind
is oftentimes just a, um, a bigidea.
Right.
It's just a big idea.
And so when I look at goals thisyear, this is how Natalie and I
have broken down this 2024.
And it's something that we,every year we improve upon a
little bit, but it's somethingthat I even do with our, our
(02:09):
team that I lead at, at thechurch.
Um, it's called smart goals.
And the very first thing aboutthe smart goals is that it, the
S stands for specific.
Right.
And when we're going into ourgoals, Natalie and I have
specific, say weight loss goals.
Mm-Hmm.
specific finance goals.
Speci specific, specific goalsfor the children, specific goals
(02:30):
for each other.
Um, all but they're all have tobe specific.
And that's the difference Ithink between a goal and a
resolution.
A resolution is just a, a bigidea, right?
I want to lose weight by June20th.
Exactly.
But there's no strategy on how,but there's no strategy to do
that, how to do that.
And there's no.
There's no way you can do it.
So we just want to, we want totalk to you today.
Just a little bit of the thingsthat we've learned that we've
done over the last 25 years ofbeing together
Natalie (02:53):
and what we've really implemented in the last nine ish
Bryan (02:56):
years.
And, and we'll be honest rightfrom the beginning, the truth
about goals is that even what Isaid in the opening, if goals
were easy and it was easy toachieve a resolution, but if our
goals were easy to do.
Um, everyone will be doing themexactly.
And so there's a reason that youhave to have a system.
The things you put in place, um,like parameter, uh, parameters
(03:20):
and boundaries for each goal.
And one of the things that Ihaven't written down further
down, but I'm actually going toread it right now.
This is what Habakkuk, uh,chapter two versus two and three
says, is right, right.
The vision.
Make it plain on tablets so hemay run who reads it.
All this means is that when youhave a vision and a goal,
Natalie and I have startedputting our goals down regularly
(03:40):
onto paper.
So we have them written out.
Sometimes we forget where we putthe paper.
So now we do digitally becausewe're in 2024.
Ooh, we're in 2024.
Yeah.
Right.
But we want to have specificthings that we want to do with
our family this year.
What we want to accomplishpersonally and all has to be
specific and then written downon the system.
Natalie (04:00):
That's right.
Because I don't know about you,but I forget, well, yeah, I
forget things that I havewritten and writing them on
paper gives you a referencepoint.
Um, for those times when you'relike, I don't want to do this, I
don't want to do this.
And then you can reflect back onit.
Or that's the hope.
Anyways, we're not alwaysperfect at reflecting back until
the end of the year, but I'mreally trying to get into the
(04:22):
habit of doing that selfreflection, that goal
reflection, even throughout theyear of like, where are, how on
track are we?
And not just waiting till theend of the year to reflect on
whether or not we were orweren't on track.
Bryan (04:37):
Well, and, and I would say to like, um, I say this to
people when they first startgoing to the gym, because I, at
this point I built a fairly gooddiscipline.
I go frequently on a, on aschedule that we've determined.
And I say this to new people, assoon as they start, I said, um,
it's, it's not about thefrequency.
(04:57):
It's about the consistency.
Yeah.
So I will tell you straight upthat I would say 95 percent of
the time that I go to the gymand I do a 35, 45 minute
workout.
I honestly.
Most of the time I'm notmotivated and I don't really
feel like going to the gym.
Like after Christmas, we'regoing, we're going, we're going
after this podcast.
(05:17):
As soon as we finished recordingthis, we're heading over to the
gym.
I don't really want to go now,but the thing is, is that when
you begin putting things into asystem.
And so this is specific.
You start writing out what youwant to do.
You turn that motivation into adiscipline.
So what happens is, is that thediscipline becomes part of what
you do.
That's right.
Part of what you do every day,part of your morning or part of
(05:39):
your afternoon, wherever youchoose to add the discipline
that that's about.
I'm using the gym as well,working out as an example
because I've had to fight withthis one for a long time.
Right.
But it becomes easier.
It becomes, it becomes easy.
Easier to go and do it.
That's what I mean.
Because you're disciplined, butthe motivation, this is the
thing.
Are we always going to bemotivated for anything?
(06:00):
No.
Right.
If you have kids in your housefrom zero to 25 years old and
they're living with you, you'renot motivated every night to
make dinner.
Nope.
Right.
And there's, and you're notmotivated every day to do
laundry or every day that youhave to do.
So the motivation, if you baseyour whole future, if you base
2024 off the motivation to doit, your motivation is going to
(06:22):
fail.
That's right.
Natalie (06:23):
But I think, I think creating habits and making them
like, you know, in, inprinciples and things like that,
we're all like baby steps, babysteps.
If you have a giant goal, youhave to have baby steps in order
to get there because the momentthat you.
Miss fire or you, um, try tojump ahead and you fall.
(06:49):
Figuratively speaking, you'regoing to get discouraged.
And so yes, you know, um, beingon a routine, I think that's the
key is setting a routine that ismanageable in small increments.
And then as you, as you canfulfill the routine or fulfill
the habit, then you can increasethe frequency and you can
(07:10):
increase all of that once itbecomes ingrained, so to speak.
So for us, like you're, eventhough.
I hate going to the gym.
It does not bring me joywhatsoever.
I always feel the joy of havinggone after the fact.
So if I can remember that afterthis, I will be so thankful that
(07:31):
I went.
And then as I start to see likethe pounds drop off or the
ounces drop off or I start tofeel just better where I'm not
so.
tired.
I find myself making bettereating choices and, and all like
it's a, it's a domino effect ineither direction.
You
Bryan (07:50):
know, there's a, a writer that I have read his book now
twice called atomic habits byJames clear.
And he says something in thebook that has stuck with me that
I use with our team that Iprobably have said on this
podcast before he said, youdon't.
Uh, rise to the level of yourgoals.
You fall to the level of yoursystems, right?
And so much of what we do is aseries of small steps, small
(08:14):
decisions, small things thattake us to the lead.
Like when you're, you're doinglike Bible study or you're doing
school study, you're settingyourself with knowledge that
will benefit you five yearsafter school is finished.
When you finally found that job.
And actually implement thethings that you've learned,
right?
The physical aspect of your jobor eating differently and
getting the sugar out of yoursystem if that's what you're
(08:34):
doing or stopping caffeine orquitting smoking or what any one
of these things, all of themtake steps and things with a
goal in mind, but also with asystem and how we're going to
get there.
I remember.
Uh, listening to a podcast, um,I can't remember the name of the
podcast, but he, he, he said inthere, he said, there's a
gentleman that he was coaching,um, new year hit.
(08:55):
And he's like, I need to losesome weight.
I'm 150 pounds overweight.
He was a big guy.
And the guy said, I didn't knowhow I was going to do this, but
what he started doing every dayis that he got in his car and he
drove to the gym and he said,and he said, remember I told you
this, he sat outside for fiveminutes and then he went home
and he did that day after dayfor like two weeks.
(09:17):
And then he started going to thegym, um, the, the next week a
little bit longer.
So it was 10 minutes.
He did that for a couple moreweeks.
And then after that for fourweeks later, he started going
into the gym, stepping into thefront door, sitting on the
bench, talking with the personat the front.
And then he would go in his carand he would drive home.
And I think I can't remember theexact length of time, but it
took like.
Six weeks or eight weeks beforehe stepped and stayed into the
(09:39):
gym and then he got onto thetreadmill, right?
And then it was like six oreight months later He had lost
like 20 pounds or 15 pounds ofweight and he was going towards
his goals because he dideverything in small incremental
steps To get to where you wantto go celebrating the wins along
the way celebrating the highsand then taking the lows What
can you learn from it and movingon?
Natalie (09:59):
So I think that's a great segue into here are some
of the things that we implementand we have done and we just did
today actually, uh, whichhopefully will be sort of like.
Uh, small baby steps that if youare starting from square one or
if, if what you've currentlybeen doing isn't working,
perhaps this method, uh, mightbe useful.
Bryan (10:22):
So my mom about, Oh, nine years ago, nine years ago,
started doing something with meand her, or sorry, me and
Natalie, my brother.
And sister in law, or wow, I'mscrewing this up, my brother in
law and my sister, uh, Katie andJeremy and Natalie and I, and my
mom would sit down and we wouldwrite down, um, the highs and
(10:43):
lows of the year that we were inand then the goals for the next
year.
And so for the last nine years,the day after we've rarely
missed that the day after newyear, January 1st, January 1st,
we get together and we discussthe highs and lows of the last
year.
Um, and then we.
We talked to each other aboutthe goals that we have set for
this, this next year coming up.
Natalie (11:03):
Yeah.
And we share, we share with eachother because there have been
years that have been really goodand we've, we've shared in the
joy of that year.
And there have been other yearsthat have been absolute crap.
And Um, feeling incredibly lowand discouraged and just
vocalizing the discontentfeeling and whatnot.
(11:27):
They have been such a, um, avoice of encouragement or, or
another perspective to speakinto.
It has been so valuable to me.
Bryan (11:37):
Well, and, and I think even today, even with some of
the notes that we have for todayis that where, where, where are
your main focuses?
And I think when we, it's easy,like any other goal.
Um, that when you are in themiddle of life to get wrapped up
into and forget what the mainfocus is.
And I think even today kind ofreset us and it showed us where
our main focuses was for lastyear.
(11:58):
And we were happy with most ofthem.
Um, but there's a, some thatwe're going to do is do a
realignment and change theirperspective and we're going to
shift where we want to go, um,with the family, with the kids.
Where's our next trip?
Where's the next goalspiritually?
Where do we want the kids?
That kind of thing.
You know what I mean?
And like when you're
Natalie (12:13):
talking about the highs of the year.
Yeah.
People might be like, what areyou even talking about?
But like, what are the thingsthat were awesome?
What, what of your children'saccomplishments, um, were you
celebrating?
That's a high.
Um, some of the goals that youhad set for the previous year,
looking back, okay, yes, I wasable to do that.
(12:34):
Like I balanced my, my budget.
Like that was huge.
That's a win, right?
That's a high.
What are, what are your thingsthat you set out for yourself?
Um, in self reflecting that wereincredible, right?
Like what in your marriage, Hey,I want to be a better
communicator.
Bryan (12:54):
Yeah.
Well, like it's one of the goalsthat we had last year was we
wanted to date more.
Yes.
One of the goals, I think weboth put it on separately and
then we discussed it after likewe want to, we want to have more
dates.
And so we have learned that thekids are at this age where they
can either stay at home or whenthey're out doing things, Nat
and I will just go literally foran hour, go have an ice cream
from McDonald's or we'll go fora coffee and we'll sit in a
(13:16):
Starbucks or Tim Hortons andwe'll just chat for an hour,
hour and a half and then, andthen go home.
But to have more of those dates.
It actually makes a difference.
And so we looked at that thisyear and we're like, Oh man, we
actually did that.
That was something we foughtfor, for the whole year and it
was a, it was a win.
And
Natalie (13:31):
now it's a goal for next year.
And it's really exciting that wepiggyback off of what, what
worked this year and we thencan, um, Together, work towards
making that more often, more
Bryan (13:46):
frequent and more part of our, of our core values as a
husband and wife that we want tolike, here's the thing, our kids
are getting to the age now, Iwon't say too much because
Natalie might start crying,which has happened in the last
few weeks, but our kids aregetting at the age where within
the next 10, eight years, sevento six to eight years, probably
all of the kids will be out ofthe house.
Our goal.
And all of this is so that whenthe kids are gone, that I still
(14:09):
love her and she still loves me.
Exactly.
She still knows me and I stillknow her so many times.
Maybe this is you if you'relistening, whatever country
you're listening from.
Maybe this is you, but you areso focused on your kids that you
don't remember who your spousewas.
Yeah.
And that is, is actually sad.
It's sad because you get to theage where all of a sudden.
Now that the kids are out of thehouse, you don't know each other
(14:31):
and then you actually startfighting and then divorces
happen because now your wholefocus is on your kids.
Can I tell you a simple, simpletruth that our culture would
have you deny is that your kidsare not your whole world.
Mic drop.
I wish I would've had the.
thing though.
Natalie (14:48):
Exactly.
But Hey, we set that standard,um, because you know what?
Let's face it.
My husband was here before mychildren were, my husband needs
to remain a priority in my
Bryan (14:57):
life.
And so in all of these thingsthat we're saying on the highs
and talking about the, the thingabout, we didn't talk about the
lows was the lows actually helpyou determine it.
Was it, and here's the thing Ipreached yesterday at church or
this last Sunday.
And I said, there's two thingsthat you, you see in scripture
when the Bible talks in Matthewabout being, uh, those of you
(15:18):
who are burdened and heavy ladenare, there's what happens is
that there's one you put onyourself.
Like these are burdens that youput on yourself and then the
heavy laden is people thatthings that other people put on
you.
And so in our relationship.
What is the pressure that you'reputting on yourself?
And I would say that needs to goagainst is, um, is that a
realistic pressure?
(15:38):
Is that an abnormal pressure?
Is it something you can evenreach?
Is it a standard that you canmeet?
And then you look at your lowsthrough the lens of, Hey, I can
accomplish this.
This year was tough and we cameclose, but it was a mess.
But how can we make that bettergoing into the next year?
Natalie (15:52):
Exactly.
And like what, here's the thingof being able to do a spiritual
audit and doing a spiritualreflection of like, where.
Has my walk with the Lord, wherehas that been on a scale of one
to 10 for me this past year?
Um, is that a priority for me?
Absolutely.
(16:13):
What, what do I want?
Um, for, for that element of it,do I want to be doing more
devotions?
Do I want to be more intentionalduring my prayer time?
Do I want to be more intentionalin reading the Bible?
Whatever it might be.
That also plays a thing becauselisten, for me, a huge gauge of
my emotional.
(16:34):
And, um, physical wellbeing, ifI find myself super snappy and
whatever, it's one of twothings.
One, I need to connect with myhusband or you're hungry while,
or maybe three things, but.
I can definitely tell when I'vemade the Lord a priority and
when I have sort of had otherthings come in the way.
So doing a spiritual audit isalso incredibly important as far
(16:57):
as it being a low, but that'snot a bad, like having a low
doesn't mean that you'refailing.
No,
Bryan (17:05):
no.
And I think sometimes like
Natalie (17:06):
things happen and death happens in family or the death
of a friendship or, or, um, atragedy of some sort or, you
know, uh, An unmet expectationcan be a low, right?
So I think it's a really goodindicator for me.
Where is my emotional level at?
Where's my mental health at?
(17:28):
Where's my, um, where's myheart?
Bryan (17:32):
Right.
Absolutely.
And I think, um, Even our nextapplication was a goal setting,
not resolutions.
And I think we kind of, we'vecovered that all the way through
is that we are more aboutsetting the goals with steps to
reach those goals.
So you, and have it written downand work on it as a couple and
know each other and help eachother be accountable to each
(17:54):
other to make it, make it work,um, to, to build yourself up
into a place where you'redisciplined to be able to move,
move forward.
And whatever your goals are,exactly.
Natalie (18:03):
And yes, you have, we have goals as a couple, but when
we do this whole new year'sthing with our family, it is a
very individual basis.
Right.
And so we're all writing in ourown, we have books that we write
in.
So we're all doing that.
Yeah.
Individually.
Yeah.
Right.
And what we choose to bring outinto the open to discuss is up
(18:24):
to us, but, um, I mean, for themost part we're pretty open,
right?
So the things that are on mygoal list, you know, oftentimes
line up with the things on yourgoal list.
Yeah.
Right.
And we've not prediscussed thisor whatever.
I have
Bryan (18:38):
some other ones like riding motorcycle and that's not
on yours.
That's not on
Natalie (18:41):
mine.
Right.
But I think, you know, now thatwe have a goal, what is this,
what are some of the strategiesthat we can do?
And, and right there, I justsaid, writing it down in a book,
in a journal, um, havingsomething to reference when, and
go back to it regularly.
Exactly.
Like our, my mom in law keepsall of our books, um, and she
lives downstairs.
(19:01):
So I mean, I could just go, mom,can I have my book?
I really need.
A reset.
Can we?
Yeah.
Right.
And any one of us could, right?
Just mum holds on.
We
Bryan (19:10):
have it written down.
The ones that we want to keep onour, our, we have a list.
Otherwise, these are the goalsthat we're going for.
This is the stuff that we'redoing there, there, and this is
the thing, like even when you'relooking at any one of these
things.
It's really hard to, tomaintain, not some people can do
it, but it's hard to maintainthe discipline of the goal on
(19:31):
your own.
Exactly.
So it's so important that youactually engage your, your
spouse or a really close friendor someone who's going to push
you.
Like it's a one say one of yougoes to the gym, but the other
one doesn't yeah, right Then youfind someone who is gonna
challenge you and say hey Thisis where you got to go say like
I have I have a series of men inmy life that challenged me in
(19:54):
Just in life Yeah right thatthey look at the things I'm
doing or saying or how I'mmoving or the things that I'm
teaching and just be like Bryan,you can't say that, or that was
really good.
Or what did you mean by this orchallenge?
No, that's not right.
You have to have those people inyour life.
You can't just have a bunch ofyes people around you.
No.
And
Natalie (20:10):
like for me, my sister in law, like she was so great,
uh, lean like over thisChristmas season of like really
maintaining a gym schedule.
And I was not, but I was like,ah, gosh, I should, I should get
on this because not that it's,and it's not a competition
because we all have the samegoal of being right.
Right.
Like the best selves for movingforward physically, right?
(20:35):
Because if we're, if I'm healthyphysically, my emotional health
benefits from it.
My mental health benefits fromit.
My spiritual health benefitsfrom it.
So I'm of like motivating,right?
Right.
Where she's like, you know, ifit wasn't for her, we would not
have done the ninja parkour acourse that we did and we paid
for it, but it was like qualitytime that we could invest with
Bryan (20:57):
our kids.
When Natalie says we paid forit, not only do we pay for it
with finances, which it was justa small fee, but we paid for it
physically for several daysafterwards because I am not a
young and or speedy or agilelike I used to
Natalie (21:11):
be.
Exactly.
So like.
Encouraging each other, likecome on, we are on, we might be
in different lanes as far as ourphysical health goes, but
motivating each other to keepgoing.
Bryan (21:22):
And I would say, um, don't reflect just once a year
on Christmas Eve like we do, wereflect Regularly throughout the
year.
And we have just, we
Natalie (21:32):
have like weekly
Bryan (21:34):
debriefs where we just sit and we'll chat about the
week and when things are goingand work the calendars out and
things like that.
And it's, these are just some ofthe things that we do.
We hope that it all makes, makessense.
We also didn't want to be sobroad that it didn't make, it
didn't land, but also there'sjust so many.
The thing is, is that this is anew year.
(21:55):
You're going to start seeingcontent from every influencer on
the planet coming up with a,here's your five step strategy
in order to lose weight.
Here's your final, the sevensteps to financial freedom.
Here's the, the eight steps youneed for pride, for the best
mental health, like all of thesethings, you're going to start
getting bombarded by thesethings.
And we.
Because we're, we're believers,these things are based in
(22:18):
scripture, like that scripture,right?
These things make them plain,right?
I'm on tablets.
Make it plain.
Simple.
It's simple.
Doesn't mean it's easy.
It just means it's simple.
And the, the, this is the, thesystem you make doesn't need to
be so complex.
Natalie (22:31):
No.
And I think my final thoughtwould be making sure that you
find some community.
Right.
So whether that's a churchgroup, uh, you know, putting
your kids in youth group or somekind of, um, after school
program or whatnot where they,um, can learn and grow.
Absolutely.
Um, we weren't meant to do lifealone.
(22:52):
And so oftentimes if we'restruggling, uh, we have a
community and I don't know whatwe could do without it.
Right.
Bryan (22:59):
I don't know where we would be, our kids would be if
we didn't have our churchcommunity around us, our friends
and our family, the, the, thefriends that had become family
because of, of the relationshipsthat we've built through the
church over these last manyyears.
And so.
There's so many differentoptions where you can find
community.
I know sometimes it's reallytough, especially if you're a
bit more introverted, butthere's people out there.
(23:20):
There's good churches whereveryou're listening to find a good
church.
We can't, I can't honestly, it'sone of those things I can't talk
about church enough because Ithink it's so incredibly
valuable.
And
Natalie (23:30):
it's such
Bryan (23:31):
an important part of our life, but also of, of the
development and spiritual growthand mental health and just being
around people.
So there's one thing I wanted toask all of you that are
listening to this, um, we knowthat you live in the podcast
cause you keep listening to it,but if you have a.
Tip or a trick or a hack or asomething that you want to share
(23:53):
specifically about keeping trackof your progress or how do you
discipline yourself to, to, togrow?
How do you discipline yourselffor the 20?
We want to hear about it.
So send us an email.
If you like this podcast, justshare it with all of your
friends, all of your family.
Facebook.
That's where you can let usknow.
You can also email if you have.
Any of those things you want toshare with us at amplified
(24:15):
marriage at gmail.
com.
And as you hear us say everysingle time, we believe that
your marriage can be reset,refreshed, recharged, and
restored.
Thank you so much for listening.
Talk to you soon.
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Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.