#105 - Cherishing

To cherish someone is to hold them dear. It's to protect and care for someone lovingly. It's to show affection for someone. It's to nurture, value, treasure, and adore someone.

In this episode we discuss:

- the meaning of cherishing.
- the importance of cherishing.
- different values that are apart of cherishing.
- and ways to cherish your spouse.

CHERISHING IS DEEPEST KIND OF LOVE, MUST BE CULTIVATED AND RENEWED DAILY
https://www.deseret.com/1992/10/18/19011172/cherishing-is-deepest-kind-of-love-must-be-cultivated-and-renewed-daily#:~:text=Cherishing is first of all,person can have for another.

https://jamelynstephan.com

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jamelyn@jamelynstpehan.com

Transcript

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I'm jamielynn Stephan and this is what to wanted. Episode number 105. Cherishing. Welcome to want to want it a podcast for women of the church of Jesus Christ of latter day saints who are ready to ignite not only their sexual desire, but all of their desires to create a more fulfilling life and marriage. I'm jamielynn Stephan. I'm a certified life coach, a wife, and a mother of seven children. I'm excited to share my personal journey to desire with you and teach you how to desire more as well Happy Tuesday, everybody. Welcome to want to want it today. Tomorrow is Valentine's day. And so I wanted to do an episode on something to do with relationships or with love. And the word cherishing came into my mind. And probably because I feel like I've heard it a lot lately more than normal, and it has been something. I wonder if I'm good at. And if I'm really honest with myself, It's something I need to do some more con. So. So, what does it mean to chair someone? The dictionary says it is to hold dear. It's to protect and care for someone lovingly. It is to show affection for someone to nurture, to value, to treasure, to adore. So when I was looking up these definitions of cherish, I came across an article from 1992. In the Deseret news by Joanne Larson. And here's what she wrote. Now, I'm not going to read you the whole thing, but I have a few paragraphs I want to share, and I'm just going to stop every once in a while and put in my 2 cents. So, you know, enjoy. So here's what Joanne Larson says. And I will put a link to the article in the show notes. Okay. Cherishing is first of all, love. But one can love without cherishing. Cherishing is an exalted form of love. The highest noblest, strongest feeling one person can have for another. Okay. So I want to stop there. I think she's right. I think we can love someone without cherishing them without valuing and adoring and treasuring them. So for many of our relationships to love, someone's probably great. Right? It's like the guy at the grocery store. I can just show love to you and kindness. But when we think about our marriage, As it's Valentine's day tomorrow, how can we move to a higher form of love to really cherishing our spouse? I'm doing my own self evaluation as I read here. And so I would encourage you to do the same as well. Do you love your spouse? Do you cherish them? Different question a little bit. Okay. Let's continue with Joanne's article. One who cherishes, regards another, not as an extension of self, but as a unique forever becoming beautiful person. Okay. I have to stop again because it can be really easy to see your spouse as more of an object than a person at times. And I know that we're not necessarily doing this on purpose, but we can start to see them literally as an extension of us instead of as an individual. Because it can just be so easy to say to yourself, how does my husband, or how does my wife serve me in my life? How are they helping me get what I want? That's not cherishing someone that is seeing them as a means to an end that seeing them as an object. And I think many men and many women at times feel like that's all they are to their spouse. So to cherish someone means that you're going to require yourself to look at them as a unique individual, separate from you, who has their own hopes and dreams and desires. And you're going to make space in your life and in your marriage for that whole person, not just for the parts of them that serve your end goal, but for all of them, And that may mean that you're willing to put off some of your own desires for a little while to help them reach theirs and vice versa. So again, like she said, one who cherishes regards another, not as an extension of self, but as a unique forever becoming beautiful person. She goes on to say. The person who cherishes and develops another with a cloak of dignity and respect, that person creates an environment so safe. The other can share his or her inner most feelings, dreams, failures, or successes without fear of recrimination. There's room for mistakes and there's always forgiveness. Okay. I really do have to stop here because it sounding more and more like some impossible thing to create envelops another with a cloak of dignity and respect. Creates an environment so safe. Now, maybe it's just her language, but it starting to sound a little bit like a fairytale to me rather than good marriage advice. But if I can kind of look through the language of what she's really saying, I think she is presenting us with this ideal that we can strive towards recognizing that we all bring our own insecurities and immaturities into our marriage, and that it's going to take us possibly a lifetime together to create this little utopia she's describing. But. It is good to say, like, how can I show more dignity and respect for my husband? Where do I fail at this? How can I do better at creating a safe place for my spouse to share his feelings, his dreams, his failures. And to be clear, I don't think that means deciding that you're going to give your spouse free license to act any way they want. And that's never going to bother you. I don't think that's the safe space. That's not good either. It's not about creating this safe place for your spouse to be indulgent and selfish. It's about creating a place where you're willing to have calm, honest conversations, conversations, where you're willing to take responsibility for where you fall short, right conversations, where. You're willing to seek first to understand. And conversations where you're willing to share what you need to share until you feel understood. And. I also agree that we need more practice, many of us at least to make space for mistakes and to be quicker to forgive. So I agree with what she says in that. I think it's an ideal to work towards, but I don't think we need to beat ourselves up if we aren't there already. As you require a better behavior from yourself and practice, you will get better at showing respect, being forgiving and creating a safe place for your spouse to share their real life with you. John Larson goes on to see. The person who cherishes is not demanding. Neither does she keep score? Okay. It gets so easy. Like I said before to see your spouse as an object as how do you serve my life? Instead of as an individual. And so we can become very demanding of them. I think about this. When I think about my clients that I coach around their sexual relationships. Many women, especially feel like their husbands are demanding about sex. And it's such a turnoff. They don't feel cherished. They feel used. And I know that there are men out there who feel like they're nothing but a bank machine for their whites. You know, or you have couples who are constantly keeping score of who's done more for the other person. This kind of stuff, kills intimacy and love. So like Joanne says, if you want to cherish someone, don't be demanding and stop keeping score. Okay, continuing on the one who cherishes has the desire to connect with the other to experience that person's deepest, inner self and to share in return his own. Okay. We've kind of touched on this already, but what she's really describing here is intimacy. When we chair someone, we want to connect with them. We want to experience that person's inner self and we want to share our inner self with them. And that is what intimacy it's being willing to show yourself and to see someone as they really are. And to love them. We may not like everything we see that's okay. Intimacy. Isn't about saying, and it's all. Okay. It's just about, I want to see it and I want you to see me and I'm willing to put it out there and I'm willing to do work where I need to do work. Joanne continues. To develop one's capacity to cherish a person must reach inside to find the vulnerable self and to express that self in soft, nurturing and appealing ways. Cherishing requires giving up the toughness, harshness and impatience that often comes from prioritizing everything above the people in one's life. So I want to stop there again because certainly we have other responsibilities in our lives. Besides cherishing our spouse all day, every day. But maybe we need to look at those things that can feel so pressing and feel like priorities and see if we are using them as a way to cherish our spouse or as a way to distance ourselves from them. Does that make sense? A man or a woman who goes out everyday to work, to support and provide for their family. I believe that is an act of cherishing. But if he or she makes work or money, their focus and stops engaging at home and hides under this excuse of, I just got so much to do as a way to stay out of the intimacy of their marriage. Then they aren't cherishing. So, I guess we need to look at our life and see, like, what am I prioritizing over my spouse? That makes it harder for my spouse to feel cherished by me. It doesn't have to be work or projects because sometimes it can be other people. And that is the thing I know I'm guilty of. Other people and other relationships that shouldn't take priority over my spouse have in the past. That's not cherishing. Okay, let's continue with the article. Cherishing requires clearing emotional space inside oneself to contemplate and to appreciate the precious and irreplaceable value of a loved one. You know, I think many of us don't do this often enough because to really contemplate. The irreplaceable value of a loved one. Can get our heads into a place that feels scary. Like if I really think about how much I appreciate and value this person and how irreplaceable they are in my life. It reveals a vulnerability because it shows me how devastated I would be if I lost them somehow. And so to avoid feeling that fear of loss, we will hold back. Really cherishing someone, we hold back really admitting to ourselves how valuable they really are. And I feel like I really need to work on this in myself because even though it feels scary to me, the idea of losing someone I cherish. I actually want to deeply feel love for my husband. I want to allow myself to let him matter so much to me. When I do that, I'm actually a way better wife. But when I hold back that kind of caring and hopes that if he should leave or be taken, that I just would feel less pain. I don't like it. I feel like he deserves better than that. He deserves all of my caring and valuing and love and appreciation. Now, again, this is a practice I'm trying to do better at, but even though it's more vulnerable and scary, it actually feels so good. And it helps me show up as the type of wife. I really want to be. And I hope one day it will help my husband truly understand how much I do cherish him. Okay, let's continue on. We're getting close to the end here. To cherish. One must affirm through acts of love. The value of the other cherishing requires becoming more, deeply involved, more vulnerable, more responsive, more sharing, and more intimate. Finally cherishing involves commitment of time. Okay, then she goes on to tell a story from Nathaniel Branden, who is a psychologist. And he was at a lecture and he was lecturing on the importance of devoting time to your relationship. And after the talk, this young couple comes up to him and they're telling him how happily in love they are. And then the husband says to him, but this one thing troubles me. How do you find time for intimacy? K. So this is the lecture, it was about the importance of devoting time in your relationship. And the husband's like, how do I find time for more intimacy? So, this is what. Dr. Brandon said. I asked him his profession and he told me he was a lawyer. And then I said, well, there's one thing that troubles me given how much you love your wife. How do you find time to attend to your law practice? Responding to the disoriented. Look on the man's face. Brandon next said. The answer seems obvious, right? I mean, You have to attend to your law practice. Don't you. Slowly a light of comprehension began to Dawn on the young man's face as Brandon continued. When, and if you decide that love means as much to you as your work does, when success in your relationships seems as important to you as success in your career, you won't ask how does one find time? You'll know. I really like that example. What we cherish, we spend time with that is just true. So like Dr. Brandon said to this young man, listen, When success in your relationship seems as important to you, a success in your career, you'll know how to make time for it. You make the time for your law practice because you know, you have to, even though you love your wife, you make time to be a successful lawyer. So now it's time to care as much about your relationships. Success. As your law success and make time for it. So again, take a minute to do some self reflection. I've been so guilty of putting time into things that seem pressing and demanding and feeling like I don't have time to really give to Jared. Now, maybe with medical school and small babies or big boy jobs and a full house of kids. Our time one-on-one is legitimately less than we would want right now. I don't think it's so much how much time we're willing to get. I think it's more actually wanting to give time to our spouse and being willing to make the most of the time we do get with each other. I don't feel like I want really more time than Jared gives to his job. It's just not even possible. But it means so much to me when he says that he would rather be home than on call at the hospital. And it matters when he comes home that he wants to be with me. It makes me feel like he values me, that he cherishes me. So committing time to your spouse is a great way to cherish them. Even if it can't be a big chunk of time. Okay. So that's the end of the article. To add to this. I just have a little list of some things that we can do to practice learning to cherish our spouse to move from kind of, I love you too. I really cherish you. So listen and seek first to understand, let your spouse feel heard. Public displays of affection are a way to show someone. I cherish you. I'm not embarrassed of you. I'm not embarrassed about how I feel about you. I love you. Acknowledging their efforts and the goodness they bring to your life and to the life of your family. Right. Appreciating them that matters. Take an interest in their life. Ask how they're doing. Like I said before, your spouse is a whole person that has their own dreams. Talk to them about it. Listen to them about it. Take an interest in it. Compliment your spouse. Everybody loves a compliment. Act with tenderness towards them. Help your spouse. Sometimes it's so easy to be like, this is your job. And this is my job. And we kind of have our roles and everyone's doing their roles. And it can be really easy to be like, well, that's their thing, so they'll have to do it. It's not my thing. That's not cherishing someone step in help. Her helps needed. Be respectful to your spouse when you have differences of opinions. Don't try to change your spouse and don't compare them to others. Be a good lover. Oh, you got to decide what that means and this isn't you going to your spouse and saying be a better lover to me. It's just show up and be a good lover to your spouse. Be faithful, be devoted, be true to your spouse. Touch your spouse in a way that conveys love to them. So I've done this for myself. I worked on this with some of my clients as well. Just this idea of listen. If you couldn't express how you feel to your spouse through words. What would it be like if you had to express it through your touch? And this is not just like, Hey, I desire you sexually kind of touch. This is. I love you. I cherish you so deeply. You matter so much to me. I appreciate you so much. What does that touch feel like for you and for them? If you had to express your genuine deep feelings of love for them through your touch, what would that be like? And lastly give all of you to your spouse. Don't hold back. To really chair someone feels amazing, but it also can feel risky. What if my spouse won't cherish me back, what if he leaves me? What if he is? Prematurely taken from me. If I've loved and cherished so deeply, how could I ever stand that loss? And so we can convince ourselves to hold back to not go all in, to not love wholeheartedly in an effort to protect ourselves. But by making that choice, we miss out on the deep intimacy we could experience by going all in. It is a risk. It is you could chair someone who will walk out on you. This is why so many of us claim. We want more intimacy in our marriage, but we really struggled to create it because to deeply care and show someone, all of us is incredibly vulnerable and it opens us up to the possibility of being hurt. But it also opens us up to the possibility of loving and being loved in a way that many of us really can only imagine. I think so many of us want to be adored, want to be cherished. And we may even feel entitled to it, but so few of us are willing to put our pride on the altar or drop our walls or go all in and really cherish our spouse. We want it, but we're not great at giving it. We kind of have this, you go first, like you cherish me first and let me know. It's safe to cherish you. And then I'm going to let myself really deeply care about you and cherish you. Here's my Valentine's day invitation for you. Cherish your spouse all day. Even if you don't know exactly how cherishing feels or even if it feels maybe too vulnerable and uncomfortable, I promise there is no gift you could give. That would mean more to your spouse than experiencing you. Cherishing them. Happy Valentine's day everyone. I will talk to you next week. Bye. Thanks for listening today. If you like what you hear on the podcast, and you'd like to learn more, feel free to head over to my website. Jamilin Stephan coaching.com or find me on Instagram or Facebook at Jamileh. step in coaching.