How Married High Performers Get on the Same Page (and Stay There)

Transcribed from the episode audio and lightly edited for readability. Speaker labels are automated and may occasionally be off.

Austin: Stop what you're doing, claim responsibility, and then go, "What are we doing?"

Rachel: Like, yeah.

Austin: We're not bound by some laws or rules that says we have to clash over meaningless things. What if the secret to a thriving marriage as a high performer isn't about actually working harder, but about syncing up smarter?

Rachel: In this video, we are going to show you four practical ways that married high performers actually get on the same page, and more importantly, how they stay there without feeling like they have to sacrifice their mission, their ministry, their marriage, or their mental bandwidth.

Austin: And this is not because we have read it in a book, but because we have actually lived it. Rachel and I are both wired for growth. We're driven, we're ambitious, we're constantly optimizing everything in our life. But there definitely was a season where our calendars were full, life was full our bank accounts were full, and yet our conversations felt like business meetings.

Rachel: Yeah. And we weren't fighting, but we also just weren't fully aligned.

Austin: And what changed everything wasn't just a better system or a couple's retreat, it was actually uncovering why we both kept drifting out of sync, and building a rhythm that honored both our pace that we like to operate at, but also our peace together.

Rachel: Yeah. And if you've ever felt like you and your spouse are working hard but not walking together, then this video is for you. Welcome to the Conscious Christian Marriage Podcast, where we equip growth-minded Christian couples to elevate every aspect of their heart, soul, mind, and strength. Thank you for tuning in today. We are your hosts, Rachel and Austin Holt.

Austin: Yes. Thank you guys for joining us today, and we are very excited to be back in the studio. We like to try to be really, really transparent in these podcasts. And over the last month, five, six weeks, we have had, very, very, very full traveling schedules and event schedules, and, we actually had one of our gathering events, which is a really epic event where couples from all over the country come into town and they hang out at our farm for a couple days. They meet lots of other couples that they've had lots of Zoom time with and online time with and we just have a chance to fellowship together, do some fun activities, sit around the fire, eat some good food, and, even some late night worship sessions on the patio. We just have a really great time. So we've been packed, very intentionally packed and full but we're very excited to be back in the studio today to bring you guys some thunder. Did you like that?

I threw that- I threw that word in there for you.

Rachel: I didn't know what word was coming out of your mouth.

Austin: Good. I'm glad.

Rachel: I thought you were lisping at first.

Austin: No, thunder. Yeah, I did kinda. Thunder.

Rachel: All right. Well, we'll kick it off with appreciations, as we always do, because what you appreciate appreciates. So let this be a reminder to stop and send a text of appreciation to your spouse. take a mental note that when you see them later today to pause what you're doing, look them in the eye, and genuinely appreciate them.

Austin: Yeah. And

Rachel: Not like a, "Hey, thanks for doing that," but genuinely appreciate.

Austin: You know, and that actually brings up something that I like to do every single day. I really enjoy, is I don't do it every day, but I do it pretty often, is I will text five people every day in appreciation. You know, I love texting you. Luckily, I get to see you in the mornings because self-employed life, we get to do whatever we want, so we get to start our, our days together most days. But I love just, beyond just texting you in appreciation, I love texting random people because here's what's really fun. If you text five Not random people that I don't know.

Rachel: You're like, "Hmm, wonder what number this is."

Austin: I should try this. Yeah, I should try that. Get the, get my white pages out. but it's really powerful. One, one practice that we teach people is text five people every morning in appreciation. "Hey, I was thinking of you this morning." "Praying for you today. Appreciate you. Love you. Here's how you impacted my life. Here's a great memory I have, and I just just wanted to share this with you." And then throughout the day, you're gonna get five replies typically. You know, and it's gonna be like, "Oh my gosh, thank you for thinking of me today. That was so kind of you." And man, those just really, like, boost my spirit. They just fill me with energy and get me excited, so appreciations are powerful.

Rachel: I love doing that in, like, during my Bible time, just saying like, "Hey, God, who do you want me to pray for today?" And then somebody will come to my mind and I'll say like, "What do you want them to know?" And sometimes He'll speak something for that person and I might say, "Hey, I don't know what this word means to you, but- God gave me this word for you." And it leads to really cool conversation and connection, so

Austin: That is really cool

Rachel: I love that idea.

Austin: Well, I'll go first. So a big appreciation I have, and I didn't get to share this because we didn't have an episode for a few weeks, but, and I mentioned the gathering, so I just wanna appreciate you for your just endless preparation and attention to detail that made that event here a huge success. So- I just really appreciate, um It's not just about you being organized, but it's the heart that you put into the details of these events because, like, all those little details, like the little gift bags and all just the fun little stuff, it just goes a long way for people. They feel loved and appreciated, and you have this feminine nurturing heart that thinks about those things, and I don't always think about those things. And so I just really appreciate, again, not just the organization, but how much heart energy goes into planning these events, and I definitely could not do that without you.

Rachel: Thank you. I enjoy it and I receive that. I wanna appreciate you for something that I think sometimes can be the stereotypical, like, ladies will complain about it in their husband. But I appreciate that you fix things. Like, that if I am struggling or if I am hitting an area of resistance, that is a blessing to me in my feminine nature where I might be swirling in the sea of my emotions or overwhelm or just paralysis of the situation, but I can bring that to you and you will always help me. And that's a huge strength that you as the masculine, but also you as Austin James Holt, have to- Really in any situation, I know that I can come to you and you have a really great idea most of the time. I'm like, "Why didn't I think of that?" But you just have this way of coming in and basically saving the day. So I appreciate you for that.

Austin: Are you saying I'm your hero?

Rachel: You are my hero.

Austin: Yes. Winning.

Rachel: So thank you for that. Handshake.

Austin: Mm-hmm. Good handshake right here.

Rachel: Ooh, it's warm. That's really warm.

Austin: Your hand, why are your hands so cold? I have the heater on in here.

Rachel: I'm always cold.

Austin: Okay. All right. Let's get rocking and rolling here. Thank you for those appreciations. So everyone, we're super excited for today's topic. As you know, we are in video three of our four video series on increasing intimacy capacity. And today we're gonna be talking about one of our favorite topics. Have I ever said that before on this podcast?

Rachel: Probably.

Austin: Yes. One of our favorite topics, and that's what we call co-creation. Okay? And, co-creation is really, really powerful, and we're gonna dive into what that is, how it's gonna affect your marriage, and then we're gonna give you guys these four really practical things that we do. We literally do This isn't out of some book or out of some other podcast or out of some journal of theoretical, you know, experimentations to try. Like, this is stuff that people ask us the question all the time. And a lot of like guru-y type people say this. I don't know if they actually mean it, but I mean this. People ask us all the time, "How do you guys do what you do?" You know, how do we manage our businesses, how do we manage the kids and the farm and the goats and church responsibilities? And also, how do I still have hobbies, and how do you still have time for the spa, and whatever it is, you know, you like to do?

Rachel: Do I?

Austin: You know, occasionally. You know, spa time, whatever. I just know you love being with the kids 24/7, so.

Rachel: It's just so spa-like.

Austin: It i- Thank you. but people ask us all the time sort of like, "How do you guys actually do what you do?" And I think people think we're a lot busier than we are. We're just very intentional with like everything we do. And so we wanna give you guys today just a peek into some of the things that we do to create life together. And why that actually matters and why that has created such a big impact in our life. And so we're excited to dive into that. And just so you guys know, next week we're gonna be wrapping up the series, and we're gonna be talking about community. And if you're the kind of person that has friends or wants friends

Rachel: Which is anyone

Austin: Which is anyone. Or just, you just wanna know like, "Am I in a container of people that are gonna help me grow or help me die?" We will help you figure that out next week. So make sure that you're here for that. So Rachel, what does it mean to co-create? Tell us about co-creation.

Rachel: Yeah. Co-creating is in essence at the root of every incredible marriage because not only are we creating and building everything together on the same team, but it's also with God entwined. So, you know, talk about three strands of cords cannot easily be broken. We are creating our life together, our finances, our schedule. Everything is being birthed out of our desire, my desire, your desire, coming to great win-win agreements, and ultimately like Christ at the root of all of it.

Austin: Yeah. So what you're saying is you and I essentially have an agreement that we will build life together. Like that we will not fall victim to happenstance or to luck or to things like that, but that you and I are being intentional together to actually build life together.

Rachel: Yeah. It's great. It's great intention, for sure.

Austin: Yeah. And I think what also builds on that is that you and I have a really strong commitment to, like, never playing the victim role. You know, when it comes to, oh, life got in the way, or so and so made me do this or made me feel this way, or, "Well, we need to go to that thing because so and so will think this way," or, "Well, that's just what you do. That's just what people do. That's just what Christians do," or whatever. Like, you and I have really made a commitment to, never taking that victim position that would make us act out of guilt or out of fear. But rather we have been very intentional about everything.

Rachel: Yeah. It makes me think back even to the early years of marriage, shaping everything that our life looks like. It started with, you know, it started and is with great intention, but deciding how do we wanna do holidays? How do we wanna do, you know, work? How do we wanna do raising kids? And just really, like you said, this is one thing I really appreciate about you, is that you've been so, kinda like a trailblazer in that, yeah, we leave and cleave. Left and cleft.

Austin: Mm-hmm. Left and cleft. Mm-hmm.

Rachel: Nod to an old episode. Hi hot debate. Hot debate.

Austin: Hot debate. Still being debated to this day.

Rachel: We left and cleft. We leave and cleave to each other.

Austin: Leave and cleave.

Rachel: Leave our parents, cleave to each other, and we are forging our own path and creating our own things that work best for our family and our mission because our life doesn't look like other people's because I'm me, you're you, and God has a unique s very specific calling on our lives. And I think that's what a lot of couples forget to take into account, is that, their life doesn't have to look like Joe and Lucy's. You know? Like, their life shouldn't look like Joe and Lucy's because their life isn't Joe and Lucy's. I don't know a Joe and Lucy, but they forget that, and like you said, do things out of, like, obligatory reasons. Like, oh, that's what we should do, or that's what people say, or that's what m our family always did. But it's now you are a new family, and what is it that you want to create together? And specifically, what is God calling you to create? Like, man, you know, letting your schedule run you versus the other way around.

Like, God wants you to be, thriving and not your schedule. Really being a slave to your schedule.

Austin: Yeah. That's right. Well, I love that you were intentional. to use the word intentional shows your intentionality. And we are very intentional people, and I like to- I like to really nod this conversation back to even the creation story, right? You know, when God created the Earth, you know, He created us in His image, right? Like, we are an image bearer of God, and God is ultimately a creator. And then He even co-created with Adam. 'Cause even though God created the animals- He was like, "Adam, I want you to name all these animals."

Rachel: I know. It's so fun.

Austin: And so co-creation goes all the way back to the creation story. And so I think you and I have really modeled after that in our marriage, where, you know, even though I might be the leader Or let me rephrase that.

Rachel: You are the leader.

Austin: I am the leader. That I am the leader of our marriage and our home, that we create together. You know? Where I want your feedback, I want your opinion, and I, I want your involvement in any major decision, all that. And I ultimately know if a decision has to be made that we don't necessarily agree on, I'm gonna make it, and if I'm gonna get to claim responsibility for whatever happens next, and I'm, I'm ready for that, you know, anytime. But we really modeled that aspect of our relationship off of, I, I really believe the image of God that we're supposed to, we're supposed to mimic, which is to create, right? I mean, when we're being creative think about what we're doing, you know, we are creating. And I do believe that God loves creativity, God loves art. Like, I mean think of the Just read the Bible and you'll, you'll see that pretty clear. But I really do believe that we are creating life, and we're creating life with Christ.

So not only just from the creation story, but all the way, this through line all the way to today, when you and I are praying together, when we're in the Word together, when we're asking the Holy Spirit together, you know, "Okay, God. Okay, Holy Spirit, what do you want for us next? What word do you have for us here? What, what, what vision do you have for us?" And we're gonna talk about vision here in a minute as well. But that's been our intention, is how can we create together, but also how are we creating with God you know, so that, like, His thumbprint and His DNA is all over everything that we have built together in our marriage. And the key point that I just wanna end on with that for everyone listening is the word intentional. Co-creating life together as a married couple means that everything you do, there's some level of thought, some level of planning, some level of intention, some level of design or vision behind what we do, versus being the kind of people that's like, "Oh, I don't know how we wound up here"- or, "Why are we doing this?

Why are we doing that?" You know? or, "Life made us do this," or, "So-and-so made us do this," whatever that looks like. We don't wanna live a life like that. We wanna live a life where everything is intentional.

Rachel: Yeah. For sure.

Austin: So Rachel, when couples co-create together, when they make an intentional commitment to build their marriage together versus these parallel lives that happen to be in the same house together what do they experience differently because of that?

Rachel: Yeah. So first of all, when we prioritize creating with intention together, we experience more peace, we experience more flow, more connection, more love and joy. but when I think about you and I and the intentionality that we put into our life and to our home and to our children and our work and all of that, I think about peace. Like, just the peace of the environment, the peace of the container of our marriage and our home. And I mean, man, as we were building our home, that's what I prayed over our home, was that it would be a place of peace, for us, but also for those coming into our life and coming into our home and to our space, is just that it's a place of peace. So we've created that with the intentionality, peace. And then I also think about the fact that there's no drama, which of course means there's peace. But- I think I know that so many couples experience so much drama based on expectations, that they don't even realize are expectations.

It's like, "Well, I just thought you would," or, "That's what the dude does," or, "You, you didn't do this, I thought you would." And there's just so much drama that comes from that and, and, you know, conflict, which we know is a learning opportunity. But if you're not intentional and you don't know what you don't know, then it is conflict. It's, it's painful. And you're just, you know, doing the insanity thing of hitting your head against a brick wall over and over. And so, yeah, if you're not creating, you're not going to get the reward of that. If you're not co-creating, you're not gonna get that intentional reward of peace and thriving. You know, another benefit is our business s is successful because and I'm not just saying, like, the marriage business, but, like, business. When couples are intentional to co-create the marriage they want, the home, the environment, it blesses their business. Because when you're not wasting your time on that drama and you're not having conflict, guys, that takes so much energy.

You know? Like, it sucks the life out of everything, so then you don't have as much to give. You don't have that creativity to give to your business, or that energy or that life and that, like, zest and fervor. it doesn't trickle into your business. It's the opposite. You show up depleted. You have a really difficult time being creative. And so when I think about the benefits of co-creating together, I think a lot about how everything else benefits in your business and your ministry and anything that you put your hand to.

Austin: Yeah. That makes me think a lot about when we are so focused on our faith and on our marriage, that's where so much of our sustenance comes from, and then this byproduct of not wasting time, money, energy, effort, emotion on other things starts to come into play. You know, it's like if someone has a hard time with their marriage or their har hard time being happy or creating, co-creating success together, it's easier to go find happiness in other places, whether that's spending money, other places, or spending time or spending effort or energy or emotion. And so when you and I are creating life together, I don't need to go create life separately from you. You know? And I definitely have individualistic things that I like to do. Like, I have hobbies that you don't necessarily love. Or, you know, I might wanna go play cards with my buddies, and you're not like, "Hey, I wanna go play cards with you guys." Or I might wanna nerd out on my 3D printers and, you know, you're not like, "Oh, my gosh, I wanna be down there with you," you know?

So like we, you know, and there's stuff that you like to do that I don't necessarily love to do, and that's not what we're talking about. What we're really talking about is that when we build life together, when we create life together, it really checks a lot of those boxes of companionship and togetherness and just peace within our own connection, knowing we don't need to go outside of our connection to get dopamine, to get fulfillment, to get purpose because we're making life together. You know, and not only can we make more money because our business is doing better, because we're doing better, and this is whether y if you're watching this episode, whether you own a business or whether you're, you, you have a job or wh however you make money, when your home is stable, you are far more unstoppable at work, period. When your marriage and your home is stable, your ability to make money goes up a hundredfold. Because you're confident and you're excited to bring success home.

We know a lot of people that have a hard time making money because to them, it's like, what's the point?

Rachel: Yeah. This is not anecdotal, by the way.

Austin: Yeah. This is like com

Rachel: This is not like, "Oh, hey, this is, like, a thing." This is proven. We've seen it with couples over and over and over.

Austin: Yeah. And it's at every scale. It's at every scale of earner as well. You know, because we work with couples, you know, all the way up into the, the bigger seven, eight-figure earners, and it's, it can be an issue at that level, too. What's keeping them from getting to the next level is not because they're not good at business or good at money. It's because deep down, they're not actually excited to take home the wins because they know that they're not creating very much together. And when we create life separately, well, then what starts to happen is resentment builds up, you know? So if, if you and I just created life separately, and I'm maybe experiencing success at work or you're experiencing success somewhere else, but then you're wondering why you and I aren't experiencing success it communicates this message of like, well, we're capable of it, but we're not doing it. Why is that? You know, and so when you co-create life together and y you really get the sense that you actually have a partner.

Okay? Like, you know, roommates do not create together. They just occupy space together. That is not creating. But when we create life together, not only do we always feel on the same team, but we feel included. You know, we share in our victories together. You know, we share in the spoils of our victories, you know, and you always feel like you're connected to me and plugged in in what I'm doing and vice versa when we create life together. 'Cause a lot of couples have a hard time feeling left out. You know, especially if you've got a stay-at-home parent and you've got maybe a, a harder-charging, you know, businessperson or executive or someone who just works a lot or takes their job seriously, that kind of thing. And it can be easy for resentment to build up because it's like, oh, like, you're off building this other empire somewhere, and I'm just sustaining the home. But you and I, we build in both those arenas together.

And you don't have to own a business together with your spouse to experience what you and I are experiencing, but, but we create together. And we're gonna talk a whole lot more about that. But an one more benefit I just wanna make sure that I, share, too, is that I just never feel like I'm lonely. I never feel like I'm- I'm on an island, you know? And we've helped a lot of couples experience this, where it was like it just felt like they were both creating their own separate lives and didn't really have connection points, like bridges between those two lives. And we really believe in really, intertwining those lives together, and you do that by building together, by creating together.

Rachel: Yes, exactly. Austin, what are some practical ways, so there are a lot of practical ways but we're talking about four today. What are four practical ways that couples can get on the same page and co-create a powerful marriage together?

Austin: Great question. So number one is what we call shared values and vision. Now, this is a big one, so everyone listening, I really want you to take this seriously because this is something that we teach in coursework. We have churches using this model to help their couples. We're having conversations. I literally had this conversation with multiple couples today, in calls that I had talking about the power of having shared values and vision. And think of your values are, are like these little colanders almost, where everything you do in life, they have to pass through these values. And so for me, if I'm gonna make a decision and it does not serve one of your and I's pre-agreed on values, I don't do that thing. Okay? And so sometimes couples will, will meet with us, whether it's in our group program or one-on-one, two-and-two, and they're like, "Yeah, I decided to do a blank," or, "I decided to say yes or no to blank or blank."

I'm like, "Well, what was the basis for that decision?" And they're like, "I don't know. It just, that just seemed like the right thing to do," or, "That just f you know, yada, yada." And I'm like, "Well, did it honor any of the values that you have for your marriage?" And a lot of times, it's like, "Well, we don't even know what our values are." It's like, oh, great. Well, here's our next assignment. And we help couples determine what are the values that drive our marriage, okay? And so that's, that's kind of number one within that, and the second piece with that is vision. Okay? So not only do you and I create marriage and life together by saying, what do we even value, but we also take it a step further and we define what's the vision for our marriage. When we look at today, when we look at the rest of our marriage into our legacy, which will hopefully survive way long after we die, if Jesus doesn't come back by then, we define what that vision looks like.

And that's how we're building the future together starting today. So not only do we make decisions based on values that we've agreed on, everything that we do fits within the guardrails of our vision that we have for our marriage. And so you and I have created this roadmap, you know, and a lot of this is through prayer, of course, and through seeking God's counsel and God's wisdom in all this. But we've got a pretty good vision for what the future looks like. And everything that we do must honor and fit within the confines of that vision, or we don't do that thing. And it doesn't mean that other things outside of our vision are inherently wrong or negative, but if it does not rank in priority in our highest values and for the primary function of our business, we just don't do it. Like it'd be, I would love to start an olive grove. Like on The Chosen, you know? Like, that'd be so cool.

But it does not fit into our vision right now. It does not fit into the vision you and I have agreed on. If I come home one day and I'm like, "Babe, guess what I invested in? An olive field or grove or whatever they're called." Be like, "We're going to Italy and we're gonna work at it this summer," you'd be like, "Hmm, interesting. That's not in our vision, so we sh should talk about this."

Rachel: Right. Yeah, it creates, like I said earlier, it creates a lot of peace because you do not have to deliberate over decisions. I mean, yes, there might be a certain thing that might be, whether you do it or don't, might still align with your values or vision. But it does create a lot of, of clarity and cuts out a lot of the paralysis of analysis when creating decisions, making decisions. Yeah, it's already made, you know? that is a very high, high impact move, is, I love that Craig Groeschel talks about pre-decision. You know, like if you pre-decide, you don't have to wonder when the time comes.

Austin: Mm-hmm. Yeah, and you can do it generally sober-minded, meaning you're out. You're, you're not in it when you make the decision so that when you're in it the decision is clear.

Rachel: Yeah. So it creates so much clarity, so much peace, and it doesn't waste time because we already know. There's no question.

Austin: All right, so for everyone listening, number one, creating shared values and vision. And we have a whole process for that. It's, it's a really, really great process to follow. But creating shared values and vision will absolutely help you get on the same page stay on the same page, and co-create life together. So number two, agreements. So Rachel, tell our listeners how we use agreements to co-create together.

Rachel: Agreements have been a foundational part as well of our marriage and how we have co-created what we have today and what we help other couples create as well. And it's so powerful because I can share what is something that I would love. Like you said, we, we each have interests, right? I might have a desire. I can bring that to you in a conscious way and then you can say, "Great. I love that that's a win for you. However, here's a win for me." And then we can either modify the wins if they clash a little bit or tweak it to where we are creating these incredible, powerful agreements that we run our life by. So there's not any questioning. There's no drama of I thought this, or I expected this, or I hoped this. It's I know, I have this peace and safety that this is what we're creating together. And in a similar way, when somebody asks us a question, I might already know the answer because we have an agreement.

For example, someone might ask me, "Hey, you wanna come over for dinner tomorrow night?" I might say, "I'm gonna talk to Austin about that. I'm not gonna give any type of commitment until we discuss it." Because even if our calendar might be free, there might be something else. You know, we just have this agreement.

Austin: And I may not feel like going.

Rachel: Right. So I try to, I try to make sure I don't say, "I would love that, but I'll see if Austin does." yeah, I just make sure that I am communicating that I'm gonna talk to you, and then I'll let them know because that is the agreement that we have. So we do not commit to anything without communicating with each other. there's an agreement around everything in our life, and we've had couples say, "Well, isn't that rigid or not very sexy?" And it's actually the opposite because

Austin: Well, we actually have an agreement to have sex every day. What are you laughing about? I thought we made that. You were like, "Babe, will you rub my back?" And I was like, "Yeah, as long as win-win." And you're like, "Yeah, yeah, shh, shh, shh."

Rachel: What?

Austin: You don't remember that?

Rachel: I don't.

Austin: Okay. All right.

Rachel: I do love back rubs, though.

Austin: Agreements are literally building blocks of creating together. So it's like I wanna figure out, what's the win for Rachel, what's the win for me? And like you've said before, everyone listening to this podcast is smart enough and creative enough to create a win-win. Okay? And if you've been told that you need to compromise in marriage, you have been told very poor marriage advice. You've been told very one-dimensional advice that's gonna turn one of you into a victim. And if you, and if you don't believe me, ask the divorce rate how that advice is going. And so when we use agreements, it's like, it's, it's a response to everything. So if you and I ever experience resistance together one of the first things we do is go, "Okay, let's create an agreement around this," 'cause how we did it this time didn't work. So what's the agreement? And you might say, well, like for example, like the one that we've probably shared on the podcast before about leaving on time to go places.

Rachel: It's really a juicy one. Yeah.

Austin: Yeah. And I love to be in the car leaving 15 minutes before we would ever need to actually be leaving. So if there's some traffic, or we get a flat tire, or I wanna stop at a gas station

Rachel: Ooh

Austin: And get a water or whatever, whatever, whatever, we leave that nice little chunk of buffer. you however, in the younger years of our marriage you loved to leave 42 seconds after we would definitely be probably a minute late if we left at that moment. And I, that just didn't work for me. But it worked for you, and you were okay with that. And you've always been a person who's on time. I'm being a little facetious there.

Rachel: Yes. On time meaning five minutes early. If we were on time, we were late.

Austin: I don't know about that. But I love being early, okay? Because I know sometimes I'm overly optimistic about travel time which you helped me figure out. So I know I need to leave early, okay? But anyways, so it was like, okay, we would get into learning opportunities or conflicts about this. And so I, I remember one day we were like, "Okay, we need a new agreement 'cause old agreement's not working." So the win for me was I'd like to be in the car 15 minutes before we actually need to leave, so we can just I don't care if we get there early and sit in the car. That's fine with me. And you're like, "Well, the win for me would be is that you help me get the kids into the car, get the car packed, and ask me- 'If you wanna get out 15 minutes early, Austin, I would like for you to ask me, "Hey, honey, is there anything I can do to help you prepare to leave on time?"' And then if there is anything that might be holding you back- You tell me that thing, and I help with that thing, and then we get out on time.

And since we've done that, we've had very, very, very little drama around leaving on time because we identified the agreement. That's how we have co-created life together. And you can use this any area of your marriage that you ever feel resistance in. Stop what you're doing, claim responsibility, and then go, "What are we doing?"

Rachel: Like, yeah.

Austin: We're not bound by some laws or rules that says we have to clash over meaningless things. Let's create an agreement so the next time this happens, we can move through it with grace, with intentionality and so that we can then experience more joy, love, connection, grace, all these wonderful things. It's, it's actually that easy.

Rachel: Yeah. On the wives calls or, you know, a coaching call with a client, I'll work through something with them. They'll come to a discovery, and if there's an action item, I mean, always I say, "Share this with your husband, communicate this with him, and then ask him if he would agree to," you know if there's some kind of agreement you can make around this moving forward. And so even if it's something that's, like, her landmine, her thing that she's working on healing, there could be an agreement there for how the husband supports and loves and nourishes it and helps heal that part of her. And so it's so important to create those agreements because you're not only co-creating l you know, good things, but you're also co-creating healing for each other, which is really

Austin: Ooh

Rachel: Powerful. And really special.

Austin: Love that. All right. So let's go to number three, and this one's pretty simple, and it's pretty self-explanatory. We call these daily check-ins. If you want to co-create life together, you must check in with each other. So in our calendar, there's a little reminder. It goes off every night, and it says, "The A and R check-in or Rachel's feelings update." And, I don't know if I've shared this on the podcast before, but one of my favorite things, like, we have this bed. It's electric, so it, the

Rachel: It's electric.

Austin: So it's like the part that your head and neck and back on, it's like, "Err." And so sometimes we'll get in bed, kids are down, and s you know, sometimes we like to get in bed and read or we might watch a little TV or something, you know just to kinda, like, just unwind for a few minutes. And, and I always know when Rachel's ready for her check-in because I all of a sudden hear, "Err," and that's her side of the bed lowering. 'Cause what we do is we lower the bed down, and we have our, our little faces on our pillows, and we just And then we talk to each other, and we check in with each other. And so by checking in with each other, we are staying up to date on each other's inner worlds. We share any requests that we might have. We share any, resistance we might be feeling. We share any prayer requests we might have, and we use that as an opportunity to just really connect and to build, build connection, create connection together, create intimacy together.

And because we stay checked in with each other, that affects so many of the things I might do that night or the next day. So we co-create life together because we give each other intel at all times, 'cause you cannot have relationship intelligence without relationship

Rachel: Intel

Austin: Intel. You can't have emotional intelligence without

Rachel: Intel

Austin: Right. So us doing check-ins every day is how we give each other the intel that we need to make intelligent decisions about our marriage, which is the way we co-create.

Rachel: You're just so great.

Austin: Mm. Thank you. So Rachel, let's move on to number four, which is our last piece of advice today. What is number four? Why is it so important? What is it? Tell us.

Rachel: Yes. Having quarterly family planning meetings. So what this looks like for you and I is sitting down, we have our big dry erase board. And we celebrate the wins over the last quarter, and we also look at what are the areas that we maybe see needing to shift because of seasonal changes like in our schedule. If, like, we just did one moving into summer, we'll probably do another one when we start the fall school season, because there are changes. There are nuances, as parents, as being married, in our job. What is it that we want to see more of? What is it that we're noticing we would like to be doing to invest in our children or specific things that they have, like needs that they have? And we just, we talk about it. We get really intentional. And guys, this is really important to first have your values and your vision because then these meetings are so fruitful so intentional. And it does streamline those decisions, and it will help those things come up of like, oh, this is an area that's falling through the cracks, or this is an area that we wanna grow more in, or hey, let's be intentional in this way.

And so it's been, yeah, it's been a very consistent and important part of our marriage and successful marriages that we know.

Austin: Yeah. I, I loved getting to do this with you because it's just a chance to sit down. And one thing we do on our big dry erase board is we literally draw out, like, a weekly calendar or, and/or a monthly calendar. And we make sure that within those weekly calendars, one of the first things we do, always is we make sure that Rachel has time for herself, I have time for myself, and we have time to spiritually pour into the kids. We have dates with the kids, time with the kids, and making sure that, like, our church commitments and things like that are fulfilled. And then from there, everything else gets kind of backfilled around that. So like you said, there could be seasonal changes, kids activities, holiday activities. What's the weather like? Are we more outside during that time of the year, less outside? But basically we sit down and we go, "What do we want our life to look like from Sunday through Saturday?"

You know? And so for example, like on Sundays, we always leave a block of time, typically from like after church till 3:00 or 4:00, where we meal prep for the whole week, and we do all of our meal prep. We make our snacks, and we make our meals, and it makes life so much easier because we do that. Or we map out all kinds of things during these meetings. But it's just a chance to sit down and, like you said, come together and go, "Hey, where are we winning? And first let's celebrate that, and let's thank God for all that, that winning." So where are we winning? Then we go, "Where are we feeling resistance?" "What do we want to change? Where do we feel stuck? Where do we feel frustrated?" "Where do we feel like we could be loving our kids more, loving each other more, serving in a different way that's more impactful for the Kingdom of God, helping our couples on a higher level?"

And we literally every quarter almost rebuild life and business together. There's never really a question, like you also said, that we're not on the same page. Because we've built all this stuff out. We've planned all these things out. We make our checklists. We make our calendar reminders. We even have a, a little Excel sheet that we print every week, and it goes on a clipboard, and that goes under our skylight calendar thing that's got all of our calendars and our kids' to-do lists and their chore charts and all that, so that we are that intentional. You know? And none of this is difficult to set up. It just requires intentionality. It just requires saying, "I care enough about my marriage and my family and our future to take some time out of things like TV or movies or working even or scrolling Facebook." I mean, in the time, I think, this is not a clinical stat. We'll say this is anecdotal at best. I think the time it takes the av the, the a the amount of time the average person scrolls on social media for probably two days could be used to conduct a planning meeting in their marriage that would literally level, level up their marriage 10 times.

So, so if you're the type of person who wants to co-create more and feel like you're on the same page, you're staying on the same page, you're not roommates, you feel like actual partners in life doing a quarterly family and business check-in planning meeting is great. And you can even spice it up. You could go get a hotel for a night and do it there. You could go to a nice restaurant and, and set up, you know, your laptops and some paper and do your meeting there. And, and we have lots of couples in our program that use this methodology that, you know, they'll be off, again, at a restaurant, or they'll go get a hotel or make it a little vacation weekend and just plan out the next quarter.

Rachel: Yeah. It's exciting and fun.

Austin: Yeah. So, the big four things, guys. Number one, shared values and vision. Number two, agreements. Number three, daily check-ins. And then number four, quarterly family and business planning meetings. You do those four things, any of those four things, and we promise you, you're gonna start to experience all the benefits we talked about earlier in the episode, and you're gonna really begin to understand what it means to embody this idea of co-creating life together.

Rachel: Mm-hmm. Yes. So that leads us to our nonprofit shout-out.

Austin: Whoo.

Rachel: We're excited about this one. It is called Garments of Praise. It is, run by our very own Joe and John Higginbotham, who are members in our CCM program. We absolutely love them. They're phenomenal people. So they met after, this couple met after they both were running nonprofits. So we've talked about God's Bucket Brigade before. And that's been our nonprofit shout-out. That is John Higginbotham's nonprofit.

Austin: Talk about a power couple. I mean, a power couple doing amazing things for the kingdom of God. They both own and run big nonprofit, big Christian nonprofits together. For the homeless.

Rachel: Yes. Both

Austin: Both are homeless-oriented

Rachel: Both themed on homeless. So- God is so cool. He's so, so gracious to us to paint such a really cool love story in this way. So Joe Higginbotham, it's Garments of Praise. The website is is613.com, referencing the scripture about garments of praise. And the link will be linked in the bio. We would encourage you to join us in donating even just $5 to 50,000, whatever you're feeling like today to Garments of Praise. They take new clothing. They have connections with, different clothing companies, and they get heavily discounted new clothing that they give and source to homeless people. It is so special, so phenomenal. Go online and read about what they're doing and drop five bucks. Or more.

Austin: Yeah. That's right. So our big action item for you today, other than going over to is613.com and dropping some change, some big change, big dollars. We know all you guys are ballers out there, so go give some money, man. This is going to a great place. But our big action item for you is to take one of the four things that we shared with you guys today and apply it. Just take one of the four and just s make an agreement that you're gonna apply this to your marriage. Apply it over one, two, three, four, five weeks, and then see how it benefits you. And if it benefits you, commit to do it again. Make an agreement to do it again together. So don't just listen to this and let it go in one out, in one ear and out the other ear. Actually do something with it because we promise you guys, this stuff works. Not just because we validated that in our own marriage but in lots of marriages of people just like you all across the country.

So thank you for watching this episode today. We, we ask that you give it a like, a comment, a thumbs up, a heart, a smiley face.

Rachel: A share.

Austin: A share. whatever platform that you're on. maybe you're on Xanga. I don't know. Wherever you're out at

Rachel: I wish

Austin: And out there. I know, right? If you had a Xanga, drop that bad boy in the comments. Man, that would be epic.

Rachel: I wish I could find my Xanga. It would be so revealing.

Austin: I still have a Xanga. No one look for it. It's crazy. I think I have a Xanga still.

Rachel: I need to find it.

Austin: I think there's one out there. But anyways, guys, we love you. Thank you for watching, listening to this episode. Again, drop a like, a comment. We really appreciate that. And please share this with other married couples that you know because we are doing everything that we can to spread the, mission of being a conscious Christian and having a conscious Christian marriage because we really believe it will change your life and the lives of all the people that know you, and it will advance the kingdom of God. So thanks for watching, and we'll see you on the next one.