Mismatched Priority

CORE PRACTICE #25: Recognize that differing expectations are inevitable given different upbringings.

You will decide on a matter, and it will be established for you, and light will shine on your ways. —Job 22:28, ESV

TONY

Growing up in a small town, Jackson, Michigan, my childhood was filled with sports. Baseball, basketball, football—I wanted to try pretty much anything that involved a ball and a score. While I played on organized league teams, I was always ready to join any game that might break out in the neighborhood or at school. Many nights in high school I would ride with friends to Lansing, Ann Arbor, Romulus—anywhere within driving distance, and we’d play basketball under the lights into the evening.

Finally, after high school I cut my serious pursuit of sports down to two: football and basketball. I played both as a freshman at the University of Minnesota. When I wasn’t in class, my time was spent doing homework, being at practice, and working out on my own. After graduating, I was blessed to be able to play professional football.

By the time we met, Lauren’s experiences during high school and college couldn’t have been more different. As a teenager, she spent most of her time outside of class working. In the summers, when I would have been playing three or four sports and barely coming home to eat, she shared a paper route with her brothers and worked at local restaurants and department stores in Pittsburgh. That continued after high school graduation. While I was playing sports at Minnesota, she was at Duquesne University, literally working her way through college.

My parents wanted me to work hard, to be sure. However, they encouraged me to follow my passion in athletics, believing I could learn many important life lessons through those sports. Lauren’s parents, on the other hand, had an entrepreneurial bent, and they believed their children would learn life lessons and skills most effectively through employment.

Of course, Lauren and I didn’t realize how intrinsic those differences were when we were standing at the altar on our wedding day. We didn’t really understand that we were bringing entirely different life experiences, family and sibling dynamics, and expectations into the marriage. Yet such differences are inevitable when two families are merging into one.

One reason that Lauren and I advocate premarital counseling so strongly is that it can help couples understand the need to recognize and resolve issues like this one. Sometimes just being aware of the different perspectives two people bring into marriage is all that’s really needed.

When we got married, Lauren and I didn’t magically have all the answers about whether our children should work, play sports, or do both. In fact, we didn’t even realize that sports vs. work was a question until much later when our children were older. Lauren thought the answers were obvious.

So did I.

Deciding what activities to encourage our kids to pursue turned out to be yet another situation where communication between us was critical. We’d already established routines that allowed us to talk regularly, so we were able to talk through these issues. Communicating helped us understand each other’s point of view, and we reached a place of compromise so we could help our children pursue their passions while learning life’s lessons in a way that made sense to both of us.

Adventure Application: Take a few minutes to discuss what activities or values were emphasized in your home growing up. Has that resulted in any expectations for your own family? If so, does that concern either of you?