This Week’s Quick Hits: 

This Week’s Quote:

Babe Ruth is considered to be the best baseball player of all time. He posted Hall of Fame-caliber numbers in his first five seasons with the Boston Red Sox (981 OPS, 190 OPS+). Then, on Dec. 26, 1919, Red Sox owner Harry Frazee traded Babe Ruth to the New York Yankees for $100,000 cash. The Babe had so many great quotes that I could not settle on one.  

Here are my four favorites:

• “Every strike brings me closer to the next home run.”

• “It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up.”

• “Never let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game.”

• “Yesterday’s home runs don’t win today’s games.”

Random Music Trivia:

1. A very famous singer was John Lennon’s hero, but John was disappointed when they finally met. Name the singer.

2. What is the name of the rapper guest featured in Justin Bieber’s “Baby”?

3. What is the name of the band who wrote the song that inspired Lady GaGa’s stage name?

4. Which spokesperson for CoverGirl Cosmetics has her own line of cosmetics called “The Queen Collection?”

5. What was Willie Nelson’s job before becoming a famous country & western singer?

Did You Know?:

Only 18 out of 1 million Lego pieces are defective.    

The molds at the manufacturing plant at Lego are so precise and effective that just 18 out of 1 million are found to be defective. That's out of the 20 billion pieces that are manufactured every year! 

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Damon Sumner discusses millennial marriages with Dr. Kim

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Awesome Marriage This Week: 

AM Podcast: Break Away From Criticism & Grow in Appreciation | With Special Guests the Manns | Ep. 519

John Mann and his wife, Ana, are co-authors of “The Go Giver Marriage,” a marriage parable containing five practical steps toward lasting love. Today they join me me to talk about becoming a giver in your marriage. 

AM YouTube Channel: Simple, Practical Ways to Know Your Spouse Better

Most of the couples that I talk to say that at one time in their marriage they really knew each other well or were at least on the right track to deepening their knowledge of each other. Then they quit growing together. It probably doesn’t happen all at once but gradually and one day they no longer recognize the touch point opportunities in front of them. Join me in this week's video as I talk about the importance of daily touch points with your spouse.

Sneak Preview: https://youtu.be/zvLXZiJdcHs

AM YouVersion Plan: Growing Your Marriage While Your Spouse Is Away

Many couples today face times of being apart. It may be work related, a deployment, or some other reason.  Are there opportunities to invest in and protect your marriage during these times? In this 6-day plan, Awesome Marriage Care Director and my Personal Assistant Tiffany Miller discuss ways to be on guard and fight for your marriage when your spouse is away.

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Dr. Kim’s Insights:

How Our Thoughts Affect Our Marriage

What is the number one thing you are thinking about today? How about yesterday? Would you say most of your thoughts are positive or negative? What is your first thought if I asked what you think about yourself? 

Do you ever feel stuck in your thinking? Maybe there are negative thoughts that you just cannot seem to shake. How do they affect you? How do they affect those around you? Our thoughts have much more power than we like to give them credit for. They affect our choices and our decisions. 

So how do our thoughts affect our marriage? There have been times in our marriage when my thoughts towards Nancy have not been what they need to be. If I am frustrated with her or if I get angry, my thoughts can focus on those feelings and as a result, I can see her in a negative light. I can see her as my adversary instead of my advocate. I can let those thoughts cover up the good things I know to be true about her. Don’t get me wrong here, I am not saying we will never be angry or frustrated with our spouse. But how far do we take that? Do those thoughts snuff out the positive truths about our spouse? 

We are human and in our humanness we sin. We get upset. We become selfish. The key is not to get stuck there. Go back to my initial questions. If you are upset with your spouse, what are you thinking about them? How long have your thoughts about your spouse been negative? Are you stuck in a pattern of thinking negative thoughts about your spouse? Have you lost hope?

The good news is that we can change our thinking. We can ask God to help us see our spouse through His eyes. When we have negative thoughts, we can hand them off to Him. God can literally help us change our thinking. We just have to invite Him into our minds. 

In Paul’s letter to the Phillipians he gives us a template to lay over our thinking. He says to think about what is true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, commendable, excellent, and worthy of praise. Your spouse is the person you chose to do life with. Your spouse is a gift from God. If you are not thinking about them that way, what needs to change? What steps can you take today?

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Next Steps: 

• Write out the things you have been thinking about the past two days.

• Write out the things you have been thinking about your spouse.

• Do your thoughts in general and about your spouse follow Paul’s guidelines?

• What is your first step to change your thinking? 

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Random Music Trivia Answers

1. Elvis Presley 

2. Ludacris

3. Queen

4. Queen Latifa

5. Bible Salesman

This Week’s Quick Hits: 

This Week’s Quote:

Ed Sheeran is an English singer-songwriter who was born in Halifax, West Yorkshire. Now 31, Ed began writing songs at age 11. He has received many awards including 2016 Grammys for Song of the Year and Best Pop Solo Performance.

“A tongue has no bones, but it can break a heart.” – Ed Sheeran

Quirky Sports Trivia:

See how you do with these seldom asked Sports Trivia Questions:

1. Which US superstar said, “I’ve never lost a game, I just ran out of time?”     

2. Which sport has a finishing line that isn’t crossed?         

3. Mark Twain is commonly said to have described what sport as “A good walk, spoiled”?               

4. Fill in the blank: Gary Player once said, “the harder I practice, the ….. I get.”         

5. Where was it, in 1971, that Alan B. Shepard’s golf shot went for “miles and miles and miles”?  

Did You Know?

Did you know there’s a toilet museum?

The Sulabh International Museum Of Toilets in New Delhi, features a rare collection that details the historic evolution of toilets from 2,500 BC all the way up to the present day. When you browse through the exhibit, you’ll learn about the plumbing system of ancient societies, marvel at the elaborately decorated toilets of 18th and 19th-century Europe, and even get to sit upon one from Austria that is shaped like a lion!

If you are encouraged by this clip, then you will love the Online Men’s Retreat. Use discount code DRKIM10.

Awesome Marriage This Week: 

AM Podcast: How To Deal With Being Unequally Yoked

We get a lot of audience questions about this topic. What does it mean to be “unequally yoked”? Are there healthy ways of dealing with it? Join Lindsay and me as we discuss this relevant topic. ​Here is a sneak preview.

AM YouTube Channel: Get To Know Your Spouse Better Today Than You Did Before

What happens in you, your spouse, and your marriage when you continue to pursue your spouse day after day after day?

AM YouVersion Plan: Marriage On The Edge

Awesome Marriage’s YouVersion plans have been downloaded over 2 Million times! For the past month our top plan has been “Marriage On The Edge.” Over the past two years, most marriages have struggled in one way or the other. Join me in this seven-day plan as we look for answers and hope in moving your marriage from where it is today to solid ground tomorrow.

Dr. Kim’s Insights:

How would you answer these crucial questions?

• What are your core values? The values you base your decisions on.

• What do you think about God? Is He loving or angry? Is He close or distant? Does He understand you?

• What is the purpose of your life? Is there a divine plan for your life made by a God who loves you, or are you left alone to figure everything out?

• What exactly is ”truth''? The world gives us many different answers to this question. How do you define it?

Your answers to these questions determine what you do, what you think about, what you say, and in many ways, how you feel. Join me this week in spending some time thinking through these questions. I think our answers are the difference between a vital, healthy, productive life and one of emptiness. 

Here are my suggestions as we think through this. First, write your answers down. For me, writing helps me to process and gain clarity. Second, consider the words of Paul in his letter to the church in Collossia a couple thousand years ago: 

“So if you’re serious about living this new resurrection life with Christ, act like it. Pursue the things over which Christ presides. Don’t shuffle along, eyes to the ground, absorbed with the things right in front of you. Look up, and be alert to what is going on around Christ - that's where the action is. See things from His perspective.”  Colossians 3:1-2 The Message

Email me at drkim@awesomemarriage.com and share your experience with me!

Next Steps: 

• Get a pen and paper and go to a quiet place and ask God to guide you as you answer the questions.

• What have you learned?

• What is God leading you to do?

Quirky Sports Trivia Answers

1. Michael Jordan

2. Swimming

3. Golf

4. Luckier

5. The Moon

This Week’s Quick Hits: 

This Week’s Quote:

Gayle Forman is an American young adult fiction author, best known for her novel If I Stay, which topped the New York Times best sellers list for Young Adult Fiction and was made into a film of the same name. Love this quote from her novel “I Was Here.”

“Forgiveness: It's a miracle drug. It's God's miracle drug.”

Summer Movie Trivia

I love summer movies and so does Nancy. Sometimes we go on a date night. Sometimes on a hot summer afternoon. Sometimes we stream one at home. See how many of these you can answer!

1. Which actor has made the most appearances in the 100 top grossing movies of all time with nine of them being summer hits?

2. Unused film footage from summer hits “Top Gun” and “The Hunt for Red October” have been used in what NBC drama series?

3. Summer film franchises have in general not fared well at the Oscars. What franchise has the most Oscars with seven?

4. Which actor turned down the role of Indiana Jones?

5. Which actor turned down the role of Han Solo?

Did You Know

• Stephen Spielberg’s crew bought every snake they could find in the pet stores of South England for the Well of Souls sequence in Raiders of the Lost Ark. When these were not nearly enough to achieve the effect the director was seeking, lengths of hose were cut to simulate more snakes.

Awesome Marriage This Week: 

AM Podcast: In Law Issues Episode 517

When you married your spouse, you also married into their family. In laws can be a real blessing, but that’s not always the case. So how can we make the best of this relationship? Do we need to set boundaries or give grace? Join Lindsay and me as we unpack this very relevant topic.

AM YouTube Channel: Get to Know Your Spouse Better Today Than You Did Before

Think about this. If you spent 10 minutes a day getting to know your spouse better, would your marriage improve? What are you missing by not getting to know your spouse better? Click on the link for this week's vlog.  

AM YouVersion Plan: Celebrating Differences in Marriage

Tiffany Miller is the Care Director for Awesome Marriage and my Personal Administrative Assistant. In this amazing plan, Tiffany helps you apply scripture as a means to celebrate the differences between you and your spouse. 

Dr. Kim’s Insights: 

What’s the truth About Social Media?

I am an optimist. For the most part that is a good thing, but the negative side of being an optimist occurs when I see the good in something and those that I am talking to see only the bad. Those conversations do not always turn out well. 

With that in mind, I want to take a look at social media. The optimist in me loves social media.  Awesome Marriage uses social media to reach hundreds of thousands of people around the world with God’s plan for marriage. It allows us to bring content to places we would otherwise have absolutely no way of getting in. 

When a TikTok video where I slap out pornography gets over a million views, it gets people’s attention. This was an interesting video because some people defended porn while others liked our message of what it can do to a marriage. People engaged over the topic, and that’s what we were hoping for. Then there was the video tribute to Lion King where Nancy rubbed lipstick on my forehead. We were able to show a fun side of marriage and over 500,000 people engaged with the video. 

People argue over the good and bad of every social media platform. Parents are scared for their kids to use social media. Which platform is okay? Are any of them okay? Some people use social media for bullying while others use it to see how few clothes they can get away with wearing in a video. 

I could go on and on, but what I really want this week are your thoughts. How do you view social media? Send your comments directly to me at drkim@awesomemarriage.com.

“Social media is portrayed by many as the root of society’s problems but in reality, social media  serves to amplify problems that are already present.” - Author Unknown

Next Steps: 

• How has social media affected your life?

• What do you see as some of the problems in our culture that social media has amplified?

Summer Movie Trivia Answers

1. Harrison Ford

2. Jag

3. Star Wars

4. Tom Selleck

5. Burt Reynolds