Family Meeting: Our weekly Post-Sabbath routine
Every week, we have a family meeting. We do this to wrap up our Sabbath each week (Check out our Sabbath series starting here). I know what you’re probably thinking right now, “A weekly meeting? How romantic!” It may not sound like the most glamorous thing in our marriage, but a family meeting has transformed our relationship.
The absurdity of a family meeting
In our culture we tend to put such a high priority on work and business relationships. A third of our day is spent on the job where we are given certain tasks, goals and a mission. These keep us employed, and foster bonds with the people around us. They help us maintain a sense of community, because at work, we are all focused on a common goal.
Beyond that, the focus we form at work frequently spills over beyond the 9 to 5. Oftentimes, we will drop everything for a business dinner with a potential new client. Weeks of work will go into the quarterly and yearly planning meetings at our job. To-do lists, goals, and structure tend to dictate how we spend our 9-5 and beyond each day.
However, when it comes to our marriages and families, we tend to just go with the flow.
We recently started to realize that more effort and preparation was going into our jobs than our most important relationship – our marriage.
Putting the focus where it belongs
At the start of the year, we started implementing more strategy and planning into our marriage. Now I know, it sounds super lame and SO not romantic, but it truly has transformed our relationship.
At our weekly meetings, our first task is to make sure our week centers around our priorities. This means sabbath, date night, and other things get on the calendar before other things can take over that time. Next, we discuss the schedule for the week, what needs to get done, we assign responsibilities and look over the budget. We look over our quarterly and yearly meeting agendas as well (more on that later). All in all, we start the week on the same page.
We’ve created a template for our weekly meeting that keeps our meeting efficient, on track, and can help YOU as you implement a family meeting too! You can find it here!
What a family meeting can do in a marriage
We’ve cut down on the arguments about what needs to get done and who is responsible for what. We accomplish so much more while actually having MORE time to dedicate to our relationship.
Yes, our marriage is run more like a business, but is flourishing and our love is stronger than ever because of it!
We’d love for you to join in the discussion with us over on instagram or our Facebook community!