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Look What You Made Me Do — Stop Reactionary Living in Marriage · Doing Marriage Well

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  Doing Marriage Well for May 11, 2026 Look what you made me do.
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  Reactionary living stalls your marriage. One of my Twitter and Facebook postings
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  recently said, How you treat your spouse is a choice.
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  Letting their actions change how you treat them is also a choice.
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  This week I want to talk about the reasons we make poor choices in our marriages,
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  starting with blaming our spouse.
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  Look what you made me do. Look what you just made me do. Might be a catchy lyric,
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  but it's not doing marriage well.
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  I realize it's difficult to do what's right when your spouse isn't doing what's
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  right. It's hard to give when you're not receiving.
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  You struggle to do things that would be easy or automatic if they were doing what they should.
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  This isn't just about the big emotional moments. It shows up in the mundane daily grind, too.
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  That virtuous cycle is great, but God expects us to do what's right,
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  even when we're the only one doing that.
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  This advice applies to what we should do emotionally and relationally,
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  as well as what each of us should be doing to make the home run more smoothly.
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  It's easy to tell ourselves we do more than our share Maybe we do,
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  maybe we don't And regardless,
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  it's likely our spouse feels they do more than their share And so we are stuck,
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  each waiting on the other The mature thing to do, and also the Christ-like thing
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  to do, is to go first Figure out what you would be doing if your spouse were
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  doing their part And do that,
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  regardless of what your spouse does or does not do.
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  If we're talking about what needs to be done around the home,
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  this does not mean you do what your spouse should be doing.
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  Do your part and let the rest go if at all possible. Or do the minimum that
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  needs to be done if it's critical or it drives you crazy.
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  I know you're wondering how long you should let your spouse not do their part.
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  Or even how long you can live with that, especially if what they're failing at is more emotional.
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  It's a valid question. The short answer is you need to have a difficult conversation
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  before you're done, before you burn out and don't care anymore.
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  Doing your part consistently puts you in a better place to confront your spouse
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  about what they're failing to do.
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  If you do confront, don't make a big deal about what you're doing.
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  And don't threaten to stop doing what you're doing.
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  Make it about them and what you feel they should be doing.
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  This is Paul, and I choose to do marriage well.