Create Healthy Relationships in Your Grit and Grace Life

5 Ways to Make Adult Friends in the Lonely Age of Social Media

By Caroline Beidler / Relationships, Featured Article

As I scroll through my list of friend requests on social media, I usually ask myself the same questions: if my life was falling apart, could I call on this person? Would they drop everything and be over in a few minutes with a tasty meal or a listening ear or to watch my kids quick while I scream into a pillow? And the answer is almost always “no.” Today, I am “friends” with thousands of people, but I’ve never felt more alone. Why Is It So Easy to Make Friends as a Kid? When I was five years old and regularly wore a pink tutu or my beloved red cowgirl boots and pigtails, I met my soulmate. Her name was Crystal. […]

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This Is What I Learned About People Who Ghost You

By Carla Howatt / Featured, Relationships

Remember in high school when your life revolved around your friends? Oh, the drama! Who was talking to whom, who was crushing on which guy, who was talking behind someone else’s back? After all, we had nothing else to keep us occupied; no jobs, no kids, no husbands. In a lot of ways, it was a relief when we moved past that part of our life. When you become an adult, your relationships change. They become deeper, richer, and often more authentic. As adults, we can support each other through the dark valleys of life and celebrate the times we are at the top of the mountain. Over the years and throughout the stages of a woman’s life, friendships bring an intense

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Why It’s So Important to Have a Mentor and to Be One Too

By Megan Miller / Relationships

For 12 years (or more) we are taught. Being enrolled in school gives us structure and a guidebook to living. We are given this safe bubble of trial-and-error in playtime, classes, and teams. Then we graduate with no syllabus or bell to tell us our next move. Post-grad life is scary, post-wedding life is terrifying, and post-pregnancy life is foreign. We go through all of these life-changes without a compass. Years ago the word mentor meant nothing to me. I didn’t need someone telling me what to do. Nor did I have the patience to coach someone up to lead a life they loved. “You do you, and I’m going to do me,” was a mantra of mine. Until I had no

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Is Marriage Just a Piece of Paper? Or Is It Something More?

By Darlene Brock / Relationships

It appears a lot of women are waiting for their man to propose. They have been a couple for a while, and she finds herself wondering where their relationship is going. Is what they have enough? Their dating relationship, which started as an exhilarating sprint, has turned into a 100K marathon, one where the finish line never appears. Many men today are simply not getting down on that knee (or however you envision it) and asking the all-important question: “Will you marry me?” While I watch the single women around me who are dating and wondering about their future, I know this extends far outside of the world in which I reside. Further evidence comes from this very website, Grit and Grace.

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9 Qualities You Need in a Good Friend

By Ashley Johnson / Relationships

A few years ago I drove upstate to visit my best friend from college because she just had her first baby. At the time, I couldn’t help but ponder the milestones we’ve shared: graduations, weddings, fur-babies, careers, buying and selling homes, and now…motherhood! Our friendship has felt pretty special from the start, so it got me thinking about what it is that makes our relationship so life-giving… 9 Qualities That Make a Good Friend: 1. Someone who helps carry your load, but doesn’t make you feel like a burden. 2. Someone who knows your worst, but only sees your best. 3. Someone who never makes you feel small, no matter how big they are. 4. Someone who doesn’t flaunt, especially when they

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You, Your Man, and His Baby Mama All Need Grit and Grace

By Dr. Zoe / Relationships

So your man is a pretty wonderful guy. Things are going so well. You might have even married him. What in the world could mess this up? Oh, the mother of his kids! Baby mama drama began with the start of civilization—think Abraham from the Bible. Sparks were going off between Sarah (his wife) and Hagar (baby mama). Abraham couldn’t deal with the drama and finally shipped Hagar off with their child—never to be seen again. Even if that is your fantasy, it isn’t going to happen—nor should it. The modern reality is that almost half (46%) of marriages involve a step-parent situation.1 When your relationship first started, dreams of the Brady Bunch may have been circling in your head. But reality

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5 Tips for Mending Fences in Your Relationships

By Darlene Brock / Relationships

It’s a great time to begin mending fences. Not the ones in the back 40 of the ranch where very few of us currently live; I’m talking about the fences that require repair between us. We all experience damaged or broken relationships. Admittedly, some relationships are beyond repair, but most of the time, that’s not the case. So ask yourself, do you really want to be 90 years old, comfortable in your lift chair, and remember a relationship you once had? Pondering the friend you lost because of anger over something you can no longer recall? The sibling rivalry you never outgrew? Or the parent you walked away from? Probably not. So, how do you manage this repair process before the knees give

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To the Woman Whose Husband Is Married to His Job

By Meaghan Dawson / Relationships

I see you over there, sitting in the audience filled with families—moms and dads, grandparents and children. I see you juggling your toddler, holding your baby, and trying with all of your might to get a good video of your kindergartener on stage in his first-ever school play. I see you there. Alone. I see you at t-ball games and ballet drop-off, every time, just you. I see you making dinner in shifts, keeping a plate warm with tin foil as you eat with the kids, because you know he’ll be hungry when he comes home. I see you doing bath time, story time, breakfast, and middle of the night feedings by yourself. All alone. I see you feeling so lonely you

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How to Know When It’s Time for a Friendship to End

By Ashley Vancil / Relationships

We spend our lives learning how to make friends. In early childhood we learn to share and play nice. We introduce ourselves, smile big, try to do the right things, and hope they like us. In school we strive to fit in, to establish and keep friends. We do things to be cool and impress others—sometimes at the cost of our personal beliefs and feelings. In life, we all want to find our people and have a tight-knit group. I have made new friends through all phases of my life: as a child and young adult, at college, in my married life (and in my divorced life), in motherhood, in small groups at church, at work and at various events. I have

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Combat Loneliness with Connection—Tips from a Flight Attendant

By Kristen Bailey / Relationships

My first trip to Frankfurt as a flight attendant surprised me, an intrinsically valuable experience that taught me strategies for combatting loneliness both at home and abroad. I’d worked the flight overnight, finding myself in the German city for the first time. The rest of my crew was busy, leaving me alone for the day. This fine day in Europe, I learned that while loneliness is an epidemic in our modern era, it doesn’t have to be. Here are a few tricks I now regularly use no matter where I am in the world. 5 Tips to Avoid Loneliness 1. Talk to people. People are the greatest resource on the planet! I’d already started my “research” on the aircraft crossing the Atlantic.

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How to Survive a Party as an Introvert

By Ashley Johnson / Relationships

If you’re an introvert like me, you may not love parties. So, here are five simple tips to surviving the get-togethers that are sure to await us this season: 5 Steps to Survive a Party as an Introvert. 1. Bring a friend. If you’re an introvert, you’re probably familiar with this faithful crutch. 2. Make a friend. If you can’t bring a friend, make a friend! Just because we’re introverts, doesn’t mean we are unable to socialize. Most of us simply prefer small groups, or better yet, one-on-one conversations. So find a fellow wallflower and figure out what they’re passionate about. Once you discover a shared interest to discuss—you’re golden! 3. Take a break! Do you ever feel drained from smiling, nodding, and

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5 Ways to Love Your Single Life

By Darlene Brock / Relationships

So a large majority of your friends are married, and you are not. Do you celebrate because you dodged the bullet, or do you pine because you hate being alone? Do you dread the next plus-one event, or do you land at the door ready to have a good time, with or without that extra human by your side? Simply, do you love your single life? Being single is neither a malady nor a deficiency; it’s just a place in life. And it can be a really good place. Here is how to make sure that it is. 5 Ways to Love Your Single Life 1. Don’t wait for life; live life. Remove the sentence, “I will (move, travel, buy a house,

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How to Become Friends with Your Neighbors

By Twyla Franz / Relationships

It’s one thing to dream of neighbors gathering around your table when you have ample, decorated space, freshly cleaned bathrooms, and kids who keep their toys in their rooms and their crumbs on their plates. It’s a different kind of story when you’re renting a humble home with upside-down outlets. Unforgiving, flat-painted walls. Nicked linoleum. Then the dream gets turned round and round in your heart as you ask, “Why?” and “When?” and “How?” But the best dreams don’t wait for us to be ready. They meet us in boring, over-tired, spilled cheerios, right-now moments. When we feel most inadequate. When we most need hope. That’s where our family’s dream started. It’s also where it began to collect dust. If I could

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My Independence Day—Choosing Between My Self-Worth and His Selfishness

My Independence Day—Choosing Between His Selfishness and My Self-Worth

By Jill Littig / Relationships

When I stormed out of Jimmy’s apartment, mid-dinner on the Fourth of July, I left the peach and raspberry pie I had made behind. We’d spent the morning apart. I stayed at my apartment baking and thought he was sleeping late at his. Instead, he went water skiing with a mutual friend. I loved water skiing, and he knew it. I’d Gotten Used to His Selfishness at the Cost of My Self-Worth His ability to push me aside started to feel like a natural reflex. The missing sensitivity in him was made up by his family, so it took me a while to realize he was truly a jerk. There on his balcony, mid-bite into my hamburger, he bragged about his morning.

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Marriage Advice That Will Change Things More Than You Think…

By Ashby Duval / Faith, Relationships

A wise friend once told me that before you get married, ask all the couples in your life whom you respect and have a marriage worth emulating what their best marriage advice to you would be. I thought this was quite brilliant, and I spent the months leading up to my wedding doing just that. My favorite words of wisdom came from my mother-in-law, Pam, who has been happily married for 40 years and who is involved in marriage ministry. She told me four simple words: “Weed your own garden.” Needing some elaboration, I asked her to explain. She said one of the biggest mistakes you can make in your marriage is to constantly focus on what is wrong with your spouse, on their

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You, Your Man, and His Baby Mama All Need Grit and Grace

By Dr. Zoe / Relationships

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How to Make Your Man Feel Like a Great Father

By Ashby Duval / Relationships

Good or bad, how people speak to you or act around you often does have an influence on how we think about ourselves. The greater the importance of that person to you, the greater the influence. In the delicate dance of parenting, our words and actions with one another have a greater power than we think to build up or tear down. A sideways glance or condescending tone can be detrimental to our confidence as a person and especially as a parent. Often I don’t think it’s our intention to tear one another down, but because men and women can be so inherently different in their parenting styles (and life in general!), we tend to attack those differences rather then learn from them and

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