Nightly Check-In

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Nightly Check-In / Training & Guidelines

• Why Nightly Check-In? What is it?

• Guidelines

• Step by Step

Are you ready? Here it is!

• Part 1 - Conversation Questions

• Part 2 Making Requests (Issues Management)

• U.S.A, Requests

Extras (Super Cool Add-Ins to consider)

• Clarification, Affirmation &/or Rehearsal

• Couple Care

• Duncan’s Sway

• Assurance Ritual

• Nice Matters

• Family Check-In

• Stream of Consciousness

Helpful Notes

• It’s part of getting to know each other and becoming “soul mates” (as Mort Fertel puts it). In general, 85% of your attention goes to this wonderful journey of becoming one- fully knowing, accepting and loving each other!
  

• It’s a forum for gentle, loving, consistent, Issues management. As needed, ideally 15% or less of your attention goes to respectfully guiding each other through differences and issues. As Stephen Covey and Mort Fertel both point out, this 15% goes 100% better with a commitment to the 85% (building your friendship).
  

• NOTE: Don't get overwhelmed by this page!  Use as inspired. Anything is better than nothing. Do whatever you both feel good about.  Everything on this page can be done in as little time 5 to 10 minutes- Longer, of course, is much better. 

1) Nightly Check-In can be sweet and simple or more! It's up to you. But knowing how it should look for you (i.e. 2 minutes a night, or, 30 minutes a night etc.) requires understanding possibilities listed below. You can refine how it looks for you as you go, adapting any of this for your own rituals or preferences.

2) Until you actually start enjoying Nightly Check-In, start each walk (or visit) with “I’m thankful we're doing this” even if you’re not. Believe it or not, this helps. 😁

3) Ideally, Nightly Check-In is best done on a walk, at least 10 minutes a night.  Worse case scenario, you can do the entire process (everything on this page) in as little as 5 to 10 minutes, while making herbal tea together or getting ready for bed.

Optional Couple Care and/or Extra Reading is best done in a secluded room in your home.  

Nightly Check-In / Table of Contents

Part 1) Conversation

a) Share, back and forth on whatever conversation questions you’d like i.e. “So what was the best part of your day?”

b) After spouse answers, you could offer some validation (i.e. “Wow, that’s cool!” or "Interesting!”, or “Tell me more about _______ etc.), then you share on the same question i.e. “The best part of my day was ______”).

c) Ask another question, or share your answer to another question i.e. “What did you learn today” or “What I learned today was________. How about you, what did you learn?” etc. (with any questions you feel to share or ask).

Note that any of these questions could spawn different streams of chit-chat.
The point of the questions is that it’s easy to gravitate to issues, upcoming obligations, scheduling, complaints etc. The questions below are to guide you to dedicated chit-chat at least 5 nights a week. You may only need 1 or 2 questions. Sometimes none if you’ve already got stuff you want to and chat about. Note: I’ve been married to Narelle for many years and I still the questions below all the time.

Part 2) Making Requests

Take turns choosing a. b. or c.

a) I don’t have any requests tonight.

b) I have a request I’d like to make of myself, or

c) (after your Relationship Cleanse) "I have a request I'd like to make. Would that be O.K.?" 

Nightly Check-In / Table of Contents

Nightly Check-in

Note: If you are doing a relationship cleanse steer clear of all issues, implications, disappointments, grievances etc. We’ll get to that in our meetings and after your cleanse. Some of these question are obviously potentially loaded. Do your best to turn them into honest conversations about your inner world and away from your relationship.

1) What was the best part of the day? or

2) What went well for you today (what worked for you) - how and/or why? or

3) What didn’t go well for you today or what do you wish you would have done differently?

4) What did you learn today? ...or, did you have any break-throughs?  

5) What’s something you’re grateful for, appreciate, or like about me, yourself or anything?

6) What’s something you’ve been thinking about today and why? (This can’t be a marriage issue)…or,

7) What have you been feeling lately? (this is about you, not our relationship) or,

8) How did you choose fear today (competition, overwhelm, pride, rightness, scarcity, apathy, defensiveness, avoidance etc.) and what did you learn from this?

9) How did you choose love today and what did you learn from this? (service, giving your full attention, complimenting someone etc.)

10) What’s one of your biggest challenges right now and what are you learning from this? (This can’t be about us).

11) What’s one or 2 things missing from your life right now and what do you think you might be willing to do about it?

12) What are you not seeing about how God is trying to bless you and how you might be blocking Him?

13) What’s your vision?

14) What’s one of your favorite things?

15) What is something you are proud of, with yourself or with me?

16) What's been working well, or going well lately in our family or with us?

17) How did you unnecessarily judge someone or something today?

18) Who needs you right now and how? (family, work, church, neighborhood, country, world)

19) How did something turn out to be different than you thought?

20) Who inspired you today, and how? (or who did you inspire and how)

21) What’s one hard thing you’ve done lately, and you’re glad you did it? 

Nightly Check-In / Table of Contents

Either spouse starts by choosing a, b or c, below. 

Option a) “I don't have any requests for tonight”  
There may actually be something bugging you right now, but you’ve decided to keep this issue and request on your Request List a little longer and work through some of your upset before bring it up. A great move. Or perhaps you’ve just decided to water the flowers tonight- not the weeds and to just let it go (whatever it is). Note: Picking this option (“no requests for tonight”) tends to increase your emotional bank account with your spouse. Choose this option as much as possible.

Option b) “I have a request for myself" 
Be careful in your response to your partner’s request of himself. Be encouraging, not critical. For instance, your spouse might say, "I have a request for myself tonight. My request is that I get up earlier and get more exercise before going to work.”  You could say something like "That sounds great!" But if your partner says "My request of myself is that I stop being such a whiner", you do not want to say "Boy, that's for sure."  Instead, just smile and be supportive. 

Option c) "I have a request I'd like to make. Would that be O.K.?" 
Make a U.S.A. request (see below). Provide background if needed, which it usually isn’t.

Unloaded - As close to zero upset, distrust, disappointment etc. as possible. You may need to do some breakthrough work.

Specific - Understandable, actionable, reasonable.

Affirmative - if possible, something you want your spouse to do vs. not do.

Example: “Would you be willing to spend 20 minutes or so playing soccer with kids after dinner a couple of times a week?” vs. “Would you please pay more attention to the kids. You don’t seem to care much about them.” 

Dr. John Gray’s secret sauce: Are you ready to find your way to your spouse’s heart, permanently? If this is a request you’ve made before, ask like it’s the first time (your tone of voice, phrasing, etc.) Your spouse will know that you know you’ve already requested this (perhaps several times), but hearing it from your lips, like it’s the first time is like violins playing in his or her ears (vs. “As I’ve mentioned a hundred times already, would you PLEASE __________” etc.).

Nightly Check-In / Table of Contents

Extra possibilities for Nightly Check-In. You may like some, none, or all of them! If there’s anything you do in your Nightly Check-In that you love (that isn’t here), we’d love to hear about it so we could list it below.

If your spouse makes a request, choose one or more of the following:

a) Request clarification  
Example: Spouse asks you to be more excited when you come home from work. You could ask, "Could you tell me more about how that would look for you?" and/or…

b) Affirmation
"Honey, I want to really get this. I’d love it if you could help me with an affirmation.” Spouse making the request suggests a brief affirmation i.e. “I love coming home at night to rejoice in my time with my beloved family, especially playing ball with the kids before dinner.” Spouse receiving requests then goes through the affirmation a few times (out loud). Getting help with an affirmation is the perfect combo with “c” below.

c) Rehearsal
"Honey, would you mind if we rehearsed this a bit?” etc.  Example: Request is, “Please do not yell at the kids, even if they are out of control.” Rehearsal could include an imaginary situation (with out-of-control kids) with you choosing to be patient, giving guidance, and/or calmly pursuing pre-agreed consequence.

This can be especially fun in combination with “b” (above) i.e. “I am a tower of peace and guide my family toward love and respect. I am lovingly carrying Tommy to his room for us to talk and/or for him to cool down.” Make sure you actually pretend to be lovingly carrying Tommy to his room. Nightly Check-In / Table of Contents

THE MAGIC OF Clarification, Affirmation and Rehearsal

Couples spend too much time nagging and not enough time training. The advantages of this “extra” are amazing:

1) In this “Extra” you tend to take the wind out of your spouse’s sales. He or she feels completely heard and validated and experiences your focus on the issue, hence, calming the need to lecture, or continue the “beatings until the morale improves.”

2) With the wind out of his or her sales you can both pay better attention to the actual issue and request, vs. the story or upset surrounding it, and finally…

3) With this extra attention (affirmation and rehearsal), the chances of this issue and request reemerging are greatly lessened.

Consider taking your nightly routine even further by adding uplifting content and/or Couple Care.

1) Uplifting content

In reading or listening to uplifting content, remember that whatever you read is for YOU, not your spouse.

In a relationships, it is satisfying to fully get to know each other. You can take this further, by getting to know God together. Talking about deeper spiritual feelings and experiences can draw you together in a unique and powerful way. Adding uplifting content (listening or reading) is key in this process.

Suggested reading or listening:
1) Sue Johnson’s Hold Me Tight (We strongly recommend purchasing this)
2) Bonds that Make Us Free (This is a classic)
3) Steven Furtick (See YouTube)
4) Joel Osteen (YouTube)
5) Tony Robins (He has amazing podcasts)
6) The New Testament (“The Message” Version)

Here’s the process: After or instead of Part 1 “chit-chat” and Part 2 “requests”, read or listen to spiritual content together. Pause from time to time and ask each other questions and/or share your impressions i.e. “what do you think of what he’s saying here?” or “The reason I love this is because _____” etc.

A friend of mine recently shared with me, “John my husband doesn’t like chit chat. He’s never been that kind of person, yet, our relationship is thriving by reading and talking about scriptures together. In fact, before I left for work this morning, he said to me, “There is such a look of love in your face Sandy. It is something I don’t think I would have recognized without my heart being softened by reading scriptures with you.”

2) Couple Care

“Couple Care” means taking turns giving back rubs, foot rubs, brushing hair, ticking back or arm etc.

You can do Couple Care with uplifting content (i.e. listening to an inspiring talk while giving back rubs etc.) or with nothing, just the couple care and no content. This would be done before, after, or during Nightly Check-In.

If you do opt for Couple Care, you may want to set a timer for 5 minutes, twice. While one reads and sort of conducts the conversation, the other gives him or her a foot rub, back rub, arm tickling, hair brushing etc.

Nightly Check-In - Table of Contents

Kirk and Kim Duncan suggest that if you've had a particularly tough day you may want to skip “Nightly Check-In” all together, or, supplement it with what they call the "Sway."  

”Sway” guidelines:
a) Pick a romantic song with a good slow-dance beat.  Dance should last 3 minutes. 

b) "Sway" (Hold each other and just sway back and forth like you were at a high school dance).

c) Look into each other's eyes, even if you've wanted to pour sour milk on each other 2 minutes earlier.  That's O.K. just force yourself to do it.  You don't have to smile.  You don't have to be cute or even romantic.  Just be present to each other's souls.  Perhaps even ask God to assist you in a "Guided Tour" during the dance ("Guided Tour" is explained at the Couples GPS 1-day training). 

d) Most important:  Don't talk!  Nothing.  Not one single word.  If in doubt, go back to #3.

An Assurance Ritual can be helpful in the aftermath of a crises of trust. I call it a “ritual” because the words you share are so important that you are willing to share them over and over, as part of your effort to give comfort. This can be done either weekly at Weekly Inventory or daily at Nightly Check-In.

Example of “Assurance Ritual”: “I’ve been 100% faithful to you this week (or “today”) and I have loved it and I love you.”

Daily self appraisal (“from 1 to, how nice was I?” - 10 being the most)

a) Decide in advance that one or both of you will include a “Nice Matters” self appraisal for the next ___ days. Note: Only one needs to do this.

b) During Nightly Check-In, each of you give yourself an appraisal, from 1 to 10 in the following areas:
- I give myself a ___ (1 to 10) with my fellow workers.
- I give myself a ___ (1 to 10) with my siblings and/or good friends.
- I give myself a ___ (1 to 10) with my kids.
- I give myself a ___ (1 to 10) with you.

c) Most important! Person sharing gets ZERO RESPONSE from person listening (verbally or non-verbally). This is your chance to support your spouses consciousness, not to criticize or even applaud. You’re just listening and holding space (as they say). Note that his or her self evaluation will often be very different than your evaluation of him or her. Unless you want all hell to break loose, you’d better pray that he or she isn’t reading your thoughts.

d) At the conclusion of first share, person listening, says simply “thanks for sharing that” and then (if also participating) gives his or her own self-appraisal.

NOTE: “Nice Matters” will increase your over all sense of how you are with people, but is particularly effective in giving you a better view of how you treat your spouse. This is achieved in in noting that what should be increasingly higher numbers (going down the above list), are often decreasingly lower numbers.

Chit chat can be anything from light stuff i.e. highlights of the day to deeper stuff i.e. fears you've been experiencing (not related to your relationship). If you’re going to share fears, conundrums, struggles etc. try to conclude what you share with your commitments- addressing who you really are and what you are going to do about it, even if it’s just “I know that God is able to show me a way out of this. I’m going to meditate on this. I know I can arrive on some solutions.”   This will a) keep you from cycling and b) keep your spouse from offering solutions, which usually isn't a good idea anyway, unless you're asking. 

Nightly Check-In Table of Contents

This is an option for Sunday or Monday evenings instead of , or in addition to couple check-in. This can be done in person (for younger families) or on a video call for empty nesters, or a combination of both. This meeting can be as short as 5 to 10 minutes or much longer, depending on your needs and/or preferences.

Instructions:
1) Reach out to family members and determine a time and how long you’d like to spend in this meeting (ideally), and how regularly i.e. once a week, 3 times a week, once a month etc.

2) Determine who will conduct the meetings. This can be the same person each time or you could rotate, or just decide once you’re together i.e. “O.K. who wants to conduct?”

3) Person conducting, welcomes everyone and kicks off the sharing! There are two basic options, and you could create others that work for you and your family:

Option a) Going around the circle,, each person shares the answer from one of the 10 questions, or any other fun get to know you question or share). Example: Colin may say, “The Breakthrough I had today was _______.” Lucy may say “One thing I learned to day was _______.”

Option b)  Person conducting goes around the circle and asks a Nightly Check-In Conversation question or two to each child, or to the whole group, letting anyone share who would like to share, including him or herself, as inspired.  

4) Whoever would like to shares an inspirational thought, story and/or quote or scripture and gives his or her perspective or feelings on this thought, quote or scripture. There can be as many shares along this line as you’d like and have set aside time for

5) Pray together. In today’s world, we really can’t pray enough.

Nightly Check-In / Table of Contents

Note 1) Conversation - Variations
a) Interviews
Instead of going back and forth (as show above) one person interviews the other all the way through (picking 1 to 5 Conversation Questions, then making a request (or not). Then, reverse the direction and the partner that was being interviewed, does the interviewing.

b) Guessing Game
Going through the 10 Conversation Questions, stop at ones that interest you and guess what the other’s answer might be i.e. “I’m guessing that the best part of your day was ____”

Note 2) Keep It Close to the Heart
During your Nightly Conversation, drifting to an interpersonal issue isn’t usually a good idea until you’ve built up strong reserves in each other’s Hearts. In any case, to insure a peaceful conversation, stay "close to the heart"- meaning, keep to your raw, inner experience.  Talk about yourself, not you partner.  

Example of the direction not to go:  Husband asks, "What's a breakthrough you had today?" Wife answers: "I've realized how much more affection I need."  Ideally, you of course wouldn't want to say this in a Nightly Check-In.  This is heavy enough that it would be better for a Love Seat or Peace-Talk. 

But if this kind of statement is made by someone, his or her spouse would not want to say, "Well, don't I give you enough hugs and kisses?  I've always thought you were very happy in that area.  It just doesn't matter how hard I try, does it" and so on.

Example of the right direction (pulling up the nose on a plane that's going down):  
Husband asks, "What's a breakthrough you had today?" Wife answers: "I've realized how much more affection I need."  Husband, after checking in on the level of his own emotional space (see Managing Incoming), could say "Tell more about what you're feeling” and/or  “I want to know more about what's going on about this with you" or something like that.  Wife then shares her inner world- not her disappointment with her husband.  You can work out an agreement on affection now or later, but at this point, listening (option 1 in Managing Incoming) is the focus. 

Back to the wife. Wife, if you do choose to address an interpersonal issue during Nightly Check-In, focus on your feelings, not your husbands poor performance i.e. "I think I've actually felt this my entire life. It's like I just want to be held all day or something. And I'm not sure if it's a physical thing, or emotional or what etc."  Husband continues to listen, reflect back what he's hearing and perhaps ask more questions that would lead him into a deeper understanding of his wife. 

Note 3) One of the purposes of Nightly Check-In is for smaller issues and the U.S.A. requests attending these issues.  For larger issues & touchy requests, use Love Seat. Use Peace Talk is for medium sized issues or for coming to agreements on differences.  

Note 4) After your Relationship Cleanse If you have a bigger issue that you don't think can wait until your Weekly inventory, you could give your spouse heads up sometime during the day to make sure he or she is alright with you doing it at Nightly Check-In.  

Note 5) Making of a request of yourself - option B in “Making Requests" (2nd part of Nightly Check-In) can be a game changer in your relationship. Go for this (option b in the ) as much as you sincerely can. Let’s dig deeper:

a) Receiving a request from your spouse (option 3), when emotional bank accounts are low, can make you feel not good enough or defensive. However, if you are willing to look at a current interpersonal issue from his or her perspective and get in touch with his or her needs and then make a request of yourself, you reduce the chances of your spouse needing to make a request of you.

b) Without the shame that can sometimes accompany receiving his or her request and with the initiative on this issue coming from you vs. him or her, you are building trust and opening up emotional space and positive energy necessary to do what you’ve requested of yourself. So now, you are coming through for your sweetheart verses defending yourself from the angst that sometimes attend his or her “request.” Beat him or her to the punch! Open up some space and start the race from your end, of who can come through for who first.

Note 6) Stream of Consciousness
It is important, even during Chit Chat to not cut each other off.  If someone's on a role (a “Stream of Consciousness”), let him or her go!  

Most important- If choose to share deep, honest feelings about your inner world, please assure your partner that there is absolutely no implication or blame toward him or her related to what you’re sharing.

As inspired, the partner listening may want to mirror and validate (i.e. “what I hear you saying is __________”) and/or ask authentically clarifying questions i.e. “tell me more about what you mean when you say ___________” or “I’m not sure what you mean when you say ___________” etc.) 

Note 7) Request for restitution can be an option for your "U.S.A." request after you have gotten through your Relationship Cleanse.  This is usually better at a weekly inventory in connection with deeper matters but can be worked in to a nightly check-in i.e. “Jim, this has been so frustrating to me, I feel like I need some restitution to open my heart a bit more. Is there anything you can think of?” If he or she needs some help, give ideas i.e. back rub, dinner at a great restaurant in the middle of the week, spa night etc.

Other Notes on Conversation (Chit-Chat) Questions:
**The "Fear" question.  Fully facing a way that we chose fear vs. love, seems to melt the fear. 
**The "Vision" question - Saying what we want or see for our life tends to bring it into existence and to open our hearts.
**In general be tuned in, compassionate and supportive when listening to your companion vs. blaming or condemning.  

After sharing issues, if you'd like, you can return to more sharing and chit-chat, see below. 

Nightly Check-In Table of Contents

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Special Thanks to DoriAnn and David Peck for their contribution to "Sharing Positives" and "Sharing Breakthroughs."
Special thanks to others that have inspired the creation of this program: Dr. Phil, John Gray, Dr. Sue Johnson, Dr. John Lund, Victor Cline’s Marriage Enrichment, and Mort Fertel.

Nightly Check-In Table of Contents