Real life marriage retreat

Many of you that know me know that I'm very skeptical. I always have my doubts when I hear that something is "life changing". I was excited to hear the reviews from the ladies over at the FIAR boards. Like I said in my previous post there is such a need for sound tools to encourage Godly marriages. It was also a chance to to meet & learn from Steve & Jane Lambert,the publishers of my favorite curriculum, Five In A Row (FIAR). So I was sure this would be a valuable experience. But "life changing" I wasn't sure.
This year has been by far our toughest year of marriage. Recently my pastor gave me this picture. He said sometimes when you walk through a field you step on flowers. This will hurt the flower but, it will most likely continue to grow & eventually bloom. However if when you step on that flower you grind it into the ground the damage is greater. And if you keep coming back to that flower & grinding it into the ground then it will eventually die and never bloom again. (I took this picture to mean that sometimes in the course of marriage we will hurt each other. There will also be times that in the heat of the moment that we will do/ say things with the purpose of hurting the other & this will damage our marriage greatly. But to keep coming back to those hurtful patterns and allow them to get worse will eventually kill a marriage.) Over the course of our marriage we've had some problems that keep coming back and grinding the flower of our marriage into the ground. To the point that I had begun to wonder if this marriage had any life left.
Going into this retreat I had the attitude that God needed to do something for Big C. I believe that Steve said some us were born on third & thought we hit the triple. God quickly showed me that he wanted to show me somethings too. I can't even begin a play by play because there was so much truth & wisdom shared this weekend. So I'll skip straight to the part that moved me the most. It was the last secession. (Yes I'm somewhat on the hard headed side.) Steve drew a personal time line for he & Jane. There was a point in the time line where they could have easily divorced. Then he began to tear the page off at that point. What hit me was all the other points on the page. Points that would have greatly affected my life. I'm so thankful they didn't tear off the page then. It hit me that I had no idea what God had in store for me, my marriage, my children, or any unknown others on the rest of our page. I had to let go & trust that God does know what else is on that page. He has a plan for me not to harm me but to prosper. By God's design I had some time to do one on one business w/ God. What happened in my heart has been very hard to explain even to Big C. All I know is that we have talked (I mean really talked) & laughed more in the last few days than we have the whole year.
Jane made a comment that Joy is like our warning light. When we lack Joy that should scream to us that something is wrong. God used this weekend to remind me of the Joy I have in my marriage. Would I call that "life changing"? I think so. I'll join the many other ladies from the FIAR boards & say if you ever have a chance to attend please do. God can change your marriage through it.