20. Chit-Chat: Our Story- How We Built a Strong Relationship Through Communication

Honey, we need to chat. Hey guys, welcome back to Honey, we need to chat. We are a podcast all about communication in relationship. We believe that when communication dies, bad things happen and so we have a focus and a passion about communicating within our relationship. It's all about the communicator, and you know what? That's actually picked up. That's good, he said back to me. I really like, I have a friend be like, hey, how's the communicado?

If you know, you know. It's not even a real. Word. I looked it up in Spanish. I'm fairly sure that I looked it up and it wasn't actually do it right now. It is now do it right now. Where did your phone go? Because I speak Spanish semi a little bit. I need to be right? Communicado Spania. What is the Spanish Inquisition? Spanish word for communication. Do you mean but communicado schoolers? Yeah, I know what's what is it for communicate? Why don't you just type in?

What does communicado mean in Spanish? The car oht might be close. Communicate. Communicate. That's what it was. It must have been that. Maybe it's in the must have been that. No, I know it was, must have been. That must have been. It must have been. So we're both right. But Communicator? So about the communicate. Yeah, well, this is an exciting episode because this is our 20th episode 2 and that is an achievement, honestly.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I've never really had a picture of what three months of this podcast would be like. Yeah, but this is way more than what I thought it was gonna be. Like. Even though I didn't really have a thought of what it would be like. I've been since. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I did not think we would be where we are. Yeah, we've got some awesome stuff coming up and and some things we wanna be doing and and growing and changing.

We got along way to go, but it's been, man, it's been so good. I've had so much fun. And that is largely because of you guys. Yeah. So thank you so much. Absolutely. Every week when I post our episode and I watched the lessons come in, it's just I'm like, why people listening to this? But I'm so honoured and excited that that you guys are so. It's like instant too like you will. You will put upload it and press upload and then check back not long later it's.

Like if you listen to the ready straight away, it's hectic, it's awesome and we really appreciate it.

So thank you for being here. And on that note, actually, if you are here, you're obviously listening to us on some kind of platform, which means you probably follow us on some kind of platform. But we wanted to just say we would love you guys to take a moment right now and literally swipe to Instagram, YouTube, TikTok or Facebook and just follow us there if you are active on that platform. Because we do have content that comes out on all of those

platforms. And the content isn't always the same across the platforms. And another thing we're really trying to focus on in this kind of next season or stage of the podcast is building our community element outside of just the episodes that we're releasing. So if you don't follow us or on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, or TikTok, hop on over and do that right now. And also, if you're listening to us on a streaming platform and you haven't yet followed or subscribed, please make sure to

do that too. Because all of those little details mean the world to us to make a huge difference. But also it means that we've got more touch points of you guys to communicate and communicate. And communicate. Let's not change it again, Communicado. So thank you for being here, being a part of Honey. We need to chat. We're really appreciative. Yeah, it's so good. Yeah, well we're going to do a little bit of a different episode today.

Yep. We have a write in from our chatter and then we're going to dig a little bit deeper into who is the faces behind Honey, we need to chat. Who is Amy and Blair? Who are Amy Blair? Linguists? That's who we are as you can tell from the 1st 5 minutes of this episode. So welcome. Enjoy. We're gonna start breaking some ice with a Would you rather? Alright, I come up with these myself through Google. Would you rather always have a mullet haircut or a ponytail

haircut? This is not a good question for. You. Oh my gosh. Hairstyle. It just says haircut. I don't know what that is. Yeah, change it. OK. Will you? Would you? No. Would you rather always have bad gas or always have a really dry mouth? I'm no straight straight away. These are silly. Would you rather be a high school teacher or a clown high school teacher? Would you really? Ask me a question curious about. You. I feel like these guys asking me and I need to say these are silly.

Just pick one that's good. Alright, would you rather have to always hop around on one foot or always have to squat? Always hop around on one foot. I don't think so. Squat, Squat. So maybe it might be when you stop you squat. I think squat. I think I'd wanna hop on one foot. What if you need to run you'll? Start just the squatting. Like that's so uncomfortable. So I was hoping. You but it doesn't like this. Thing that I quads for days

squads for. Days, but hopping would give you quads too or some kind of something. On one leg. One more and make it good. No pressure. Just so trash. Yeah. Next, would you rather have an unlimited gift card to your favourite restaurant or favourite shop? That is actually good, Yeah. I think logistically I would say shop, yeah, but my heart wants to say restaurant. Yeah, I'm feeling quite hungry

now. I think you say, but I think I think favourite shop because The thing is I don't know what my favourite shop is. Maybe. Maybe JB Hifi, right? Which is like a tech shop like that technology. Yeah, so. But there's always new things happening there. Favourite restaurant? I'm gonna get sick of those meals. Yeah, exactly. So I think, I think, I think shop, yeah, yeah, that's all. If you did have to pick one shop and one restaurant, what would

you pick JB for your. Ji think JB and restaurant needs to be like it needs to be. There needs to be quality menu like broad menu. I wanna say something silly like Green St. That's not silly. Where's that silly? Because it's salad. That's not silly. That's that's like a wise mature. I mean, yeah. Boring. That's why I'm doing it. Wouldn't my my reasoning for that is, is because I feel like I would eat that even if I got sick of that food. I would eat that because it's healthy.

Yeah. Yeah. So I think I'll go Green Street. Can't pick mine. No, I wouldn't ever. So there's no worries there. I would actually be tempted to pick Jamie, but I think I logistically, again, I'd either go like Kmart or Target. Not because I love their stuff so much, but because I could get anything I need there for anybody that I needed to. So if I had a gift card for that constantly? Yeah, that's true. I'd feel almost. But I mean like the gifts I will give will.

Be better. Be way better than any. They'll be tech tech gifts. Yeah, but look at. These babies there clothes and I don't. Think anyone is gonna care that my gifts to them is a huge TV? They give a free gift card is to buy things for yourself, not to go to other. People that's that was not in the rules. It was What is the rule? Just what gift card would you want? So that you can buy things there for yourself.

Yeah, well, but if I but if I have to buy a gift for someone and still buying it for myself to give to that person, I have to come with a gift. This is just I thought you thought that you with a gift card you have to buy things to gift to other people. No, no, you just mentioned if you had to get. Something for someone, Yeah, I'm just saying if we need to close for our baby, if we needed nappies, if we needed for our snacks, JB. The fridge for our baby. Yeah, I'm gonna, I'm gonna be

there. I'm gonna provide. Yeah. Well, look, we'll complete each other. OK. And then food. Haven't. Haven't. Answered Yeah, the one you can't save. Me food is really I would never I. Would. Would you? Never. I would. Never say McDonald's. I'm triggered by that because I had a Rep for being the McDonald's ohe girl at my old work. Yeah. Everyone was like, everyone was super healthy and they were doing like, basically like overview, employee chat, overview, whatever.

And everybody went to this like hip Cafe that was up there. Like way closer than anything else is literally like a two minute walk from my workplace. Everyone went there and my manager came in to me and said Amy, if you wanted to go to McDonald's we could, which is like a 5 minute drive away. I was like, I don't wanna go to. McDonald's. So I just know you like it a lot.

Like I wanna go to the cafe. And I was very hurt that I had this Rep, that she thought out of the goodness of her heart she would take me to McDonald's for my little chat, whereas everyone else went to the fancy cafe. I wasn't. Hurt. So no, I wouldn't say McDonald's. Always get a McDonald's but it is your default. It's just easy. That's the only reason. Yeah, it's not because I'm like obsessed with McDonald's. Yeah, it's it's usually for

coffee. Honestly, that's the biggest thing is the drive through for coffee. So anyway, now that I'm triggered, actually, I think I would say something like either like TGI Fridays, which I don't love, yeah, or like, but somewhere that's got like a list of things you can get, like quite a menu or Paco's tacos, because I love it. I would get tired of it. I know that. Yeah, I know that without a doubt. So I think my choice is.

I think yeah, greens fruits are grey one because you can it's adjustable to whatever mood you're in unless you really not feeling solid. Cool. Well, the ice breaking, Yeah, OK, we thought. Because ice is broken and the triggers have. Been. We're already triggered. Yeah, So we're going to be anyway. I dyed my hair red. Just breaking that ice, everybody. Yes, yes, yes, it's changed.

We're going to be introducing a different segment we thought and because we want to keep things fluid, it's new.

We've had like our 20 episodes where in a bit of a good routine with getting the core episodes out. As we mentioned, we want to build our community element a little bit more on the platforms. And so as part of that, there's a few things we're going to be doing. One is we're going to put a survey out soon. We would love your feedback on it because the podcast is here to serve the people that are listening is not here to serve us, although it is also serving

us, which is incredible. But we want to hear from you guys. So please, please, please keep an eye out for that. If you haven't yet subscribed to our mailing list to do so. We haven't been super active on it yet purely out of resource time resources, but we will be. So if you want updates and that kind of thing, please hop on over to our website at www.honey. We need to chat.com. Do not tease me for saying WWW.

Do not tease me if you know, you know, and also, as we mentioned, subscribe on the platforms that were the social media platforms and that kind of thing. But we'll be putting out a survey and getting some feedback because we would love to hear

from you guys. And we thought that one of the things we could do to keep our little intros, although this has already been long, but I'll keep our intro is a bit more like moving ahead and structured, but also free was we would introduce teen chat chat, chat T what was it teen chat, teen chat. I've got my daughter. Yeah, OHS My Little Pony mug. Mom was dirty and you won't watch it. So we will just touch base with each other at the beginning of the episodes over T hmm T chap. Lovely.

So welcome to teacher baby, how are you doing? I'm good. I am feeling A8. Yeah, good. Good at 10 I think I've been in holidays as you know this week, so taking a week off. It's school holidays here, which I'm glad I'm taking a week off for that. So you'll be able to, you've been able to have more time, not as much time as I was hoping for, but more time. Focusing on the podcast this week, which has been good. So I've been hanging out with

the kids, which has been great. I say getting sick, which has been terrible, but I think I'm on the mend, which is good. Lots of, lots of the. Yeah, well, so we took a week off because we're going to get very busy at work. And so I thought, look, let's take a break during school holidays to be here while while everyone else is here and then before the busy, busy season. Yeah, that's great. How are you? Yes, I would also be an 8. I also feel a little bit like I'm getting sick.

So if this is a bit scratchy, then that's probably why we're a bit under the weather. Yeah. Which is always the case when you stop. It's always the case. Yeah, you always get sick when you stop. So that's just classic. Here's what it is. But yeah, good. It's been really nice to plough through some podcast stuff, get

up to date. We've got some really exciting things happening that we can't fully like share, not for secretly reasons or anything, but they're not yet to come to pass, but really exciting things. So that's been really fun. Yeah, yeah. And we, we thought also we were just like share a bit of what how we've been connecting recently. Yeah. So like date time we have, we actually had a date night at at home, date night the other night, a games night. Oh yeah, we did.

Yeah. And. Spontaneously. Yep, it was great and. Didn't last for super long. I won, so it seemed to struggle more with that than he wanted to let on, but he let. On who played card games, We played Phase 10. I'm not sure if you guys have played it. If you haven't, get on to it. It's amazing and I'm very good at it and let's leave it. There you played with our seven year old today. I beat him. You said you were actually struggling. I actually was. We're on the same one.

We haven't finished yet. Oh my gosh. But I won. I smashed. You smashed isn't. Yeah, exaggeration, right? But it was nice. It was just spontaneous. You're like, hey, what if we get take away after the kids go down and we play some games? So that was really good. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, and I think I've been talking to a couple of couples recently about that too. And I'm like, oh man, I need to, you know, practise, practise it myself. I know that we don't do it. We hadn't done it for awhile.

And like, I mean, like, I really wanna just hang out. And so we we did that. We just chatted for a bit and then we watched a show. We're currently watching the bear at the moment. Oh man, it is such a good show. I. Love it and it has led to a new hobby for Blair, which has. Been huge. Yeah. So where? Ever since having kids, I've really struggled to find a

hobby. You know, before having kids, I was really into full driving, dirt bike riding, stuff like that and camping and and loved it and haven't really done it since and I found it very hard. But ever since watching The Bear, man, I'm man, do I like cooking? He's been actually doing very. Well, it's been very fun. Blair Blair has always been very experimental with his cooking and he's always enjoyed it when he's done it. But he doesn't like do too much that often.

There have been times where he's just been like, I'll come out to the kitchen area and he's got this look on his face like so I'm experimenting and which is awesome, except except that sometimes the sauce mixtures unresearched and he just. Experiments. Good experiments without any kind of anchor. Yeah, and sometimes they're great and then other times they're a bit. This time around. This time around's been great. Because I'm following guys and stuff, like I'm following actual

recipes. Yeah, but that's been fun too. I've been doing that with the kids. It's been a lot of fun. Just slow and taking our time. And doing that during holidays is is a lot more doable than when I'm working. Oh yeah. It's been a lot of fun. I've really enjoyed it. And usually we're just stress me out, but it's now that I've got the time. This week it's been a. Lot of the motivation of bear you could be the Blair. I am the Blair. You are the Blair. Yeah, Yeah. So it's been really good.

Good job chef. Thanks, Jeff. Alright, well, that's chat, chat, chat, chat, chat, chat, chat. That's been the tea. That's the tea of the tea chat. Nice. Thank you for joining us you segment. So we're going to dive in by reading one of our Chatter questions that we've had written in. One Patreon? Yep. Which we thought was a good kind of start for this conversation that we're going to be having today. And it was something that we were planning on doing for our

20th episode as well. So I lined up quite well.

So we're going to dive into that now. I'll just read it. So this is from my chatter from Patreon. He writes in and says the idea of a weekly check in is really good idea, But I have a few questions. How will this play right when the relationship is quite new or neither partner are able to actually make good use of it and say things they feel? So that's a really, really good question, especially like, yeah, so if you're in your new relationship, like how intense

you go in from the beginning. Yeah, I think it it depends on a few things straight off the bat, like what kind of dynamics you've got going in the relationship. Because if it's a very casual relationship, it probably would feel a little bit weird to implement a check in night. If there's like an understanding that, Oh no, we're committed to each other and we're committed to seeing where this goes, then I think there's like, there's no, no problem with implementing

something like that. I think probably how you do it is the bigger thing. So if that was me, I think I'd be like, what if we had a weekly like date night and we just check and see how we're going And then we go out for dinner or we have an at home date night or whatever works for you guys. And instead of it being like, let's have a weekly check in and just like sit down and make sure that we're on the same page

about things. Like something that's a bit heavier may feel a bit confronting at the beginning, but you could make it funner. Instead of it being a heavy thing, just make it a date night and have part of it be that you're checking in with each other. I think like, unless she, you know, if you, you only just starting to get to know each other, you know, you don't know where you're gonna go. I think it's more down to like once you've made that commitment, Yep, you, you know,

we're together. I won't be intentional about this. Be intentional about it. Like I think that's a decision you need to make as well. Is, you know, do you just want to cruise into this relationship or do you want to be intentional with this relationship? Both have its perks. I very much about being intentional, being intentional about the relationship. Set the tone from the beginning early on. Not not maybe not the very beginning, but early on, just

set the tone. It's like, alright, I, I hardly hold this is a high value. I value that we check in, I value that we're intentional. I value that I can actually, you know, ask you the questions. How are you going out of 10? So I know how I could better support you. I need to know more about you. What's your love language? All these sorts of stuff. You know, starting to exploring is is so fun, especially in the early days.

There's so much to learn. Yeah, It's like a puzzle is ways of dating that just are so not my way of dating that it's kind of hard for me to even put my brain in that space. And I know there would be people that were that are very casual and they don't want any kind of intense heavy thing put on them. But if you are someone who has a value for being intentional or you're like, no, I really do want this kind of culture in my

relationship. I think it's so valid for you to be very clear without the upfront. And if it freaks the other person out, like be gentle with it. Don't be like super like staring them in the face. And just like we're gonna do this, this and this and we're gonna get married and blah, blah, blah. Like that might freak most people out and on the second or third date, but in introducing, like you said, this culture of, oh, I'm gonna be intentional.

This is important to me. I don't want to muck you around. I don't think that goes astray. If it if it is confronting and puts the other person off, then that's probably actually a good thing in the long run because they're not in the same place. They might not value those kinds of things, which is valid. But if you value that as a person and you want that for your relationship, being clear that actually I'm, I'm pretty

intentional person. So I'd love to learn these things about you in the nice gentle way that you introduce that is, I think always going to be a strengthening thing because the more you can learn about somebody at the beginning.

Gently and in a healthy way. The more you can learn about them, the better you're gonna be equipped to navigate things. So yeah, I think introducing it in a fun way rather than it being when we introduced it, it was like we were married. The check in is specifically and it was, it was out of a necessity to be kind of addressing things. And I don't think you need to be in that place to introduce

something like this. I think you could wind it back and have it be more casual and more fun, but kind of be that introduction to having a a time where you are just checking that the other person's going, OK, Hmm. And I think how the other part of that question was if, if people struggle to make the best use of that time, yeah, some people won't naturally know how to engage with somebody on that level. They won't know how to say what they need to say. They won't know how to ask the

questions they need to ask. They weren't even like we've spoken about. They won't even know how to like make themselves curious about the other person. And that's totally fine because everybody comes from a different place. So it's not it's not that. Oh, you don't get how to do this. You don't get how to make this a good time. OHS then you're not like a good person.

Like there's things you can do if you recognise OHS We come for these check-in nights or we come for these Hangouts and we never talk about anything serious. And then we both end up just being kind of like avoiding what's going on and we're not really talking about what needs to happen or whatever. Or we get derailed because one of us gets distracted on their phone or whatever might be. That's making that time not

quality. I think addressing those specific things and making there be more structure or less structured depending on what it is you're navigating is really helpful. So if you're from me, the big thing when we started these check-ins was I didn't know how to ask for what I needed. I found it really hard to be clear with Blair about how I was feeling about things. And I was also very scared to be confront confrontational because I'd seen that go so poorly. And so I was kind of stuck.

I didn't know how to raise these things. I needed to raise without feeling like I was then being like critical or negative. And so we found it. Well, I found it really helpful because we, we actually googled or someone sent us a list of like four or five questions to just ask every time. And that took a bit of the like guessing out of it because the question was what something that you're celebrating this week or what's something that you found

really hard this week? What's something, is there anything that you would like to you need me to know or you need to make me aware of How is our budget going like stuff like that? And it was instead of it being like, so something I want to talk to you about is this thing that's really hard and I have to like break it to you. It was like almost like you asking, so is there anything you

want to tell me about? And so that just kind of like makes it easier for you to communicate in that space, makes it easier if you're coming to the nights and you're like, I don't know what to do. You got a list of things to do. And it feels kind of weird maybe, but it's not weird. Like we compensate for our weaknesses in every area of life in order to become stronger. And this is just one of those ways of doing that. No, I agree.

And I think it's like, don't put too much pressure on yourself. Like we've said, enjoy the beginning. Yeah, it's a lot of fun. Yeah. You know, just have make fun. Like make make it fun. Don't don't get too serious too fast. Doesn't mean you can't be serious at the beginning, but you don't want to get too far that way. Just enjoy each other's company and figure out is this going somewhere? Is it not?

You know and see where you are as a couple, what your vibe you're dynamic is and what, what kind of pace works for you in that way. And one thing I would say too though, is if this is a priority for you, don't wait for them. You know, you start your journey in being prepared and being intentional with yourself. Like how start exploring these things about yourself. You know, what triggers you, what you know, what baggage are you bringing to the relationship? What values do you have?

Because when you understand that more, it's gonna be a lot easier to be for you to be able to share that to your partner when the time is right. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah. And be curious about the other person if they say they talk about this in networking as well. If you're meeting people for the first time, the best thing you can do is ask them questions about themselves because people find it easier to talk about themselves, especially if they've been asked questions for

the most part. So if you are struggling, if you like Blair said, if you're finding it a priority for you and you're not sure where your partner's at, do that work for yourself. And instead of being like, what's something I need to raise with them that I'm struggling with them, be like what how's away? I can like ask them how they're going and be curious about them. So you and if you're coming together on these nights and it's a bit comfortable, just be curious about your partner in a

neutral uplifting way. And that's one of the best things about the check in Knights is it is a neutral time. It should be a neutral time. It shouldn't be OHP. We've just had an argument. Now we're having a check in like this is meant to be a time with this set aside neutrally. So you're coming to it from a place that's not triggered, you're not coming from a heated conversation or anything like

that. So curiosity, if you're struggling with this time, put things in place, find questions, find a place, a time and a night, whatever it might be. That makes it easier for you to do that and just take it at the pace of your app, I reckon. He just followed up with two more questions. How was it for you when you started doing them? So the weekly check-ins and was it easy to start talking about things? And I thought, well, let's just bundle those up together.

We were wanting to share a bit of our story anyway on the 20th episode, helping you guys know a little bit more about us, where our journey start, all that sort of stuff. And I thought, it's all going to get answered through that anyway, plus something to that. Hey guys, just wanted to pop in and take a SEC to talk about the extra content you can find over on our Patreon and our Spotify subscription. We have a fun little community growing over there with extra

episodes, extra stories. We're also gonna have resources, messages back and forth, and also submitting listener stories through that portal as well, so. Sorry, outro theme. Themes, there's lots to be gained If you want to be a part of our closer knit community here at honey, we need to chat. Please hop on over to Patreon or Spotify subscriptions and join us there. We would love to see you. Thanks guys. Thanks.

Yes, the 20 episodes in we thought it would be good to introduce you to us. Hi have been more hi where Amy and Blair and we've also been talking a lot about the importance of story from our New Zealand trip. Since then it's been something that's really come out in our content. It's been something's come out in our family and just the importance of knowing a little bit more about each other and the significance of that brings to how we're operating now. And that's the same for you

guys. Listening to our episodes is one thing, and then knowing a little bit more about us might add a bit more depth to that, or bit more like perspective from where we're coming from and that kind of thing. One being, why does Amy's voice sound so weird? Yeah, I don't know if we've ever said that. Maybe we have but my voice sounds a little bit weird and that's it. Different. Sounds a bit weird. Yeah, different. Different. Yeah. So we're going to introduce ourselves.

So I'm Amy. I am 33 years old and I am from Australia. I do have a mixed international accent which sounds Snooty. Sounds like I'm what's Snooty Snooty like I'm international. I'm sorry, I think something like your accent sounds smoothies. No, well, I don't know, maybe it's sounds Snooty, but it also sounds like, and I'm very aware of this sounds like someone who's trying to do an accent and failing miserably. Very aware. That makes sense to you.

No, but I've experienced other people doing that and I'm like, Oh no, that's. Me. Oh, really? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm aware of that mostly because, well, the podcast is a huge thing, but also I'm really into drama like I've mentioned. And I just, I can't nail the Aussie accent and I can't nail the American accent and I can't nail any other accent because I'm not great accents. So I just am what I am.

But that's OK. So I do have, I do have an international accent and that is because I grew up in Papua New Guinea. I was there from the age of 8 to 18. My dad was a helicopter pilot with a mission organisation. And so I, yeah, was, I grew up in an international community, which was amazing. Most of my friends, we're actually American.

My school was an American style style structure and then I came back when I graduated high school to Australia, which is I'm from Melbourne in Australia. I, I did not know what I wanted to do. So my, you'll hear us allude to stuff in our episodes about our histories and we're never going to dig deep into like our families or like our backgrounds and stuff. That's not important for the

world to know. It's not gonna probably come out and that's OK. But, you know, I grew up as an, the eldest of four kids and I was very stressed all the time and my family dynamics were a little bit tough growing up. I love my family and I'm really close with them, but there was difficult dynamics. And so I came into adulthood not really sure what I wanted to do in life at all and had quite a few years just being like floaty, even just in terms of what I was interested in work wise.

I just didn't, I didn't understand myself at all. And I had spent so long being stressed about life that I just felt, I've said this as well in the podcast, I didn't feel present until I was like well into my 20s even I think into our marriage kind of thing. So I kind of feel like I just floated through life, but then I I did started studying multiple times I. It's starting again. Now, and I am studying this time I will finish.

I started studying with the idea of teaching because there was so many things that I thought was that sounded good. And I was like, maybe I'll be a teacher. But to be fair you can do everything though like you are a Unicorn. You seriously pick up stuff so much and you're interests are so broad. And understand that about myself though, at the time I just felt like a failure because I was like, I can't finish anything. And and I'm also not long term interested in any one thing

necessarily. There's some stuff that the broadly speaking, I'm interested in that area and that's kind of stayed the same way. But there wasn't like, so I decided to pursue teaching because people kept saying, oh, you'd be a great teacher. And I was like, yeah, it could be interesting. So I did a year.

I did a year. And actually that teaching degree ended up being major in psychology because I had, it's a long boring story, but basically I couldn't do teaching straight up. I had to do something else 1st. And so I majored in psychology, which I love, but I hate like study. I just wanted practical stuff.

I hated all the theory, like not the theory that was interesting, but just kind of like the writing essays and finding sources and stuff like that was like, no. So anyway, I did that for a year and then I dropped out and then I applied for an acting school and I did not get in. Moms like, why don't you travel and experience outside of your little world for a time? And I was like, I have travelled my whole life. I don't need to travel.

And then I, the, the next night I was like looking up where to travel. So then I ended up going to Spain for six months for a short course over there, which was and experience and then I came home and I suddenly met my now husband. Yeah, he did. A couple weeks after arriving home and then life got a lot clearer, so that was cool. Yeah, so I I grew up in rural Victoria. Well, I was born in rural, rural Rectoria, grew up in rural Victoria, and my dad's a

bricklayer. I was on the job site early, early years maybe. I don't know. I'm terrible time frames and remembering things. But maybe around six, between 6:00 and 9:00, I started going to the job sites. I've been working. Um, yeah, obviously not full time, but I'm, I'm used to the workforce. We moved to Queensland when I was nine and did my schooling and everything up there until area it was, it was pretty rough.

It was pretty rough. And moved back to back to rural Victoria again when I was 16 and I had a bit of a colourful background back then. So I moved away from pretty scary dudes, I guess you could say. And there was a bit of an escape for me. I was trying to get away from that and then I probably played footy, Australian football for many years as well, so really focused on for me, me and my brother. So I got a brother, one older brother.

We what was really invested into us was work ethic and teamwork. And we got that through being on the job site and playing football. You know, it's just, yeah, we just worked really, really well together. We didn't not get along at all growing up. Well, from my perspective, we didn't get along growing up at all. But really, really, really close. Now we're each other's best man at our weddings, which was great. But just after he got married, I went over seas for two years.

I was on a on a mission ship for two years. So sailed around pretty much middle from the Middle East through till South East Asia. And I left in Hong Kong after my second year where I worked in an engine room and OHS man, I when I joined there, I was really keen just to sort of get outside, see and do all this Christian ministry stuff, which was something really, really cool. But reality was I was stuck in the engine room pretty much for

two years. The first year they taught me welding and because of my trade background, I was used to tools. So they taught me welding and I was welding, welding for the first year. So I had to really struggle at the end of that year. There was a lot of burnout and intense things happened and got put into a leadership role of

the engine room. And I'd never been in leadership before in my life, like never. And for me, it, it was really strange. Like it was such a fit for me. I was super nervous about it. I had zero interest in leading anyone. And but it really was a natural fit for me. And I've been in leadership ever since. It was like, I just, it was like at that moment I discovered, I don't know. I don't know what you call it. You found your place.

Yeah, I found like, and it was like I found my place like in the workforce, you know, when I'm, when I'm more naturalised, it wasn't, you know, for me, I'm not really I, I don't have this high drive just to do work. I have to do meaningful work. It has to really feel that that spot for me where we're making a difference in the world. You know, I have to, it has to be a cause behind it. But I can't just do any job like I, I get now if I'm just doing any job, I get really restless.

I'm in the next thing and I'm always about growing and strategizing and so forth, which has been quite fun to recognise within myself. But with that comes at a cost because I think leadership is, can be a very lonely thing, but also my, my work ethic has its up and downs. I can be quite chill or I can be very, very intense and burnout and which I've done multiple times and I've shared on here quite a bit. And every time I stop, I get

sick and like now. So anyway, so I was on there for two years and came back and I got a offered an internship at a church when I came back down in Melbourne and I was there for one year and I met you. You had just come back from Spain and I came up and I saw you. I went and visited your church and I don't know, we made eye contact. We did. We did. You were at the front of the church. I was in the back of the church. You did something at the front and turned around and we made

eye contact. And actually in that moment, and this is no, no joke, this is no joke. I'm like wife material. Never met Amy before, never knew anything really about her. I actually worked for her uncle. She worked in the cafe next door to my office and never saw her in my life. Never saw her in my life. Made eye contact and I'm like, that's wife material. I never really had a girlfriend before meeting Amy and I was never really interested in having a girlfriend.

I always wanted a wife. I think because for me, I, you know, I, I've been in those like interests, you know, I mean, there's like love interest situations, situations, yeah, but never anything further. I was so sick of it. Like I'm just like this, I'm so over this. I'm so over like, do you like me? Do you don't like me? Do you like me do you don't like me or, or getting led on or whatever else? Like I just had zero type. Yeah, I, I was never about the

game. And so anyway, I, I saw, saw Amy and then after, after the church service, I went pretty much straight up to you and I introduced myself and then you walked away. I didn't just walk away, I just was. I was just very intimidated because I had the same moment when we met eyes. It was really weird. And I. She looked at me and she's like wife. Material Wife material Never seen more waffle material in my

life. I would never have ever if anyone had said do you believe in love at first sight? I was like, that is ridiculous. And it wasn't like I was in love with you, but I knew straight away that you were significant to my story. And it got weirder after that. But just like like as in like even more moments of it, just like these weird things over the next few weeks. But I would never have ever said that I believed in that.

And I still now if I'm like talking to people that are in the dating world, I'm still not like I'm still like, there's not one person that yeah, I really believe that. But there was something really significant with you is which is amazing. I was very well timed for me and for for I guess for us, but for the different significances for us. It was good that it worked out the way that it did, but because of that, I was intimidated.

When I walked up to you, you were with some friends of mine. Yeah. Yeah. I was intimidated already. And so I was trying to act cool, calm and collected. And then I thought I made, I thought I made small talk. And then? Well, not really. So I asked. So I think I, it was the conversation went for about two minutes or something, right. And I, I came up with a conversation. It was something like, ohhhhh. So you just come back, you know, where you been?

You like, and I said like, oh, what's your accent or something? Like I grew up in Papua New Guinea. And. Two, yeah, I'm not even from here. And then in and I'm like, oh, cool. And you didn't give me anything. It was, it was, it was like. But it was enough to keep you interested. You didn't lose interest in. No. Well then you walked away. I'm like, alright, I'll secure myself to be like, cool, you're

not interested. You know, I mean, so that's The thing is like, I never wanted a girlfriend. I always wanted a wife. But I still put myself out there to test the waters, you know, and. Then find a wife if you don't test the water. Yeah, you got. It's all about the waters and then number of months later, a month later or something like that. Your cousin. Baby, Oh my gosh, what there and his time for what was it? Oh my gosh. What are the next day? Literally the next weekend, OK. Cool.

Sweet. Actually, I could be wrong, but I think it was an excellent. Yeah, cool. Well, sometime in the near future, Yeah. After that moment. Within the week. Yeah, we. It was your cousin in law's birthday party that we both knew. Yeah. And I saw you there again, and I came over and I was making my move, and you walked away. Maybe you just didn't talk fast. Enough. And I was like, this guys not gonna talk fast enough. He's gonna get his conversation out there fast enough and I'm

gonna be awkward. I'm just gonna walk away. What do you mean? Like I get awkward if people don't talk and then I. I literally came up and had a conversation with you. It was like, hey Amy, how you doing? Do you wanna date? Do you want some of this? I don't remember that. I do remember that. I don't remember what we talked about. Anyway, my sister went to his youth group that week as well, and she came home. She said, Amy, I met the man you're going to marry.

Is it Blair? And she's like, yes, sounds like everybody saying that. And I to this day, I don't know who everybody is. I don't know why I said that, but I remember clearly being like, everyone is saying that. Yeah. It's probably just my head. Yeah, my head was all the voices in my head was saying it. Yeah. Yeah, and then you added me on Facebook and we had Facebook romance. Yeah, they've got all of those chats printed out, actually. Blair will never read them, but I will.

And I'll show them to my kids and I make them read them. Do which ones am I True, true, faithful children. But yeah, we, we chatted on Facebook and then everything grew from there. And from the very beginning, it was super intentional. Yeah. And actually, the way the boy told me he liked me, was he just messaged because we're like messaging for, I don't know, a couple weeks or something. And I was like, really confused if you liked me or not. But you were very like

intentional. I I felt very much like you were intentionally talking to me. But I was like, maybe he's like this with everybody. I don't know. And my cousin's like, yeah, I think he's just very friendly. Maybe he doesn't like that. And then you just message me one night. I remember I was sitting in my laundry room with my family, and we were talking. And then you're like, so obviously I like you, but I just want to be really like, I want to take things slow and just be

really careful and intentional. And you did not ask if I liked you. And I just remember being like, OK, yeah. You weren't like. And your face went red. Yeah, My face went red and I screenshot it and I sent it to my friends. Oh, really? Yeah. And I was like, Oh my gosh, this guys not even asking if I like him. He's just so confident that I

do, which I did. And just so like, intentional, like from the beginning, just very much like, this is what we should do. I think we should be really careful and intentional and blah, blah, blah. And then we started being intentional. So we didn't like and we we dated, but we didn't I we'd labelled it back then when we're young, We didn't officially start dating. No, we dated. We, we did, we did everything else like that. A dating couple would we, you know, we're pretty much dating.

But it was for me was I was so aware of what I did not want that I did not want to waste time. So again, like I, I finally found someone that like I could, I could really see something here. And for the first time, I'd, I'd felt that, but this I was still, look, this is going to be a big thing for me, for us to actually get to that point where we want to, where I want the relationship to be, where I want our relationship to be, not just with, you know, whether it was with you or not.

I knew this was gonna be intentional thing for me. I had to make sure that I was gonna be working on myself because I had a lot of things I was still working through. So cool. I like you. And it's a bit arrogant of me to say I've obviously I like you and I didn't ask you how, if you, how you feel about me, but for me, I was just so intentional from the beginning. Look, alright, cool. If you like me, I'm that guy. This is the sort of guy that I am.

I am going to be intentional. I'm not going to beat around the Bush for this. This is my fears of divorce. The word divorce is of fear of mine. And so I had something. I can do something about that now by being upfront from the very beginning. This is the sort of guy I am and this is the sort of relationship that I want. Are you in for it? If not, that's fine. Let's finish here. I'll be sending today's words to you. But this is what was going in my head.

If, if this is not what you're in for, I want to know now. So I'm going to be intentional. I'm going to be upfront from the very beginning. And then from there we sort of the unofficial dating stage. What that looks like was just take like we'll spend time together, we'd go on dates, we're dating, but we also had some older couples speaking into that relationship. And again, it wasn't necessarily about them speaking to if we are good for each other.

It was more about what are we working on is individuals like how are we growing as individuals and how is that complement each other and like how should a relationship look? But also lessons that they've learned. So it wasn't even just talk us talking about ourselves the whole time. It was really about these older couples just sharing with us their stories and things that they had learned about each other and how they went about

that, the mistakes they made. Because like, when you hear those sorts of mistakes, you gotta learn from other people,

right? So anyway, we're just a sponge in those early days of just catching up with older couples, hearing their stories and and getting to speak into yeah, our, our relationship and, and us as individuals. And thankfully, like we were both were just very ready to be very intentional, like it just happened. And maybe that's why it worked the way that it worked. But we both came at it from that perspective.

I'd seen my parents marriage struggle that my whole life and and I knew what I I knew what I had unpicked watching them and I knew what I didn't want to be taking into my marriage and what I need is to be aware of. And so and I was tired of dating and I was tired of that whole exactly what you said, the the games or the confusion or whatever.

I just wanted to be intentional. And so thankfully that worked out really, really well for us. And we, Blair was doing his internship at the church and then decided she was second year and I also decided to do the internship with him. And so that was that led us into an even more intensive time of getting to know each other because we were working together as well as dating. And that just provided so many opportunities, difficult some of them, but really, really

challenging in a good way. Opportunities to learn about each other, how we worked, how we what we struggled with, what our weaknesses were, but also about how we like helped make each other stronger. So what that looks like, you know, in the internship, we actually did a few, quite a few personality tests and things because when we first start working together, Amy and I are complete opposites.

We didn't really know that. We just knew that we clashed and the way that we worked together cause we just worked so differently. So I'm very well organised, mapped out. This is what we're doing over this big picture in mind. I'm a very big picture person and I skip details, right? This is, this is the sort of person I am. Well, Amy is more slower to get the things going, but she will always get it done. But for me, it would stress me out so much.

But she's really good at the details and going along with it, you know, and picking up all those things going away, which is where I struggled. So yeah, it was trust me, it's so much. And and, you know, I'm still quite new to leadership. This is my fourth year in a leadership role, which is still quite new. The first, no, sorry, third year, first year was on the ship. Second year, what are the church? Very, two very, very different

dynamics. And then the third year with my partner, you know, like, and this was a whole other level to the different personality tests. We quickly identified that we are literally in every test that we've done, every single test that we've done where the complete opposites. But what we started to realise, and this cool thing about the internship was that, you know, you, you don't just do the personality tests for the sake of doing personality tests.

You do them Then in terms of how does that, that now, how, how does that operate as a team now? So you identify, you know, how you work, then how everyone else works, and then how does that work together? And that's what we had from the very beginning. So from from then on, I have never ever been able to have a job other than when I was landscaping for that year. I've never ever been able to have a job where Amy's not a part of it. You know, I mean, I have to because I know what she does.

She feels the gaps of my weaknesses, you know, So I need to have her at some level in, in part of my role, as she has been ever since. Except for that year's landscaping. Players gonna get a bottle for baby. But yeah, we we had the benefit of doing this intensive training that we would have been training individually if we weren't there together and in a relationship anyway. But because we were starting our relationship, it was an incredible kind of foundation to

build that. And so during that year is like, I think it was six months in, it was in June or something that we ended up getting engaged because we had spent, we were actually only dating, I think for eight months in the end. And we had spent these months being so intentional and, and to some people's perspectives, it would have been pretty intense, I guess. But like we said, for us, it was just right. So we'd spent these months being intentional about learning ourselves and learning each

other. And we built a network around us, a community and family around us that were supportive and encouraging. And we knew they were there to challenge us, this accountable and help us to be better and to think of each other and all of those things. We had built that really solid foundation. So that worked very well in our favour. We ended up getting engaged in the Mediterranean. We went for a the mission trip over there and Blair took me. He had been there the year before.

He took me to this beautiful cafe on the edge of the Mediterranean, and there was no one there. It was empty. I don't even know if it was open. We were on the balcony on the veranda overlooking the ocean. And then he's like, look in the distance while I take a photo of you. And I turned around and I turned back and he was on his knee with a ring. I was beautiful. He's not here for me to have that back and forth here, but it was really beautiful. So we we spent the the next six

months. So the rest of the year we were also still in the internship together, which was just really cool. So we're preparing for marriage, what we're doing in the context of being working together and being in this team and learning about each other.

So it's just like marriage prep to the extreme. I think during that time is actually when we also started to be really intentional with the, some of the resources we've mentioned here. So the five love languages, I think that's one we would have had that first introduced to us. And also just we, we ask each other questions when we go on drives and that kind of thing. We would Google 100 questions to ask your partner or to ask before you get married.

There was a book of things I wish I knew before I got married. And just having those conversations and asking those questions and being curious, I think was really helpful for us in that prep because we knew how different we were. We knew how different our backgrounds, like our family cultures were so different to each other, pretty much the opposite like we were.

And and so we knew that that was probably gonna be things that we would navigate and have to work through when we did get married. And so I think that was like kind of the beginning of this question that the that the chatter is written in. How did you start these conversations? That's kind of where these conversations started was in these early months of engagement. Yeah, and going back to our channel's like question, you know, it's again, it's, it's, it's you have to ask that

question. What's the value of yours? Right. Because this is all in line with the values that we had already had kind of separate from each other. Again, from the very beginning, I knew what I did not want to have. And so I knew that there was a lot of work to be done to have what I wanted to have, you know, and, and to have the value and the vision of a family and a wife and a marriage that I had envisioned. And yeah.

And we're just, we're very lucky that we had the support that we had and the input we had both individually and together. Yeah, yeah. And I think throughout our whole, throughout our whole journey, something that really helps me is the projecting and being like, where do I want to be in five years time? Where do I want to be in 10

years time? And just knowing that whatever we want that to be, whatever vision we've got for that and we would choose, we need to be making the changes for that now to to get there. And so there's little things we can do. And this is across the board. It's not just relationships, but like you just said, we knew what we didn't want or we knew what we did want in our marriages individually. And so that kind of helped to

shape that. And so if you're in a relationship, you might not have the same values and that's OK. Like we, we are opposites. We have different values. We've just done a values exercise recently at the retreat and it was different, different values. And so that doesn't mean you're not going to work or that it's doomed or anything like that. Understanding those things about each other, that is the biggest thing.

So understanding how we differ in the values, that was a huge thing for us in those early months. There's a lot more than just the value. It's the question of why is that a value? Is it a healthy value? Yeah, and our anxiety around those things thankfully is shifting as well over the years because we've been able to identify them. We know where they've come from. It's not just when you start to

interact with people. I think this is one of the biggest things that I, that kind of boggles my mind. Everyone reacts, everybody reacts. You react to whatever is going on around you and you react from your perspective and your lens. And so when someone comes out aggressive or weird or it like doesn't sit right with you and you're like, like that's put me out. It's not just them deciding that they're going to be a horrible person that day. It's because of so many things.

Doesn't excuse, like we've said, the behaviour, but there's so much that goes into how someone interacts with the world on them that if you come into relationship unaware of why you react that way and you also come in unwilling to be curious about why that other person reacts that way, you're going to have a tough time because it will just be.

You'll be dealing with the surface level stuff that doesn't make sense and does offend and does look hurtful, instead of dealing with the deeper stuff that explains a bit of what's going on and helps you have grace for each other and helps you see them in a 3D way rather than a 2D way. Which is why I really think intentionality is the best thing. That's why I think communication in relationships is so important. Yeah. So we, we went into marriage

from that platform. We're really lucky for that. Not everybody has the opportunity to have such an intensive time of getting to know each other. And I'm really grateful for that because I think it's set us up to face, you know, the the next seven years had a tonne of trials. So my parents got divorced right after we got married. We had trouble getting pregnant with our first. We had work issues. We had a tough birth, like we had an emergency C-section.

We were struggling with housing, like we kept being moved around or not finding a place, all of these things and then diving into COVID burnout, church issues, work issues. My father doesn't suddenly died. We moved regionally like all these things crammed into a seven year period. And so I'm so grateful that before we dived into that, we have this nice foundation to kind of come back on because we were light on that. Like throughout those years, we've relied on that foundation a lot.

And without it, we would have spent those trials also being confused with the other person, also trying to navigate why the other persons and we still question sometimes I'm like, I don't get it. And we have to kind of pick through what the reactions are. But at least we've had that foundation building that understanding of each other beforehand, so that when we are facing these really difficult times, we're not also facing the dynamic the same way that it

would have been otherwise. So, you know, the second part of, of the chatter question was how was it for us when we started having these conversations? Was it easy for us to have these conversations and have these check-ins? And it, it wasn't necessarily easy, but it's been a slow burn. It's been something we've built up over the years. It's something that we've, we've woven into how our relationship works.

But I also would encourage that if your relationship hasn't been like this to date, doesn't mean it can't be. You can start now with this intentionality. So thank you guys again so much. This is number 20 for the podcasts. And yeah, again, we could not have done this without you. It's been such an incredible journey and our conversations have got so much better since

doing this. But also, like there's so many of you guys on our chatters being shared out to you guys so much for just being a part of this and supporting us in the way that you do. And and being a part of this

podcast and speaking into this podcast by giving awesome questions, awesome ideas, even feedback. All that has just been absolutely amazing. So thank you so much for our chatters. For thank you so, so much for being with us for these 20 episodes. We hope there's many, many more to come. We really appreciate you guys being part of our community. Absolutely good chat. Thanks guys.