Proverbs 15: 1 A soft answer turneth away wrath: but grievous words stir up anger.
My husband and I have started a new habit. Each time one of us is snappy, sarcastic or insulting – whether in jest or in irritation we are to put a penny in it. We had been talking about doing this for a few days because I am seeing that it is a serious problem in our relationship. Oh, not that we fight constantly, although we do fight a lot, but we are continuously making snippy little comments at each other – they are often funny right now and it is hard to stay angry long, but I am noticing that it seems to be all we do and it is taking over our communication slowly. I feel worn out by it and long to have a kinder relationship. I fear that it will deteriorate us very quickly – I have heard it described once as planting little seeds of divorce; they start out small but soon smother the relationship. We are seeing evidence of its damage in other relationships, versus those we know of who don’t play this game.
The night we started the jar we had been semi-quarreling / semi-joking over something stupid and feeling frustrated, I brought the idea up again. He stomped off, grabbed a marker and a jar from recycling and drew up the little picture, plunked a fistful of change in and thumped it onto the shelf. We now have over $14 in it because we then kept childishly tossing handfuls of money in to cover past comments the other was bringing up. LOL! *sigh*
Thankfully though we have only put in 2 pennies since.
It is a habit we have both learned from our parents and society around us but it is one we need to break before it breaks us. The money will go to a charity when we feel the habit has been broken. Maybe one for domestic abuse.
I am so glad you are nipping this in the bud. My parents do this, and after close to 50 years together, they are downright mean to one another. Both of them get hurt by the things they say, but neither of them can seem to stop. It’s so sad…and now, so ingrained in their relationship. If the pennies don’t work, use dollars! Your relationship is worth it!