I am David Matthews with marriage helper for 15 years. My wife and I,
Debbie and I have been doing, helping with marriage helper.
Three-day intensives, the marriage helper workshop. We have, uh, literally,
uh, talked to couples and sent them to this workshop for over 20 years
now. And, uh, just personally know the,
the incredible response to the marriage helper workshops.
One thing at the workshop, these three-day workshops,
and many of you who are watching all the videos online of marriage helper and so
many great resources at marriage helper is this feeling of being overwhelmed.
There's so much information out there there's so much to do.
And in my work as a coach with marriage helper,
working with many couples and individuals who are trying to save their marriage,
uh, I get the sense that so many people feel overwhelmed to the
point of, they don't know where to start. And my early days,
when a couple came in to talk to me about their marriage,
they would list all the problems in their marriage in the first hour session.
And quite frankly, leave me overwhelmed and leave them overwhelmed.
Like where do you start? How do you start to assimilate this information?
And then put it into practical use to where I can really make progress in my
marriage. If, if you have a reluctant spouse and you're trying to, uh,
save your marriage, where do you start? Uh, are,
if you're a couple and you're both wanting to save the marriage,
where do you start with it? Well,
today I want to share a very simple concept with you.
It's a concept called domino day.
Do you know that there's a domino day out there it's sometime in November,
the world record for domino stacking and knocking him
over, uh, people on domino day, try to break the world record.
The last I checked it,
the world record was set a few years ago in the Netherlands by, uh,
domino production company of all things, of course,
and the world record at that time. And I still think exist is 4 million,
500 and something thousand dominoes are stacked up and then
knocked over. And th they all fall over.
I don't know who has time to do all that except somebody trying to sell
dominoes, but it's an incredible, incredible thing, uh, that,
uh, that happens. And I got this information,
a lot of this information from a book called the one thing by Gary Keller,
Gary, I want to give him credit for this. It's a great book,
but it's so applicable to marriages and to people that feel
overwhelmed and basically a Keller in this book talks
about, you can only do one thing efficient at one time.
And, uh,
Debbie and I also work for an organization that we founded called spark of life.
It's a grief recovery organization.
We use this concept with those who are overwhelmed with grief and loss,
and oftentimes of course, uh,
couples who are in trouble and you felt this I'm sure feel a sense of loss,
a loss of expectations on what my marriage was going to be. Uh,
maybe you have a loss of, of trust in your marriage.
Maybe you've lost respect.
Maybe you feel right now that you're all alone are invisible in your marriage.
And, and like you've been devalued in and perhaps your spouse,
uh, has found somebody else or perhaps they don't want to be involved in the
marriage were in the world. He began well, Gary Keller, uh,
outlines a tremendous concept in this book. Uh,
the one thing by stating a question,
what's the one thing you need to do the doing of which will make the doing of
other things you need to do either unnecessary or easier.
And I'll repeat that cause it's kind of confusing.
So if you wake up on Monday morning and you want to work on your marriage,
you want to get your spouse back. You want to revitalize your marriage.
What do you need to do? He said,
write down the one thing you need to do this week,
the main thing you need to do, one thing, everybody can do.
One thing that you need to do that would make the doing of other things,
either easier or unnecessary.
And it gives this incredible, incredible, uh,
thing of energy that's produced when dominoes,
when those four and a half million dominoes are produced, you know,
we're knocked down. And the one thing about knocking that first domino down,
it exerted a force of some 95,000 joules of
energy. Now that Juul is spelled J O U L E S.
I learned that because I Googled it. You know, I'm not that smart. Maybe,
you know what a Juul of energy is. I don't understand it all,
but I do understand that 95,000 joules of energy is a lot of force. It's,
it's the force that's created when 4 million dominoes,
they start knocking over each other and there's a force and an energy that,
that, that gets going. And so in the book, scientists or, you know,
engineers or, uh, other it's people, you know,
who study this stuff,
say that one domino can not go over another domino one and a half times its size
one domino can knock over. And if you started with the two inch domino,
it's about that big then if the next domino was one and a half times its size,
which would be three inches. And the next domino was one and a half times,
the size of the three inch would be four and a half inches.
And if the next domino, well, you get the idea.
I don't know what the fourth domino would be one and a half times four and a
half quick, quick, what is it? Tell me, yeah, me neither. Right? So,
but if each domino was one and a half times the size of the previous domino,
do you know that after 10 dominoes that 10th domino would knock over a
domino? The 10th domino would be as, as tall as Peyton Manning,
that quarterback used to play for the cults. And then the Broncos.
You remember Peyton Manning? Uh, I don't know how tall Peyton Manning is.
I think he's six foot four or something like that.
And I don't know why Keller picked the Manning.
Cause right now he's not a very good football player because he's retired.
He doesn't play anymore. He does great commercials,
but the 10th domino would be as tall as Peyton Manning.
The 18th domino would be as tall as the leaning tower of PISA,
the 23rd domino, as tall as the Eiffel tower,
the 31st domino would be 3000 feet above
Mount Everest. That's how big it would be. The 31st domino.
If you started with a two-inch domino in each domino is one and a half times the
size of the previous one,
the 57th domino would be as tall as from the earth to the
moon. Check it out. I did.
I'm a skeptic. I'm cynical. Sometimes I'll want to know if it's really true.
If I read it in a book, is it true? So take two inches,
times 1.5 times 1.5 and you'll see that the 57th
domino is about the size of,
from the earth to the main that's how big it would be.
So what does that have to do with your marriage? When you get overwhelmed,
you don't know what to do. The old mantra that we, we,
we repeat at marriage helper a lot and that others do is do
the right thing.
So I want to boil that down to do the next right thing,
whatever the next right thing is, do only what you can do,
do the next right thing. In other words,
not go over the two inch domino.
That's how you start and use do that every day.
You do it every day.
Knock over the two inch domino and see what happens. Uh,
I want to read to you this, this quote on page it's,
it's paid 16 of this book. So when you think about success, shoot for the moon,
that's 57. Domino's that,
that domino from earth to the moon is a huge domino.
If you start with the 57th domino,
you're going to run on your marriage recovery.
You're going to run into that domino and try to knock it over.
You'll probably break your back and metaphorically.
You might break your emotional back. You can't do everything in one day.
Start with a two inch domino toppling dominoes is pretty
straightforward. You land them up.
You tip over the first one in the real world low.
It's not that simple. No,
it's not to revive your marriage to rebuild your marriage,
to hang in there.
When you're fighting for your marriage sometimes gets real messy. Doesn't it?
It drains you emotionally.
It's not as simple as knocking over a domino, but listen to what he says.
The challenge is that life doesn't line everything up for us and say,
here's where you should start highly successful. People know this.
So every day they line up their priorities, a new,
they find the lead domino and they walk away at it until it falls.
Did you get that? You get up in the morning.
What's the one thing you need to do today to improve yourself,
to work on your pies, to share facts and fee.
What's the one thing you need to do to get back on the love path.
What's the one thing you need to do to take care of yourself.
What's the one thing you need to do to the one thing,
why does this approach work? He says,
because extraordinary success is sequential. Not simultaneous.
What starts out as linear becomes geometric.
Think about that. You do the right thing, and then what you do,
you do the next right thing, the right thing,
my maybe getting up and washing your face.
The right thing might be going to a gym. The right thing might be eating, right?
The right thing might be taking care of yourself today by
going out and having fun with a friend
over time, doing the next right thing adds up in the gym.
Metric potential of success is unleashed.
Now listen to this next sentence. The domino effect applies to the big picture.
Like your marriage, your marriage struggles, your marriage strategy.
It applies to the marriage. Success builds on success.
And as this happens over and over,
you move toward the highest success possible.
The key is that it's over time. That's the key success is built.
Sequentially. It's one thing at a time.
So you hear the stories of these marriages that have been where you are,
and then they've somehow made it. And now they're living,
they're living a really good marriage relationship.
They're living in that great relationship and you say, okay, I want that.
How do you, how did they get there?
I'll tell you how they get there doing the next right thing,
knocking over the two inch dominoes.
So the solution is to start
every day, start again and do the next right thing.
The marriage helper workshop,
the solo workshop that there that we're offering. Now,
marriage helper can be a great resource if you're,
if you have a reluctant spouse and they're not about to come to the workshop,
if you're a married couple, come to that workshop,
the online workshop is powerful.
I've seen the online workshop and the in-person,
the online workshop is just incredible. Whether it's the solo,
if that fits you are the couples workshop.
And there are so many things online that can help.
You do the next right thing. So be sure you subscribe to the,
to the marriage helper channel. Be sure you, uh, on YouTube, uh,
visit our website, marriage helper.com.
Call us at eight six six nine Oh three nine nine zero.
Call us at marriage helper.
They're our client reps that will help you get started.
That might be the next right thing you do is pick up the phone and call marriage
helper or,
or sign up for a solo workshop or a couples workshop,
but start do something. Do the next right thing.
Don't forget. When you feel overwhelmed,
knock over that two inch domino, have a great day.
[Inaudible].