We spend a lot of our marriages thinking that “becoming one” means, “You’ll become more like me. And once you become more like me, then we’ll become one.” Instead, what if you could say to your spouse, “I can love you just the way you are without having to change you.” If that’s the kind of oneness you want for your marriage (present or future), grab your Java and pull up a chair with Juli and Hannah.
Prefer to listen? Listen to the full episode here.
Juli (00:00.11)
Hey, welcome to Java with Juli. I’m Juli Slattery and this podcast is a production of Authentic Intimacy, which is a ministry helping people make sense of God and sexuality. Today we are going to talk about what oneness in marriage actually looks like. Maybe some myths of oneness and how you can work towards oneness in your own relationship. Or maybe you’re single and you’re just curious about what does healthy oneness in marriage look like? And joining me to have this discussion is the one, the only Hannah Nitz.
Hannah
Hmmm about oneness. You know what? I’m going to be married 15 years this year. And on the way here, I talked to my husband about, said, I’m recording on oneness. What should I say? And he said, just take notes. We still got things to learn, yeah, I’m excited.
Juli
Well see, I’m 30 years married, so it’s the last 15 where you figure it out apparently.
Hannah
Okay, I’m excited about that. The word oneness is a funny word because you don’t use it that much in regular life. You’re right. Is that a Bible word? Is that from a Bible verse? I don’t know. Or is that just like a Christian?
Juli (01:05.78)
I don’t even really feel like we use it that much in Christian life. It’s all but unity becoming one. I don’t know.
Hannah
What else could we say? That’s good summary. I was just trying to brush it out a little bit more. Oneness doesn’t roll off the tongue.
Juli
How are we in our oneness?
Hannah
But anyway, that’s kind of what we’re talking about. And we’re going to start with just kind of some myths or truths about onenesses. It’s a weird word to say, but we are going to define it. It’s something, I mean, two become one, the two shall become one. That’s a Bible.
Juli
It says one flesh. So yeah, that definitely happens
Hannah (01:48.984)
But it’s was exciting. Maybe more exciting if instead of one-ness, we’re saying we’re talking about one-
Juli
We talk about one flesh quite a bit here at Authentic Intimacy.
Hannah
The new tagline of your ministry. There you go. Okay, so let’s just talk about some myths and some truths about this oneness. Yeah. Myth number one. I’m going to say the myths and then how about you hit me with the truth.
Juli
Okay, that’s cool. Okay. Yeah.
Hannah
Myth number one on this oneness. Healthy couples will always agree.
Juli (02:17.358)
Oh my goodness, not true. Yeah, it is a myth.
Hannah
Yeah. And that is a myth… They’ll always agree, at least on the big issues.
Juli
No, I don’t think they even always agree on the big issues. I think the myth is as you become one, you always will agree. Like the goal is to always agree. And the research even shows that up to 70 % of things a married couple disagrees about are never going to change.
Hannah
Whoa, I do not like that statistic.
Juli
I know that’s pretty crazy, huh? So there are so many things for example that Mike and I disagree on and early in marriage it was like we have to come to a place of “You need to think like I do or I need to think like you do”, and instead what we’ve learned is that actually we can pursue oneness while we still will never see eye to eye and a lot of things But we’ve learned how to take his perspective of my perspective and make decisions together even when we’re not always going to see eye to eye.
Hannah
Wow! Yeah, I feel like when you’re dating, you value so much how different you are. And then once you get married, that somehow becomes a little annoying. Like, yeah, you somehow desire this complete agreement and thinking that that’s going to produce better you.
Juli (03:34.894)
Yeah, and Mike and I disagree on a lot of big things like our philosophies of work. We disagree on our philosophies of money, rest, like all these things that we really see life differently and those things come up in daily decisions and they used to create like tons of conflict but we’ve really learned to settle into the fact that it’s okay to have different philosophies on those things. And actually, it helps us be balanced. As I learn from him, he learns from me, but we still have different ways of approaching a lot of things.
Hannah
Well, you know what? That’s a comforting myth. So oneness does not mean totally granted. We received that. Okay, let’s hit you with another one, Juli. You have no identity apart from your spouse.
Juli
Yes, uh-huh. Yeah, I think that happens in some marriages and that’s not healthy. Yeah, I don’t think that’s healthy oneness.
Hannah
So we’re going to call that a myth.
Hannah (04:36.992)
For some reason, I just picture that that’s the way it’s supposed to be.
Juli
Yeah, I think so. I use the example of a unity candle with this one. And actually I first heard about this from Dr. Greg Smalley. He’s been on this podcast often. And he talked about how unity candles, what we do in a marriage ceremony with the unity candle sometimes gives us a wrong understanding of marriage. Because if you haven’t seen one, you’ve got a candle. Did you have one at your wedding?
Hannah
Juli this picture is killing me. It is so funny. I didn’t, but I have seen hundreds of them. I’m pretty sure.
Juli
So you can describe them.
Hannah
Yeah, you, well, it depends how dramatic you want to be. I’ve been to a lot of weddings where the moms of each person come and light their individual candles. Mother of the bride, mother of the groom. They like walk up their holding hands in their little dresses.
Hannah (05:30.934)
And then at some point throughout the ceremony, the husband and wife take a lighter and light a new candle.
Juli
No, they don’t take it lighter. They take the old candles and they together create a new one.
Hannah
Yeah. And then they blow out their candles. And they’re like, two have become one. Here’s our one flame. Same last name, same candle, baby.
Juli
There you go. Same last name, same flame. There you go. that’s good. It’s poetry.
Hannah (05:59.886)
So this is a bad picture? No offense to everyone who did that.
Juli
I mean, I think if you can look at that and say, I’m blowing out the life I had before you, then I think that’s healthy. But some people take it to where it’s almost like I’m blowing out myself. I’m blowing out my identity. Yeah, yeah, you’re the think of that. But in marriage, three things exist. The husband exists, the wife exists, and then they exist together.
Juli (06:32.014)
And so you don’t take your spouse to work with you and make decisions. Well, you do. I do. Yeah, I didn’t used to. I do now. But even within that, we can have different activities and different things we’re doing in life where it’s not always 100 % overlapping. And ultimately, I will not stand before God as a married couple with Mike. I’ll stand before him as an individual. I won’t be responsible for my marriage, I’m going to be responsible for how I stewarded my part in my marriage. And I think there are some situations where somebody totally feels like they get lost in their spouse, they lose their voice, they lose their perspective, they lose their sense of self, their own relationship with God to an unhealthy level. And so that is not the oneness God calls us to. Even when you look at Scripture, how many people in scripture are referred to in reference to their spouse?
Hannah
Wow, I’m like struggling to even think of that.
Juli
Like God doesn’t, there’s a few, but not many. Like God doesn’t speak to a married couple often. He speaks to an individual. And then the person, if they’re married, they have to work that out and walk that out with their spouse. But God doesn’t see us only as a married couple. He also sees us as individuals.
Hannah (07:51.458)
So if there’s three parts of our marriage, we light that unity candle, but the problem is we just shouldn’t blow out our individual candles.
Juli
Or just think of it as my life changed the day I married Mike. My future is wrapped up in him. So there’s a part of my old life is blown out, but I’m not blown out. I think that’s the distinction.
Hannah
That is a good distinction. Okay, so we’ve got a couple good myths so far. Let’s get one more in. This is a myth, I think, just like fueled day after day by the romance books of all, in my opinion. The cute movies, they’ll just like, things that look just adorable. All you need is each other. My spouse will complete me. This is my soulmate. It’s my best friend. That whole picture. And sometimes that somehow gets wrapped into our idea of this oneness or this unity.
Juli
Yeah.
Hannah
Of this person being everything. Right. Sounds beautiful.
Juli
Yeah. And honestly, like, this is probably the myth that most of us believe, especially in Western culture that, you know, like, I’m half a person, God created the other half, and I got to go find the other half. And then once I find that other half, like, we’re one, like, all my needs are met, I don’t really need good friends. Like, this person is going to give me a sense of purpose, identity, like, fill all my love needs. And so…
Hannah (09:21.006)
So you’re saying that’s a little too strong?
Juli
I would say it’s not at all right. I mean, first of all, I don’t think it’s like you’re looking for your other half. Like we are meant to be completing Christ in the body of Christ, like in the family of God. It’s not that a spouse is going to complete you, but also it’s putting so much pressure on that one relationship that it can’t hold.
Hannah
Interesting
Juli (09:53.686)
Like your spouse cannot always be your best friend, your confidant, your fun person, your serious person. You know, like you need community, you need other relationships and friendships. And I think a lot of the reason we see marriages fail, particularly in the younger years, like a lot of marriages are failing in the first seven years now, is because that myth gets blown apart and they don’t know how to do marriage without thinking of it that way.
Hannah
So those are some of those myths they’re talking about, things that you see in life and in your ministry, of often that people are getting tripped up on. So what is it that we actually signed up for with this oneness? What is that then?
Juli
Yeah, so it’s a few things. First of all, it’s a lifelong commitment. And the scripture makes that clear that this is not just a friendship that, as long as we feel good about each other, as long as our marriage is going well, we’re going to hang out. It is a covenant of saying, till death do us part. And it’s meant to mirror the covenant that Jesus has with us when He says, I’m never going to leave you or forsake you and so you are promising to be with this other person through life until death parts you, and that’s unlike any other relationship.
And the second thing I think that we’re promising is we’re promising that we’re going to have some forms of exclusive intimacy. And obviously the sexual piece of it is the one that is most obvious, that sexuality and what we share in terms of sexual intimacy and all that, that is between husband and wife exclusively, that you don’t cheat on your spouse, that this is between the two of you. But there are other areas of exclusivity, you in terms of honoring each other. You know, if I have really good news to share and I don’t call Mike first, like, that’s going to be hurtful to him. Like, he wants to be my first person. I want to be his.
Juli (11:55.63)
Like, there’s certain aspects of emotional intimacy that particularly if you begin sharing it with somebody who is the opposite sex that feels like a violation of the sacred space that you’re forming as a husband and wife. So you’ve got that piece of it.
And then finally, marriage is sharing everything. Like you share a name, you share children, you share a home, you share your finances.
Hannah
A lot of sharing. That’s a really big word.
Juli
It’s like I don’t do that with any other friend. You share a bathroom. There’s no secrets. Yeah, we’re all in. It’s not like here’s my money and your money. This is ours. And so it’s a call to a shared life now. And so if I were to boil it down of what that oneness looks like, those are the main things.
Hannah
Yeah, and those are different from some of those romanticized pieces at the beginning. I mean I remember probably 12 or 13 years ago at this point, you writing a blog called, “My Spouse Is Not My Best Friend”. I just remember reading that for the first time and thinking, I don’t think anyone’s ever said this before. That feels controversial. And instead you kind of talked about these other pieces of like, no, this is what you’re signed up for, but it isn’t this some of these myths you talked about, just like, you know, they have to be my everything.
Juli (13:14.144)
Yeah. And there are seasons where your spouse may be your best friend. And that’s amazing. That’s great. But when we start defining marriage and oneness as it always has to look this way is when we put too much pressure on that relationship and where we get disillusioned when it’s not that.
So in some of that Juli, you’ve talked through these like four pieces that you do see in building this, like more of this marital oneness. So talk us through like some of those pieces.
Juli
Like how do we actually have oneness?
Hannah
It’s one of those things that as you hear someone talking about it, you think, yeah, I’m probably doing that. Then you take a step back and are thinking, well, are we just sharing a lot of stuff or is it actually oneness? One of the first ones you talk about is just this idea of trust. That is a big one. You slice it right there at number one.
Juli
Yeah, so the most important thing you can build in marriage is a sense of trusting each other. Like if you start hiding, lying to each other, like nothing else is going to work.
Hannah (14:23.288)
Yeah, that fights against any idea of one.
Juli
Yeah, it really does. so, you know, none of us when we get married are like perfectly trustworthy, like we have character issues we got to work through, you’re not sure if you trust this person yet. And it takes time to build that. But even in the early stages of marriage, like if you’re dishonest with each other, if you hold back, if you feel like your spouse is keeping a secret from you, like that really starts to undermine that oneness because oneness is built on a sense of trust.
Like, I can share everything if I can trust you. Not just share everything physically or materially, but share my heart. And so protect and nurture trust, nurture the heart. I think when married couples are struggling and they go to a marriage intensive, which I highly recommend, the main goal of that intensive is to help each other see your heart again. Because after years of living together, you can build up all these defenses and you forgot the beauty of the person’s heart. And when your hearts can feel safe together like anything is possible.
Hannah
Man, yeah, I didn’t think of that picture of like the heart, seeing their heart, but that’s so much connected to that trust. Like that person you agreed to marry, fell in love with, like made this commitment with. There was such a deep trust in that, of where you were at then and what was to come. Yeah. Yeah. It’s beautiful.
Juli (15:58.894)
Well, hey friend, I’m taking a quick break from our conversation to let you know that registration for summer Online Book Studies is open. I’d encourage you to grab your spot today in one of our groups going through my new upcoming book called “Surrender Sexuality”. That’s right, you can be one of the first to read it. Plus we’ve got groups that are going through “God, Sex and Your Marriage”, “Finding the Hero in Your Husband”, “Surprised by the Healer”, “Her Freedom Journey”, and “Rethinking Sexuality”.
Now in these studies, you’ll take part in a weekly Zoom meeting, online discussions, and a live Q &A with the author, which is usually me. The deadline to register is June 14th, but don’t wait because some of these groups fill up really fast. Head to Authenticintimacy.com/online-book-studies or just click the link in the show notes and grab your spot today. Okay, now back to my conversation at the coffee shop.
Hannah (16:58.21)
Another piece that you’ve talked about is that our job, as hard as it is to say, is not to fix our spouse, but loving them. And just, you know, I think we all would agree with that, but sometimes we have just a little bit of a secret plan that we’re all working on.
Juli
Oh, we don’t all agree with that. I think we all get to the place where we realize we can’t fix our spouse. And so we give up. I mean, I don’t know if it’s true guys, but what woman has gotten married and not had like a secret agenda of, I got to fix the way he eats, dresses, talk to him. All of it. Like, I want him to be more like me. I really think this comes out in parenting too.
Juli (17:44.896)
Like it took me a lot of years to realize that I actually wanted Mike to be more of a mom, because I feel like as a mom, I get it, instead of recognizing, he’s different, dads are different, they approach things differently. And I think we can spend a lot of our marriage thinking that oneness means you have to become more like me. And once you become more like me, once you see money the way I do, and you see parenting the way I do, and you want to make decisions the way I want to make them, then we’ll become one. Instead of accepting your spouse for who they are, letting God work in your own heart and pursue oneness and, okay, I can love you just the way you are without having to change you.
Hannah
Juli, I literally had the best conversation today with a friend that was on this very topic. And him and his wife recently have adopted two girls, which is so exciting, so wonderful. And they’ve gone through this years of fostering and so much for this like sweet moment of having two amazing kids. And he was talking about at the beginning of fostering that they kind of got, you kind of get thrown into parenting. They didn’t have, you know, kids of their own.
They didn’t start with just one tiny baby. They start with a couple kids, elementary school age. Could you imagine? You’re just like day one of parenting, you know? And he said how much they were different in every area of parenting and how much it shocked them and how horrible it became in their house and in their marriage of just like everything, know, seeing each other different, feeling the other one was constantly doing it wrong. And he said, I don’t even know how to describe it, but now we are operating so much. Like we are on the same team and we’re different, but we’re like unified. And I just couldn’t get over what he was describing. And I was like, how did that happen? Like, how do you make that big of a shift? And it’s so much of what you’re talking about here when you’re not battling to make the other one more like you and literally learning to love and not fix, you know, like this unity in that way.
Juli (19:52.756)
And learning to appreciate what they bring. I look back on all the decisions that Mike and I have made over the years, some of them I’m still like, “You should have done it my way!” But I can also see, boy, if I didn’t have him, if I were just making decisions on my own, I would have been unbalanced. He really is a great balance for me and I’m a great balance for him. So it’s not just tolerating, but it’s appreciating the uniqueness of your spouse.
Hannah
That’s awesome. I just said yes to having backyard chickens. That was my husband’s request. That’s new. Never would have brought up if it was just me, but we said yes, we’re on the adventure.
Juli
Well, that kind of brings us to point number three, doesn’t it, Hannah?
Hannah
It kind of does. Let marriage do its work on you. Is that what it’s doing to me? One chicken at a time. Tell us more about that one.
Juli (20:47.084)
Yeah there you go. Yeah. You know, God has a plan in marriage and this call to oneness, and it’s not just the end result being a great marriage. It’s what happens inside of us on the journey to that. So, like, I remember probably like 10 years into my marriage, again, having frustrations that Mike wasn’t more like me, like, really thinking the way I knew how to do things was better than him.
Hannah
Which honestly guys, if you could just spend some time with Juli and Mike together, you’d really understand how big of a statement that is. It’s so great.
Juli
Yeah, we have to flesh that one out a little. What do you mean?
Hannah
You guys are just so different. are very different. Like moon and sun. We are. You are on different planets.
Juli
Yes, we are. But I still remember the place I was where it dawned on me, like, God just started to show me my pride in that. And I was like, ew. Oh yeah, that’s what that is. Like, that’s where all the anger is coming from is that I really am convinced that I do it better than he does. And he needs to become more like me. Marriage will show you how proud you are. It’ll show you how selfish you are. It’ll show you how angry you are.
Juli (22:01.574)
And if you receive that, like God showing you your heart through the process of becoming one, then what you get in the end is not simply the goal of a great marriage, He’s actually refining you to become a more surrendered person. Where, you know, if I hadn’t been married, I’m sure as a single God shows you things that are unique as well, but in marriage, in the Crucible, becoming one in marriage, there are all these character qualities that aren’t so great that come up as you’re trying to navigate how you’re different and how you’ve hurt each other and how you’re frustrated. And so, instead of pushing against that and being defensive with it, like actually saying to God, I receive it, like I’m going to let marriage do this to me, like show me where I’m selfish, show me where I’m fearful and lack courage, show me where I’m proud and I need to learn humility, and that becomes a beautiful gift that transcends marriage.
Hannah
It’s interesting as you’re talking about that though, Juli, because what you’re saying right there in those sentences is a conversation between you and God, and the practicality of it is being walked out between you and your husband. But the words, it’s this heart of humility between you and the Father.
Juli
It is, yeah. And so, that does have to be worked out in your own time with God, your own prayer life, and it overflows into treating your spouse differently.
Hannah (23:34.19)
Man, Juli, I remember one of the many conversations we’ve had on marriage and you told me that I need to work on asking my husband what growth areas he sees in me, in areas that I would be open enough to ask for that and receive it. Oof, man, it’s so hard. It is. It’s like, this is a really hard one for me. I don’t know between these four if everyone hits something different, but this idea of like letting it do its work on you, just the humility required in it is something that is always being pushed up against it for me.
Juli
Hey, I’m with you. I know, but it’s good once you embrace it.
Hannah
Yeah, it is. And then the last one that you landed on was in this idea of oneness and unity is really returning to what does unite you. So what does that look like?
Juli
Yeah, I think every couple needs to have the things that they come back to. know, like, what is it that holds you together? You’re have all these differences, but what does it mean to be on the same team? What is that team for? And I can think of 30 years of marriage and like there are four things, specific things that Mike and I have always agreed are what defines us. yeah.
Hannah (24:50.926)
Team Slattery, I like it.
Juli (24:55.724)
Yeah, so the first one is God, like, God is the most important thing in both of our lives. And that was true when we got married, but it’s even more so now as we’ve grown in our faith. And so, we trust the scripture. We’re always going to put God, this is about God first.
The second one is family. Like, we both love family, very intentional about family, whether it’s our extended family or our children. Like, we highly value that. We want to work through conflict instead of just writing people off in family.
The third one is something that my dad said to us at our wedding ceremony. I still remember he read something from 1 Peter and he said, “Mike and Juli, I charge you to be a blessing”. And so what does it look like to be a blessing to others in every season? Whether that’s our neighborhood or people we play pickleball with, or people we work with, like how can we be a blessing?
And then the fourth one is we’d love to have fun and adventure. Like we just have always been active together. Like we’re always doing something like an adventure race or traveling or, you know, like now lately it’s pickleball. Like we want to have that fun together. We play together. And if you look at the course of our 30 years in marriage, like those four strands have always been there and they’re going to be different for every couple. They don’t have to be Team Slattery.
Hannah
Don’t write those exact things down and just present them at dinner tonight.
Juli
But you as a couple really determining it like between three and five things what are the essential things that make us us? That we can keep coming back to like when we start to feel splintered man
Hannah (26:36.034)
Man I really love that one because it really does bring you back to this word we used at the very beginning of oneness. When you have those three to five things that’s like, this is who we are. This is what we care about and what we’re unified on.
Juli
And I’ll tell you Hannah, this is a process. Oneness is a journey. It’s a decision. It’s a direction you set yourselves on, but it’s an ongoing, every season of marriage, you have new challenges, you have new threats to your oneness, but it’s that determination to keep going forward together. So thank you for helping me flesh this out a little bit for our listeners.
Hannah
Anytime. And I took some notes. I’m ready to take them back to Caleb.
Juli
And to thank you for listening or watching this Java with Juli episode. We will have links in our show notes to some resources that can help you and your spouse pursue oneness as a couple. And as always, we’ll be back next Monday for more Java with Juli and I look forward to seeing you then.
