We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Ashley Briggs a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Ashley thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Can you share a customer success story with us?

I work for a non-profit that strengthens marriages and families through relationship education. One of my favorite things we do is provide marriage retreats for military marriages and families. We offer a program called Adventures in Marriage, which is implemented over a 3-day weekend, with all expenses paid for the service members and their families. During these retreats, we see a lot of marriages that are struggling. As you can imagine, military life is stressful and not many know how to cope with the weight of their jobs. As you can imagine that makes military service men and women highly susceptible to loneliness, which is a leading indicator for suicide. During the Adventures in Marriage weekend, we teach couples 4 different skills that will help them connect; a skill for communication, one for conflict resolution, one for bonding and one to teach them how to show negative emotion in a healthy way. These skills are practical and easy to implement which is why we are seeing overwhelming success over the last 7 years of providing the program. On one weekend we had a family who was in crisis. The wife had planned on serving the husband with divorce papers on Monday after the retreat but decided to come to the weekend for the free hotel, free food, and free childcare. The husband had also decided on something; he was never going to be served divorce papers. He also was going on the retreat for the free hotel, free food, free childcare and one last weekend as a family. He had planned on committing suicide as soon as they got back from the retreat rather than face the humiliation of getting divorced. But their experience with Adventures in Marriage turned it all around. This couple learned how to communicate, learned how to bond and felt like they had hope for the first time they could remember. Later on the husband confided in the Chapel staff, “This weekend didn’t just save my marriage, it saved my life. I am not kidding.” When I asked a Chaplain about this story, obviously moved by how impactful the retreat had been, he told me he couldn’t keep track of how many couples had come to him and told him the same exact thing. I was shocked. It is so powerful to be a part of a program that gives people the tools they need to learn how to love and how to be loved. Everyone is looking for love, everyone wants to be known, no one wants to be alone. The key is finding out the “how”, and that is what Adventures in Marriage can teach you.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I work for Live the Life, a non-profit that exists to strengthen marriages and families through relationship education. I started working here in high school, my dad actually started the company in 1998 and I needed a summer job. What started out as taking out the trash and cleaning toilets turned into the most incredible job I have ever had. I kept doing custodial work through high school, but I become interested in graphic design so I started helping in that department. Then I went off to college and got my degree in political science, worked for the Florida House of Representatives, did some private political consulting work and in the middle of all that was going through an abusive marriage that ultimately ended in divorce. That is what got me passionate about relationships. If I, who had been a part of relationship education classes my whole life, could get into an abusive marriage and get relationships so wrong, then there were probably a lot of others just like me. I became a student of the brain, of singleness, of marriage and all things relationships. I read so many books, I started writing a singles curriculum, I started teaching. Through all of that, I was also healing myself and growing. Eventually, I met my now husband and was able to finally do things the right way and have a healthy relationship. I’ll be the first to tell you marriage is incredibly hard, but the work is worth it, and thats also exactly how I feel about my job, it’s hard but so rewarding.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

I had to unlearn the thought that “speaking first means what you have to say is the most important”. Because I work for my dad I used to be desperate to prove myself, so I would jump in when any question was asked or brainstorming session was happening. This usually meant that I also thought I had the best ideas. My dad really helped me with this, he told me that I didn’t have to prove anything, that I was where I was because I earned it, not because I was his daughter. That was the security I needed. I started listening much more and speaking much less. I was able to think deeper on problems or ideas and come up with much better solutions. I would encourage any leader who thinks their worth comes from having to say something all the time, to remember that people want to be heard more than they want to be talked at. You will learn a lot more and gain a lot more respect if you listen first and speak after.

How do you keep your team’s morale high?

I once read that an employee’s number one complaint in all sectors of business is that they do not feel appreciated. Reading that can be harsh, but probably a wake up call. How often do we take time to stop and appreciate the people under us for the work they do? On my team I make appreciations part of the agenda, we always start with an open floor for people to appreciate one another, I try and go first and find something, big or small. that I can appreciate about each person on my team. This doesn’t just foster a healthy work environment it also allows us to get to know each other. At the end of the agenda is Wishes, Hopes and Dreams. This is another way for me to get to know my people, see what makes them tick, and what are they excited about. Yes, it takes a little longer to do our meetings than other companies, but if my team isn’t unified and cohesive it’ll take a lot longer to try and fix that or retrain new people because of constant turnover. People excel when they are cared for well.

Contact Info:

• Website: livethelife.org
• Instagram: @livethelife_org
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Livethelifeministriesorg
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@livethelifeministries
• Other: https://open.spotify.com/show/2a2PjtOcX2tPjrngwNd0Ts