Sometimes, people say that if a couple can survive building a house together (with all the countless decisions to face and agree on), their marriage is pretty strong. We can report that the same can be said about writing a book together. In fact, in the first decade of our marriage, we did both. Whew! I guess you could say we practiced peacemaking in action.

The two of us are vastly different in nearly every way—our backgrounds, where we are on the introvert/extrovert scale, how we communicate, how we react under stress, how quickly we process information, and more. Co-writing Great Peacemakers definitely gave us chance after chance to practice what we were writing about—honoring diversity and peacemaking! In fact, as far as adventures in peacemaking go, some days it felt like we were climbing Mt. Everest!

But, we believed in the project and each other. When we disagreed, we managed to hang in there and work it out. We did not compromise, with one person giving in to the other. Instead, we took time to find solutions we were both comfortable with. In the end, we truly believe the book is much stronger and appeals to a wider range of readers than if only one of us had written it. Plus, the process brought us closer together and strengthened our relationship. As with the book, we are better and stronger together than we would be apart.

So, when we say that creating the book was a labor of love, it is in two ways: we loved learning and writing about these amazing visionaries, and the process strengthened our love for each other.

Have you had an experience like this? How was it?