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    US Marines and loved ones participate in CREDO Retreat

    CAMP HANSEN, OKINAWA, JAPAN

    04.11.2021

    Story by Lance Cpl. Colton Nicks 

    31st Marine Expeditionary Unit       

    CAMP HANSEN, OKINAWA, Japan -- U.S. Marines with Marine Expeditionary Unit attend the Chaplain Religious Enrichment Development Operation retreat at the Marriott Okinawa Resort and Spa on April 9-11.

    Capt. Daniel Urban, a pilot with Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 262 (Reinforced), and his wife, Melissa Cramer, shared their experience of what it was like developing new relational skills and techniques while attending the retreat.

    “We learned about marriage specific communication, the sacrifices each other have taken and how to build on it,” said Urban. “Me and my wife are newly married, so it was good to learn how she communicates and how I can view her and myself.”

    CREDO provides regionally based religious ministry designed to assist the Marine Corps community in developing the personal, relational and spiritual resources necessary to increase the personal resilience of Marines and their families and enhance mission readiness.

    On the first night, Lt. Cmdr. Evan Adams, the Okinawa CREDO director, encouraged each participating couple to introduce themselves amongst the group. This was an opportunity to strengthen comfortability and familiarity in hopes of maximizing participation with the days to come.
    As the day was coming to an end, the couples engaged in a game-night. According to Urban it was his most memorable experience of the retreat because they could all just be like kids, have fun and not worry about work.

    Daniel and his wife, along with the other couples, took a personality test designed to discover their ‘color’; each color represents a specific communication type. By engaging in communication habits that align with one’s partner, it ultimately helps strengthen the relationship by allowing couples to understand how each other prefers to be spoken to.
    The second day was kicked off by dissecting unique aspects of what their color means.

    “Second day was just getting deeper into the four colors class, and just getting into the nitty gritty stuff,” said Urban. “She’s a blue, and I’m a gold. We dove into the negative attributes that occur when a partner's color is not fulfilled.”

    The third day the couples wrapped up what they learned with a class presented by Lt. Cmdr. Jeremy Blythe, the chaplain for 31s MEU. The participants listened as Blythe discussed his personal experiences with his wife and how they balance their own communication colors into a cohesive skill.

    Daniel explained that apart from spending three days at a gorgeous resort in Okinawa, his favorite part of the retreat was learning what his wife’s color was, giving him a newfound view of her, himself and their relationship.
    The retreat was a symbolic time of reconnection at the participants’ core relationships. Each day is uniquely designed to bring light to areas of a partnership that couples may have not yet unraveled and discovered.

    “The material was simple and fun and wasn’t very deep, so it gave you the surface of what to work on,” said Cramer. “It wasn’t so heavy where you didn’t have fun. It was just an awesome retreat.”

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    NEWS INFO

    Date Taken: 04.11.2021
    Date Posted: 06.06.2021 19:35
    Story ID: 398113
    Location: CAMP HANSEN, OKINAWA, JP

    Web Views: 92
    Downloads: 0

    PUBLIC DOMAIN