Sunday, August 17, 2008
Tip of the Week of August 18, 2008
When your spouse has a complaint, keep from offering your alternative view or a counter-complaint. Just get a better understanding about their complaint and why it is a problem for them.
Monday, August 11, 2008
Tip of the Week of August 11, 2008
Everyone has complaints about their partner. If the complaint is bothersome enough to talk about, find a way to begin softly, maybe with a compliment or as a request for what you want rather than a complaint about what you don’t like.
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Falling In and Out of Love
The way that most people get to our blog these days is through searching out words such as “no longer in love,” “why do people fall out of love” “why do people stop trying” and other variations on this dilemma. We also meet with many couples where one or both of the partners are struggling with recapturing old feelings of love. What a painful time for both people … and it presents such a struggle.
Trying to recapture those feelings of love can be like insomnia … the harder that you try to fall asleep … the more awake you feel. The harder that you try to fall back in love, the more you may notice times of not feeling in love. The more that you try to push those thoughts and feelings of distance out of your mind, the more present that they seem.
The more someone struggles with these feelings, the harder it becomes for the spouse because she, or he, feels that distance and the natural inclination is to try to pull their partner closer. Then the pursuit begins and couples engage in a dance that involves one trying to get closer and the closer that one tries, the more that their spouse pulls back as he or she feels pressure.
Bill and Sandy struggled with this when their children were very young and both were working a lot of hours. It seemed that there was no time to devote to their relationship and they felt distance develop. Both were also tired a lot of the time and their conversations frequently turned to nagging and complaining about the common couple issues of housework, child care, money and sex.
Many of their problems were never resolved but they also continued to surface and slowly but surely their goodwill and friendship eroded. Neither of them wanted to give up on the marriage, mainly because of the children, but both agreed that they had lost feelings of passion and love for each other. When one of them wanted to try, the other had little interest and they just became more stuck and more unhappy.
Bill was the one to finally decide that he needed to do whatever it took to change things in the marriage; however, even with the many changes that he made, it took Sandy months to notice or acknowledge them. He found the courage and patience to persist; however, and made the many changes that he knew she wanted. He focused on rebuilding their friendship, not pressuring her, just being open to her much slower progress.
Both are in a much better place today … and can look back on this time as one that might affect many couples at their stage of life. They are very glad for themselves, as well as their children, that they were able to hang in and turn things around.
Do you have stories to tell about your change of feelings … or of your spouse? Please share them with us.
Trying to recapture those feelings of love can be like insomnia … the harder that you try to fall asleep … the more awake you feel. The harder that you try to fall back in love, the more you may notice times of not feeling in love. The more that you try to push those thoughts and feelings of distance out of your mind, the more present that they seem.
The more someone struggles with these feelings, the harder it becomes for the spouse because she, or he, feels that distance and the natural inclination is to try to pull their partner closer. Then the pursuit begins and couples engage in a dance that involves one trying to get closer and the closer that one tries, the more that their spouse pulls back as he or she feels pressure.
Bill and Sandy struggled with this when their children were very young and both were working a lot of hours. It seemed that there was no time to devote to their relationship and they felt distance develop. Both were also tired a lot of the time and their conversations frequently turned to nagging and complaining about the common couple issues of housework, child care, money and sex.
Many of their problems were never resolved but they also continued to surface and slowly but surely their goodwill and friendship eroded. Neither of them wanted to give up on the marriage, mainly because of the children, but both agreed that they had lost feelings of passion and love for each other. When one of them wanted to try, the other had little interest and they just became more stuck and more unhappy.
Bill was the one to finally decide that he needed to do whatever it took to change things in the marriage; however, even with the many changes that he made, it took Sandy months to notice or acknowledge them. He found the courage and patience to persist; however, and made the many changes that he knew she wanted. He focused on rebuilding their friendship, not pressuring her, just being open to her much slower progress.
Both are in a much better place today … and can look back on this time as one that might affect many couples at their stage of life. They are very glad for themselves, as well as their children, that they were able to hang in and turn things around.
Do you have stories to tell about your change of feelings … or of your spouse? Please share them with us.
Sunday, August 3, 2008
Tip of the Week of August 4, 2008
One advantage of marriage, it seems to me, is that when you fall out of love with each other, it keeps you together until maybe you fall in love again.
Judith Viorst
Judith Viorst
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Love Is A Choice
Have you seen the widely circulated email about making the choice to have a good or bad day? It starts out like this:
“John is the kind of guy you love to hate. He is always in a good mood and always has something positive to say. When someone would ask him how he was doing, he would reply, 'If I were any better, I would be twins!' He was a natural motivator. If an employee was having a bad day, John was there telling the employee how to look on the positive side of the situation.
“Seeing this style really made me curious, so one day I went up and asked him, 'I don't get it! You can't be a positive person all of the time. How do you do it?'
“He replied, 'Each morning I wake up and say to myself, you have two choices today. You can choose to be in a good mood or ... you can choose to be in a bad mood. I choose to be in a good mood. Each time something bad happens, I can choose to be a victim or ... I can choose to learn from it. I choose to learn from it. Every time someone comes to me complaining, I can choose to accept their complaining or ... I can point out the positive side of life. I choose the positive side of life.
“'Yeah, right, it's not that easy,' I protested.
“'Yes, it is,' he said. 'Life is all about choices. When you cut away all the junk, every situation is a choice. You choose how you react to situations. You choose how people affect your mood. You choose to be in a good mood or bad mood. The bottom line: It's your choice how you live your life.'”
Love can also be a choice. You can wake up in the morning and choose to think about the bad things about your partner and everything that you do not like about him or her or you can choose to think about the good things about your partner, the things that you like and want to continue.
You can choose to think about the problems in your relationship as ones that may be fairly normal and ones that the two of you must work together to solve. You can choose to recognize some of the differences as normal ones that many couples face.
You can choose to let go of some of the small things as differences that you have to accept about your spouse or you can choose to let them build up until you are monumentally unhappy. You can choose to evaluate differences and decide which ones need to be talked about and worked through and which ones need to be just accepted as differences between you.
Couples in long-term healthy relationships say that they have seen each stress as something that they have to get through together rather than as something that might end their marriage. The view and attitude that you have colors your feelings. You have a choice in how you view your relationship.
“John is the kind of guy you love to hate. He is always in a good mood and always has something positive to say. When someone would ask him how he was doing, he would reply, 'If I were any better, I would be twins!' He was a natural motivator. If an employee was having a bad day, John was there telling the employee how to look on the positive side of the situation.
“Seeing this style really made me curious, so one day I went up and asked him, 'I don't get it! You can't be a positive person all of the time. How do you do it?'
“He replied, 'Each morning I wake up and say to myself, you have two choices today. You can choose to be in a good mood or ... you can choose to be in a bad mood. I choose to be in a good mood. Each time something bad happens, I can choose to be a victim or ... I can choose to learn from it. I choose to learn from it. Every time someone comes to me complaining, I can choose to accept their complaining or ... I can point out the positive side of life. I choose the positive side of life.
“'Yeah, right, it's not that easy,' I protested.
“'Yes, it is,' he said. 'Life is all about choices. When you cut away all the junk, every situation is a choice. You choose how you react to situations. You choose how people affect your mood. You choose to be in a good mood or bad mood. The bottom line: It's your choice how you live your life.'”
Love can also be a choice. You can wake up in the morning and choose to think about the bad things about your partner and everything that you do not like about him or her or you can choose to think about the good things about your partner, the things that you like and want to continue.
You can choose to think about the problems in your relationship as ones that may be fairly normal and ones that the two of you must work together to solve. You can choose to recognize some of the differences as normal ones that many couples face.
You can choose to let go of some of the small things as differences that you have to accept about your spouse or you can choose to let them build up until you are monumentally unhappy. You can choose to evaluate differences and decide which ones need to be talked about and worked through and which ones need to be just accepted as differences between you.
Couples in long-term healthy relationships say that they have seen each stress as something that they have to get through together rather than as something that might end their marriage. The view and attitude that you have colors your feelings. You have a choice in how you view your relationship.
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Tip of the Week, July 28, 2008
What you look for is what you get. Look for the positives in your partner and your relationship and comment out loud about them.
Monday, July 21, 2008
Is Divorce Contagious?
We have often remarked that, when clients refer their friends, the dilemmas are often similar. We are not sure what makes that happen; however, we do know that connections with other people influence ideas and experiences.
When you are connected to someone who is unhappy in their marriage, and that is a focus of some of the conversation, it can be easier to notice what is wrong with your own marriage. As people make decisions about their marriage, it may give others the idea that they can do the same. Some said that they found the courage to divorce after seeing their friends manage that difficult step and survive. Others have said that they wanted to stay away from friends who divorced because they feared that it would make it easier for them to give up trying to change things in their own relationships.
In a 2002 Swedish study, Yvonne Aberg, a sociologist at Stockholm University, found that as the proportion of recently divorced co-workers increased, so did the chances that other married workers would divorce. Aberg also found that men and women were 75 percent more likely to divorce during this period if they worked in an office consisting mainly of people of the opposite sex and of the same age. In addition, the more single people working in an office, the higher the divorce rate.
Surrounding your own relationship with others who believe that problems exist and are meant to be worked out can enhance your marriage. Spending time with others who are mature and committed spouses channels activities and conversation into ideas of healthy coupling. Talking with friends and family about the good things in your relationship and, if you need some advice, framing it in a way that imparts the message that you want some ideas for how to solve a problem, not just complain about what is wrong, also supports finding ways to have and maintain a healthy marriage.
When you are connected to someone who is unhappy in their marriage, and that is a focus of some of the conversation, it can be easier to notice what is wrong with your own marriage. As people make decisions about their marriage, it may give others the idea that they can do the same. Some said that they found the courage to divorce after seeing their friends manage that difficult step and survive. Others have said that they wanted to stay away from friends who divorced because they feared that it would make it easier for them to give up trying to change things in their own relationships.
In a 2002 Swedish study, Yvonne Aberg, a sociologist at Stockholm University, found that as the proportion of recently divorced co-workers increased, so did the chances that other married workers would divorce. Aberg also found that men and women were 75 percent more likely to divorce during this period if they worked in an office consisting mainly of people of the opposite sex and of the same age. In addition, the more single people working in an office, the higher the divorce rate.
Surrounding your own relationship with others who believe that problems exist and are meant to be worked out can enhance your marriage. Spending time with others who are mature and committed spouses channels activities and conversation into ideas of healthy coupling. Talking with friends and family about the good things in your relationship and, if you need some advice, framing it in a way that imparts the message that you want some ideas for how to solve a problem, not just complain about what is wrong, also supports finding ways to have and maintain a healthy marriage.
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