simcha's postings about love, connection, parenting & personal growth
California couples therapist Dr. Robert Solley writes about the need to be right as a significant single predictor of relationship failure.
When differences become contests of right and wrong, he writes, the essential feelings of safety and comfort that we seek in relationship get replaced with feelings of helplessness, mistrust, inadequacy and pain.
Part 2: The Art of Reconnecting
The skills we need to “work the relationship” by “working ourselves” inside the relationship are different from qualities prized in the “intervention from above” model — being right, being powerful. That flies out the window when we begin to think relationally.
The following two selections are from Terrence Real’s important book, How Can I Get Through to You? Closing the intimacy gap between men and women (2003). Relational therapist, lecturer and author Real looks at the “thousand cuts” that contribute to the death of a marriage and the “intimacy skill set” that is essential for reconnection.
Relationship and sex therapist Esther Perel notes that, much as one must be able to conjugate certain core verbs in order to speak a language, one must similarly practice seven basic relational verbs to sustain a satisfying friendship or relationship. In the bedroom, practicing these verbs becomes even more significant.
So many couples wish that the repair work might be done for them. They come into couples therapy hoping the therapist will quickly notice how very (very!) wrong their partner is in every way, how responsible that partner is for all the damage, distrust and ill will.
In her New York Times article, Great Betrayals (10.05.13), New York psychiatrist Dr. Anna Fels writes eloquently about the corrosive, confusing and life-altering impact of betrayal and deceit in a marriage.
She describes how lies eat away at the fabric of the betrayed partner’s past reality, creating the need — in order to move forward — for a new narrative that integrates both the good and the bad. The following is a selection from her longer article.
When our partner snaps at us, s/he is generally sending us a distress signal. That distress may be connected to an immediate need that is not being met; to a sense of being overwhelmed; to a feeling of inadequacy or of being misunderstood; or even to an old (painful or uncomfortable) family-of-origin dynamic or trauma that is being triggered.
Many partners find themselves in a dreadful state of ambivalence, unable to decide whether the positive aspects of their relationship sufficiently outweigh the negative aspects to warrant staying.