COUPLES
A successful partnership demands so much of us: compassion, forbearance, curiosity and vulnerability to name just a few of the requisite traits. It is unquestionably easier to write off problems in relationships to deficiencies in our partners, or simply to the lack of a “good fit”. The struggle to restore mutual credibility and good faith is indeed difficult. However, I believe there were good reasons for both our initial attraction and eventual choice to commit to each other; we are not in the relationship we are in by accident.
Couples therapy offers the opportunity to untangle how our own participation may be consciously and unconsciously creating turmoil. In fact, the parts of our partners that drive us most crazy often mirror disowned parts of our own selves that we have the greatest difficulty loving. In this way, the moments we are most frustrated by our partners offer us important insight into our own minds and histories…if we are willing.
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Become more curious about the things you believe you know for certain about your partner.
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Learn to interrupt repeating fights. Getting lost in the specific content of a particular fight often misses the larger theme. Learn how to go back over fights to learn where you and your partner became derailed.
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Discover these themes of frustration and hurt from your own individual history that get played out in the drama of a committed relationship… and how these themes are often mirrored/reciprocated/complemented perfectly by your partner.
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Learn to identify when you have become locked into zero sum gain arguments in which no matter who wins, the relationship suffers. Learn how to fight while inflicting less damage.
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Learn how to keep trying to imagine the other’s mind/experience…. Even when you are really angry with them. Aim to be kind even when you don’t really feel like it.
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Learn to identify what’s actually at stake in a given moment, both for you as well as your partner.
Even when hurt and angry, or even disinterested, can you remember that your partners feelings may actually feel just as bad as your own? And perhaps more importantly, can this matter?
"We are never so defensless against suffering as when we love."
– Sigmund Freud
"Love is a fire/It burns everyone/It disfigures everyone/It is the world's excuse for being ugly."
– Leonard Cohen
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“I want to do with you what spring does with the cherry trees.”
– Pablo Neruda