Nurturing Love and Respect in Marriage
Nuturing Love and Respect in Marriage
The Family: A Proclamation to the World reminds us that we have an obligation to love and serve our marriage partner. To love them effectively, we have to know and understand their inner world—their likes, dislikes, thoughts, and feelings. Taking the time to do this and then acting on what we learn is a powerful way to nurture love and respect in our marriage. Researcher John Gottman calls this process enhancing our "love maps."
What is a love map? Gottman says it's the part of your brain where you store important information about your spouse. It's like a mental notebook where you write down unique traits of your spouse and things about him or her you want to remember. It includes your spouse's dreams, goals, joys, fears, likes, dislikes, frustrations, and worries. Things like your husband's favorite breakfast cereal or the name of your wife's best friend are important "points" on the map.
Why are thorough love maps so important? Because they strengthen marriages. Couples with extensive love maps remember important dates and events, and they stay aware of their partner's changing needs. They constantly seek updates on what the other person is doing, feeling, and thinking. Being known in this way is a gift each partner gives the other, bringing great happiness and satisfaction. It also makes couples better prepared to cope with stresses on their marriage.
For example, in one study Gottman interviewed couples around the time of the birth of their first child. For 67% of couples this stressful event was accompanied by a significant drop in marital satisfaction. But the other 33% did not see such a drop, and many felt their marriages had improved. The difference was the completeness of the couples' love maps. "The couples whose marriages thrived after the birth had detailed love maps from the get-go. . . ," says Gottman. "These love maps protected their marriages in the wake of this dramatic upheaval."
Couples who had established a habit of finding out about each other's thoughts and feelings were likely to continue doing so at a time of change. Their deep knowledge about each other and their practice of staying in touch protected their relationships from being thrown off course. They grew to love each other more deeply because there was more about each other to love.
Here are some activities to help you nurture love and respect by expanding and using your love maps:
Play "Love Map 20 Questions" with your spouse. Together write down as many detailed, personal questions you can think of (at least 20). Include a wide range of questions from many different categories. Take turns asking each other questions from your list. Then see if you can answer the questions for each other by turning your questions around. Instead of asking "What is your dream vacation?" ask "What is my dream vacation?"
Keep score if you like, but keep the game lighthearted and fun, not competitive. Examples of the categories and questions you might ask include the following:
Family: Which of my parents do I think I'm most like? Why?
Friends: Name two of my best friends and how I met them.
Work: How do I feel about my boss? What would I change about my job?
Hobbies: What are my three favorite things to do in my spare time?
Dreams: What is one of my unrealized dreams?
Favorites: What is my favorite dessert? TV show? Sports team?
Feelings: What makes me feel stressed? When do I feel confident?
Exchange journals. For two consecutive weeks, keep a journal. Write something every day, even if it's brief. Try not to focus on your actions, such as "Today I went to the store and took the kids to soccer." Rather, focus on your thoughts and feelings-"I was really upset by the way Bob treated me at work today" or "I read an article today and it reminded me of. . . ." At the end of the two weeks, exchange journals.
Use your love map to show you care. Think of something special or unique about your spouse-something personal and specific, such as a talent, dream, favorite thing. Then turn that thought into a kind act for your spouse, such as making her favorite dish or clipping from the newspaper a course announcement about something that interests him. You might also write your spouse a note about one of their best qualities. For example, if your husband or wife is especially dedicated to his or her job, write a note saying how much you appreciate and admire this. Slip it into a briefcase or purse.
It's important that you not do something generic. The purpose of this activity is to show your spouse that you know and remember specific things about him or her. So don't just buy your wife some flowers-buy her yellow rose buds because you know those are her favorite.
Other examples:
During a visit to her in-laws, Ann found out that when her husband, Steve, was a little boy he always wanted his birthday cakes decorated like choo-choo trains. A few months later, she surprised Steve by making a train cake for his birthday.
Bob's favorite movie was playing at the local theatre. After work, Susan surprised him with pre-paid tickets for the evening show.
Bill's wife, Jill, loves to try new recipes. While he was picking up a few things at the store, he also picked up a cooking magazine.
Use your love maps to speak your spouse's "love language." Each of us likes to be loved in our own way, according to our own love language. Enhancing our love maps allows us to become more knowledgeable about our spouse's love language so that when we send a message intended as loving, it will be received as loving.
When we neglect to learn our partner's love language, it's easy to make mistakes when we intend to communicate love. For example, Robert got up at 5:30 one Saturday morning and washed, waxed, and polished the floors, cleaned the garage, cut the lawn, and planted flowers. He thought these actions were a great way to communicate love to his wife because for him, such actions communicate love. At noon he showered and was about to leave. As he walked out the front door, his wife said: "John, the least you could do is kiss me good-bye!" He thought he had already shown his love by doing the chores above and beyond what was expected, but her love language required affection. Without it, she did not truly feel loved.
Develop a "Caring Days" list. One way to learn to speak each other's love language is to practice "Caring Days," a technique developed by therapist Richard Stuart and clinically shown to strengthen marriages. Here's how to do it:
First, sit down together and develop a Caring Days list by agreeing on several behaviors or actions (say, nine for each partner) that you find loving and would like to receive from your partner. These actions must be:
1. Specific (such as "Tell me you love me at least once a day"),
2. Positive (not "Don't do this" or "Stop doing that"),
3. Small enough to be done on a daily basis (such as "Call me at work during lunch, just to see how I'm doing"), and
4. Not related to any recent conflict.
Second, agree to doing five of the actions on the Caring Days list each day for two weeks. Even if your partner doesn't follow through with his or her list, be patient and persist in doing your list.
Third, put the Caring Days list in a conspicuous place, such as on the refrigerator door or bathroom mirror. List the actions in a center column and your name on one side and your spouse's names on the other. When an action is received, note the date next to the action. This will help reinforce speaking one another's love language.
At the end of two weeks, evaluate how your relationship has changed.
An action one wife listed was a "daily back rub." He liked her to "snuggle up close to me when we sit together." Creating, keeping, then following a current Caring List reduces the guesswork in nurturing love and respect in marriage.
Improving Communication In Marriage
Wednesday, April 26, 2006
Improving Communication In Marriage
Do All Women Talk More Than Men?
Research suggests that the average woman speaks nearly three times as many words per day as the average man. Sex generalizations, however, are riddled with exceptions. As explained in Men: The Simpler Sex? marriages in which the typical gender strengths and weaknesses are reversed can be just as strong, exciting and challenging as other marriages. Since the more talkative partner is often the wife, this is the situation assumed in this webpage. If in your relationship the typical roles are reversed, you will still find the following helpful but in reading it you would have to see yourself as the opposite gender. That is as unfair as the many gadgets designed with only the right-handed user in mind. Just as being left-handed is as valid as being right-handed, so being in a relationship in which the male is the most communicative is as desirable as the opposite. Were it not for the vast numbers of webpages screaming in my head demanding to be written, I would craft a page specifically for these couples. Such a page would be essentially the same, of course, with the words husband and wife interchanged.
Understanding ‘The Strong, Silent Type’
Several factors railroad men into acting like the strong, silent type. One reason for many men clamming up is that they feel pressured to perpetuate the illusion that they are not quite human. As women feel shame about exposing stretch marks, so men find it humiliating to reveal their mistakes, fears and weaknesses. They suffer the compulsion to hide their normality because western society usually expects men to be abnormally free from human frailties. The oppressive myth as to what men should be like came about by expecting natural male strengths to be pushed to unnatural extremes. This misconception is so strong that few people seem to realize that what is expected of the normal man is, in fact, not normal. As individuals, men realize they don’t match the myth, but many hold the truth about themselves like a guilty secret, scared that if ever the truth slipped out they would be despised as much as if they suddenly started wearing high heels and dresses. Strength and silence travel together because silence is needed to maintain the illusion of strength.
Relative to most men, I have a kamikaze-like willingness to expose my flaws. My unusual behavior is partly driven by a yearning to help others, by understanding the value of the Christian virtues of honesty and humility, and by the realization that I cannot affirm Jesus as the ideal man if I have too negative a view of a man showing emotion. Nevertheless, before anyone shoots from the lip at her husband and implies all one needs is a dose of virtue to be open, we would do well to remember that most women are equally reluctant to humiliate themselves – it’s just that what humiliates women is often of a different nature to what humiliates their husbands. Is anyone who uses makeup to cover up the truth about her skin able to find a firm footing from which to throw mud at a man who wants to cover up certain truths about himself? Both genders find it exceedingly difficult to break the concrete of one’s upbringing and to prise oneself from the unrealistic expectations of society.
Furthermore, my own openness is partly due to defeatism – a quality no woman would want in her man. I am more willing than the average man to blab about my weaknesses because I have given up all hope of being popular or being regarded as a good specimen of manhood. The female equivalent is someone who has given up all attempts to make herself look attractive.
Unlike me, many men feel they still have a degree of respect in people’s eyes that would be further eroded if the truth got out. Living under such pressure is an enormous burden. Added to this is the even more vexing issue of self-respect. Some men fear they could barely cope with the devastation, should they admit their humanity even to themselves. If they are trying to suppress the truth from their own consciousness, it is little wonder that they have a desperate need to convince others that they have everything under control. The tragedy is that the weaknesses that fill them with shame are a normal part of being human. A female equivalent is women with normal bodies feeling ashamed that they are ‘overweight.’
Women are usually eager to admit to themselves that they have insecurities and so they crave the security that the ‘strong, silent type’ seems to offer them. When they get the man of their choice, however, they find themselves frustrated that he is so silent. Moreover, a wife often keeps her man clammed up because he senses that her need to feel secure and protected is such that despite what she may say, deep down she doesn’t really want to know how weak and vulnerable he is.
This is a significant factor that keeps a man from blabbing about his real self. But there is much more keeping him the strong, silent type.
The Male Brain
Another factor pressuring men to act like the strong silent type haunts me as much as it does other men and it will continue to affect me until I somehow manage to change the physical structure of my brain. Women reading my writings often imagine I would make a better companion than their own husband because I seem articulate. Actually, I am as untalkative (how’s that for a new word?) as the average man, and I assume most men find their verbal inadequacies as frustrating as I do. I labor over words so much that I feel almost forced to write because I am unable to string words together sufficiently to be the conversationalist I would like to be. Nevertheless, my writings demonstrate how much is locked within the average man. There are treasures that a skilful, patient woman could draw out of her man.
Brain science has uncovered genuine physiological reasons why talking is more taxing for most men than it is for most women. My sister was wonderfully articulate until struck by a brain tumor that affected her speech. She then started displaying the same sort of difficulties that I have always had. Just as the average woman can have difficulty keeping up with her man when it comes to brisk walking, so men suffer a physical disadvantage that makes it difficult for them keep up with the average woman at talking. When a man in a hurry is walking, his wife will keep up for a while, but in time she might find the pace increasingly uncomfortable. She is likely to tire quicker and begin to lag behind. Likewise, for the average man to keep up with his wife verbally takes a lot of effort and before long he will begin to tire.
Women find it confusing that in certain settings men are talkative, giving the impression that their men must have good verbal skills after all. For a short but helpful exploration of why this is, see Why the Life of the Party Clams up at Home.
Consider this analogy: especially in the early days of marriage, some young men have such a raging sex drive that they always seem in the mood for that side of marriage, whereas their new brides might occasionally match their husbands’ passion but usually everything has to be just right for them to be as quickly aroused as their husbands. Similarly, some women are quickly in the mood for talk but to get their husbands in the mood usually requires creating a conducive atmosphere and skilful selection of the right moment. A wife cannot expect much from her husband when, for example, he is tired or preoccupied or the subject does not animate him.
Every time a woman seizes the right moment to draw her husband into conversation will become a valuable time of bonding that will build her husband’s desire to share with her on future occasions. Conversely, whenever she squanders a critical moment by talking too much or crushing his feelings, it will not only gag him that time but it will make him more withdrawn on other occasions. Most wives who complain about their husbands not talking are unaware that for years they have contributed to the problem.
Opposites Attract
I once had a talkative woman in my life. I was drawn to her precisely because of her talkativeness. It meant there were no uncomfortable silences in our conversation. In time, however, the one-way nature of our conversation began to wear me down. Eighty percent of our conversation seemed to be her talking without her making the slightest attempt to ask about me. I felt the need for her to draw words out of me, like a masseuse easing tension out of a taut body. Even though we were exceptionally close friends, I still needed the assurance that I wasn’t imposing myself upon her by talking about myself or expressing my views. Perhaps, like men tend to assume their wives no longer need to be told they are loved, she kept assuming I didn’t need the invitation to speak, despite all my attempts to explain my need to her.
Even on the rare occasions she managed to think to ask, “How are you?” I would commence by giving the off-hand reply that most people expect when they ask that question. I hoped she would question me further, indicating a desire to really know about me, but she very rarely did. I believe she loved me deeply, but her need to talk seemed to swamp any desire to hear from me. I felt it was impolite to interrupt her, and usually her torrent of words meant that unless I were to interrupt and change the subject, I would have to wait half an hour or more into a conversation before a brief lull would allow me raise a subject of my own. Occasionally, I had something I particularly wanted to share with her but after the passing of such a period of time before my first opportunity to say anything, my yearning to share had sometimes completely drained from me. I was content when her monolog featured significant matters but by the time her talking had degenerated to inconsequential things, with still no invitation for me to speak, I was feeling that she considered it more important for her to jabber on about utter trivia rather than think of asking what was going on in my life. I’m sure her perception of her behavior was very different to the way I saw it. I knew she cared and so I kept tolerating her behavior, and yet it still took its toll on our friendship.
Of course, if he is willing to wait long enough, there are plenty of silences in a marriage during which a husband can have his say, but there are critical times when a man wants to share and if these occasions are missed he may well lose interest in talking when an opportunity finally arrives. So when a husband and wife get together after being separated for a few hours, it is good for the wife to ask how her husband is feeling and what he has experienced, and to show genuine interest by gaining eye contact and acting as if she is hoping for an answer. Often the man will not have much to say, but occasionally he will, and those times need to be nurtured.
Another habit to avoid is finishing his sentences for him. You might think you are helping but you are sending the message that he is verbally inadequate and that you are getting impatient with him. At times you’ll guess wrongly and only distract him and slow down his thinking process.
Wives Can Help – Or Hinder
There is a mysterious factor affecting how talkative a man is. Occasionally, I have met someone who almost miraculously turns me into a chatterbox. Normally, I would be bored talking about myself – after all, I am learning nothing new by the exercise – but with these people I have had a nearly uncontrollable desire to talk. I feel uncomfortable about hogging the conversation. To me, it feels ill-mannered and self-centered and I genuinely regret learning less about the other person than if I had spoken less, and yet still these rare people draw from me a torrent of words. I doubt that I have identified all the elements involved, but a key factor is that these people seem to listen intently. They seem to hang on to my every word, giving non-verbal signals, such as laughing at the right times, that make me feel I’m a witty, almost fascinating, conversationalist. Their interest is so convincing that it dispels my normal reservations. These people are not particularly talkative, so they allow lulls in the conversation that give me time to collect my thoughts and proceed. A more talkative person would jump in at that point and by their comments unintentionally take the conversation in a slightly different direction, causing me to lose my train of thought and hence lose the opportunity to contribute to that part of the conversation. Long silences in conversation make me feel uncomfortable, but with these people there are little silences in which they look to me in expectation of me saying something of value and, surprisingly, words come from my mouth.
So if you want your partner to talk more, listen hard. Hang on his every word. Value what he says. Agree with him as much as you possibly can. The very thought probably annoys you. ‘He doesn’t do that to me,’ you object. That is unfortunate. Realistically, however, which of you most needs to be coaxed to talk more? In many countries where narrow vehicular tracks wind up mountains, the road rule is that vehicles going down must give way to ones going up. This is a matter of common sense and courtesy, because it is much easier for a descending vehicle to start again. Talking is often as easy for women as coasting downhill, whereas for men it is like lumbering uphill. So, in conversation, a wise woman aware of her verbal superiority will give way to a man. Applying the brake frustrates her but she realizes that she finds starting again much easier than her husband does. So she tries not to interrupt him when he is speaking but she lets him interrupt her. This gives him greater ease in sharing and ends up more rewarding for both of them.
A wife who leaves her husband only the leftovers in conversations – the times she has lost interest in monopolizing the talking or run out of things to say – has no conception of how much of her marriage’s rich potential she robs herself of.
Timeless Wisdom
Verbal ability is a beautiful gift, but like a man’s physical strength, it can turn ugly if abused. Here’s some ancient wisdom that applies with equal force to both sexes:
Pleasant words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones.
A man finds joy in giving an apt reply – and how good is a timely word!
A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.
He who guards his lips guards his life, but he who speaks rashly will come to ruin.
Reckless words pierce like a sword, but the tongue of the wise brings healing.
A man of knowledge uses words with restraint . . . . Even a fool is thought wise if he keeps silent, and discerning if he holds his tongue.
He who answers before listening – that is his folly and his shame.
Do you see a man who speaks in haste? There is more hope for a fool than for him.
When words are many, sin is not absent, but he who holds his tongue is wise.
Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry.
A quarrelsome wife is like a constant dripping on a rainy day.
Better to live on a corner of the roof than share a house with a quarrelsome wife.
A gossip betrays a confidence; so avoid a man who talks too much.
Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.
SOURCE OF THIS WISDOM
Though thousands of years old, it is astounding to realize that these words have not only been acclaimed throughout history, but they are part of the modern world’s best seller. Like the rest of the Bible, they have truth and divine wisdom stamped all over them.
It might seem unfair that whoever finds talking easiest be the one who must keep her foot on the brake, but it makes a lot of sense. The tragedy is that many wives overpower their husbands with their talking skills, unwittingly acting like verbal bulldozers, and then have the hide to blame the men they have crushed, condemning them for finding talking to their wives less than enjoyable.
The wisdom of talkative wives giving way to their husbands in conversation applies not just in private but is equally important in public, unless the intention is to turn the man into a social recluse. In fact, for most couples in a group setting, the wife will benefit from working hard at drawing her man into the conversation. Steering the conversation toward subjects that interest him will help. Additionally, she could ask his opinion on whatever is being discussed, unless she thinks the topic of so little interest to him that it would only embarrass him to be asked. When she wants to inform friends about something both of them experienced, she could ask her husband to tell the story and try not to correct or add to his version. A wife with natural verbal superiority need not act this way but, having squeezed him out of much of the conversation, she also need not be surprised when he shows little interest in visiting friends with her.
Do Women have a Greater Need to Talk?
Another aspect of the gender difference in communicating is that women tend to process things by talking more than men do. The peculiar thing is that talking about a problem helps women resolve the matter even if, unknown to them, the other person is not even listening. More often for men, to talk is merely to repeat what one already knows. This makes it essentially boring and unproductive for the talker. For women, however, talking is closer to thinking out loud – and, of course, thinking about a problem can be very beneficial.
While women find talking therapeutic, men typically find it counterproductive. For men it is rarely comforting, nor a relief, to talk about their feelings. Men are almost expected not to have feelings, so for them to reveal the truth about their feelings exposes them to the risk of being regarded as being less ‘masculine’ than men are expected to be. Even reminding himself of his ‘unmasculine’ feelings can depress a man. And, rightly or wrongly, they see talking about past traumas as a failure to get on with life and merely perpetuating their agony. For them, quite a proportion of talk falls into the unproductive category of living in the past, even if the event is only a couple of hours old. In addition, to come home from work and talk about their day is for many men neither relaxing, nor a helpful way to unwind. Instead, they find it a wearying re-living of events, equivalent to having to extend their working day and work without pay at the very time when they most need a break from work.
The average man wants to cherish marriage as a haven from the stress and drudgery of his working life. For him, the ideal marriage is an exotic island located far from the pressures of his work; a carefully preserved sanctuary to which he can regularly return and be refreshed. He longs for his marriage to be a haven of peace in the midst of a war torn world; a cozy place where he recharges by putting everything unpleasant out of his mind and relaxes by enjoying a well-earned break with his wife, whom he regards as his best friend. To deliberately spoil this paradise by introducing to it dreary talk of one’s workaday life and problems is, for him, almost like trampling underfoot that which is holy. If there are aspects of his work that he regards as exciting, they might be acceptable to share with his wife, but if to him it is a gray subject, he would prefer not to dull his marriage with it.
If a woman is hoping to find help in coping with a stressful job by talking about it with her partner each time she had a tough day, my immediate reaction is, ‘That poor guy!’ Hopefully, he has little stress in his own life to have the capacity to take on all of hers. A man in this woman’s situation would usually think it his loving duty not to burden his wife with his worries. Gagging himself would be his act of selflessness; his way of honoring his wife and his marriage. A wife, in contrast, might dismiss this as mere escapism. Women often want a sizable part of their marriage not to be a beautiful tropical isle, a sanctuary from their workaday life, but to be a psychiatrist’s couch on which they can verbally work through all their problems and find relief by talking things through.
One partner longs to forget problems; the other longs to dredge them up. What is relaxing to one partner, is stressful to the other. And even more threatening to the relationship: what for one is a loving way to treat a partner, seems to the other most unloving. Of prime importance is not deciding whose coping mechanism works best – that itself might depend on one’s gender – but for the couple simply to realize that they have differing aspirations for marriage, stemming from differing strategies for coping with stress, and there is nothing unusual about being in this predicament.
Loose Lips?
This gender difference in the need to talk manifests itself in yet another frustrating source of marital tension. Some women feel so dependent upon talking about problems in order to think things through and/or gain emotional release, that they feel the need to tell their friends their husband’s most personal and embarrassing secrets – things their men would rather die than confide in their own, most trusted friends, much less have their wife’s friends know.
A woman e-mailed a friend, ending with the words, ‘I just needed to bare my soul.’ The problem was she was not just baring her soul, but her husband’s soul; humiliating him and blabbing about his failings, without him even having the opportunity to defend himself.
‘My husband is trying to control me,’ complained a woman, when all he was doing was asking her to keep quiet about aspects of his personal life, in a desperate attempt to maintain a semblance of dignity.
A secret might seem minor to the wife, but it is not for any of us to decide how mortifying our partner finds something. No matter how lofty a man thinks his motives are – such as feeling proud of his wife – he has no right to show his friends snap shots of his shy wife naked, or of her when she has just woken up and looks a mess. Likewise, a woman has no right to humiliate her husband by revealing to anyone things he believes should be for her eyes and ears alone. If she does, a man is fully justified in regarding it as a devastating betrayal of trust. And if not even his wife will respect him enough to keep a secret, what hope has he that her friends will have higher standards?
This is a most perplexing dilemma because a woman’s need to talk about problems can be so intense that she finds it almost suffocating to be asked to keep a marital secret.
A woman’s need to talk with other people is a need that most men do not have and they find it very difficult to understand. In fact, it is a source of great distress to many husbands. I found it amusing – but I’m sure it was far from amusing to him – to read that even a US President was plagued by this problem. Imagine such a respected man entrusted with national secrets and hounded by journalists eager to expose his personal foibles, lumbered with a wife who cannot stop herself telling her friends his most embarrassing secrets!
Why Men ‘Don’t Listen’
Comprehending speech is also harder work for men than most women realize. In addition, women seem fascinated by detailed descriptions that bore men to distraction. (Countless couples would chuckle in agreement with the saying, Men go for the headlines; women go for the fine print.) These factors combine to drive men to rest their brains, sliding them into neutral, when women gush words. Unfortunately, the more wives talk what their husbands regard as trivia, the more these men are likely not to be listening when something important is said. (I suggest that when a wife has something of real importance to say that she do something physical to get his undivided attention, such as sit on his lap and establish eye contact. Even this will only work for a couple of minutes before his attention is likely to lapse.)
War of Words
Yet another reason for men going silent is that they find verbal conflict more upsetting than women do. This has been demonstrated using such objective measures as heart rate and adrenaline levels (see Bob Beale, From Stone Age to Clone Age, Penguin Books). Men are far more easily and deeply hurt by their wives than they will ever allow themselves to show. Because men don’t react to pain in feminine ways, many wives think they have license to keep plunging the knife in.
When a wife wants to resolve a marital problem by telling her husband some home truths, it isn’t just escapism that can cause him to go silent or walk away. To a man’s frustration in trying to keep up with his wife verbally, add his physical strength and greater innate tendency to resolve things by physical force, and it becomes in the interest of the wife’s safety that men avoid situations that could lead to heated exchanges. Women fight with their lips - and imagine that infliction of pain is acceptable – but men tend to fight with their fists – and everyone agrees this is unacceptable. I am not for a moment suggesting that women avoid discussing relationship problems with their husbands, but many wives need to do so with a greater gentleness and sensitivity to their husband’s feelings and to never corner their husbands but let their men decide when they need to escape the barrage of words and cool down. Men also typically need longer both to get in touch with their feelings and to express them coherently
One woman told me:
When my husband gets upset, he tends to do manual things such as clean up, instead of talking. I feel that talking is important, but Jake will not talk until enough time has elapsed for him to feel able to talk. It sometimes drives me crazy, but it is his way of coping and it is important for me to be patient and realize that Jake is hurting.
How to Get a Man to Talk
Let’s now build upon what we have established and develop practical steps to taking one’s relationship to a new level.
For a woman to reveal her body to her husband without shame or trauma, she needs to feel beautiful and feminine. For a man to reveal his heart he needs to feel masculine. If a wife can recall an incident when her man confessed some little weakness, she should make the most of it by building him up and making him feel positive about such sharing. It would be very beneficial for her to recite the incident and say something like:
I really admire you for having the guts to be open. You’re so much stronger than all those wimpish men who feel forced to pretend they are tough by hiding their feelings. In my eyes you’re a man’s man and I’m proud of you.
And from time to time, especially when her husband opens up a little, she needs to reinforce this. If she does the opposite by labeling him as a man who never expresses his feelings, she will strengthen this self-image and cause him to continue acting this way. The more he knows she sees him as open and articulate, the more inspired he will be to act that way.
If, compared to his wife, talking takes a man more effort and he gains less out of the mechanics of talking, then he needs more motivation to talk than his wife does. The best motivation is if talking increases his awareness that he is loved and accepted.
Relative to women, the average man is not so interested in spieling off facts or reliving the past or thinking out loud and reducing a person to a mere sounding board. He wants to know that in this lonely world he has someone on his side; that he is understood; that he is truly one with someone. If sharing with his wife increases his feeling that she does not understand him or that she thinks his views are mistaken or thinks him weird or does not share his interests, then not only will he find communication unrewarding, it would increase his pain. Ironically, such communication will make him feel lonelier. It will make him feel a misfit and more isolated. It will make him want to clam up.
Many arguments about opinions are not because a man wants to prove his wife wrong but because he yearns for a soul mate. He wants his wife to agree with him, not for the sake of ego but because he longs to feel one with her. He argues not because he loves arguing but because he hates disagreement. It pains him when someone who means much to him is so obviously not one mind with him.
Many a man avoids discussion with someone who disagrees with him because the response he gets intensifies his feeling of aloneness. For other men, to stop arguing would mean they have given up hope of changing the person’s view. To them, this is equivalent to giving up hope of finding in marriage the companionship and connectedness they craved.
Women who watch soapies and sit-coms or read romantic novels are endangering their marriage, like men ruined by porn who cannot be satisfied with the sight of a normal woman’s body. The men portrayed in romantic fiction are the artificial product of writers who spend hours laboring over words their fictitious characters utter in minutes. These fictional ‘men’ are even less real than the airbrushed, never-aging ‘beauties’ that male users of porn become addicted to.
Often a wife’s attitude and expectations have contributed to her husband feeling defeated about how hard it is for him to talk. Many a man has gained the impression that his verbal limitations are yet another thing his wife dislikes about him – or even that she is angry at him for having these limitations. He can feel like someone punished at school for being dyslexic. None of us likes doing anything we have been told we are no good at. It is essential that a wife transform her husband’s attitude to talking from just another duty into something he finds personally rewarding.
If a wife seizes occasions when her man utters more than one word, and uses these times as opportunities to affirm that she is loyal to him, proud of his achievements, supportive of his goals, shares his dreams and feels his pain, then talking will begin to seem worth the effort to him.
For him to talk more, she must talk less, especially on occasions when he begins to talk. She should try not to always have the last word. She needs to ease off using words and instead put more emphasis on unspoken communication. She should give affirmation to what her man says, not by interrupting, nor by flooding him with words, but by eye contact, intently listening, enjoying his jokes, nodding, smiling, groaning, non-verbally showing concern or delight at the appropriate points in the conversation. She should practice the Bible’s famous advice, ‘Rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep.’ It is not easy to laugh at someone’s jokes when you have heard them five thousand, six hundred and fifty-four times, but be assured that there are women who will find his jokes hilarious – or will at least act as though they do. He’ll like talking to such women and he will wish he had a wife who makes him feel valued and appreciated like these women do.
For two ships to sail in convoy, the faster must reduce its speed to match that of the slower. In the past your husband has tended not to listen because you, the faster talker, have sped off, tiring him out and leaving him behind. If until this point you have often done more than half the talking, begin to correct the imbalance by talking less and listening better.
When his words seem to have definitely dried up, ask a relevant question, but don’t act like an interrogator firing questions in rapid succession. Allow pauses in the conversation. Give him time to collect his thoughts.
It is much easier to believe that a relative stranger is genuinely interested in what one has to say than it is to believe that the wife one has known intimately for years has permanently changed. Consequently, a flirting stranger has a huge credibility advantage over the sudden change of a wife who for years has been sending negative messages. The flirt is far more likely to have an instant effect on a man’s talkativeness. Nevertheless, the wife who makes permanent changes to the way she treats and reacts to her husband will gradually begin reaping the benefits and will eventually overtake the power of the flirt.
It is usually better for anyone planning a permanent change to let the partner know one’s intention, rather than keep the partner guessing as to whether this is an aberration you have no intention of making permanent. If you were to apologize for past behavior – and especially if you were not in the habit of repeating the offence after apologies– a partner would probably be even more convinced that this might be a permanent change, and so accept the new you more quickly and with less skepticism.
If a wife fosters the habit of ‘giving right of way’ to her husband when he lumbers uphill with his mouth, and if she regularly shows intense interest and as much oneness with him as she can muster, the result will not be as effective as a brain transplant. Each of us has certain fundamental limitations that no one can change. It will nevertheless be a significant help in making her man more talkative.
To the above I suggest you add supernatural intervention. What a staggering thought! What a difference it would make if you could enlist the help of the One who knows every hidden or forgotten or unrecognized cause of your every pain and of your every action – and the One who has equally intimate and exhaustive understanding of your partner! What if the One who created you, loves you and your partner so passionately and longs so much for your marriage to reach its highest pinnacles of fulfillment that he wants to use his infinite knowledge and unlimited power to give you his best? You can soar beyond the confines of what is humanly possible. For an introduction to this fascinating realm, read You can find love: What your fantasies reveal.
Windup
The gender difference in talkativeness is exciting. The greater the difference, however, the greater the challenge and the more each partner must adapt. There is no need to fall into despair or defeatism. Instead, rise to the challenge. The more you invest in a relationship, the greater the fulfillment and the greater the eternal honor.
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Simple Secrets of How to be Happy
By Darshan Goswami, M.S., PE
Being happy is really a choice we make. The secret of Happiness is simple, very simple - what is it?
You decide if you want to be happy!
We all strive for happiness in life. Like many, you probably think achievements such as education, marriage, family and social/financial status make you happy.
However, studies of happiness in several countries have found that these achievements have little to do with your happiness. For millions of people, happiness has remained a rather elusive goal. They've tried to buy happiness.
They've sought it through materialistic and pleasurable activities such as buying a new SUV or going on vacation. But nothing has seemed to work. For most people these changes, new possessions or temporary pleasures, might work for a while but will eventually become part of your status quo, and their power to deliver happiness will fade.
Researchers now strongly believe that your brains is hard-wired in ways that, at least to some degree, determine just how happy you're going to be. Some psychologists believe happiness is genetic. Other scientists say they may have located an important area of the brain where happiness is generated. As powerful as these genetic predispositions may be, happiness is still partly within your control, says David Myers, PhD, the John Dirk Werkman Professor of Psychology at Hope College in Holland, Mich. "It's rather like our cholesterol level -- genetically influenced, yet also influenced by our habits and attitudes."
While these ideas are debated, you don’t have to wait to begin discovering happiness within yourself. You see happiness comes from your social relationships, enjoyable work, fulfillment, high self-esteem, a sense that your life has meaning, and joining civic and other groups.
Your life is sprinkled with ample opportunities for discovering happiness. Search for the small things that give you a little laugh or a smile. Take time to be with your family and friends. In the long run, these are the treasures that will enhance your happiness, not some grand achievements that only give you a lift for a short while.
One way to steer your life toward happiness is simply to count your blessings. Happy people know that they don't get to be happy all the time. They can appreciate brief moments, little victories, small miracles, and the personal interactions that bring real happiness.
Research has proven that happy people live longer, are healthier, are more successful, enjoy more fulfilling relationships, earn more money, and are liked and respected more.
What is Happiness and How Do You Achieve It?
Happiness seems to be a selfish goal. Happiness doesn't depend upon who you are or what you have; it depends solely upon what you think. So start each day by thinking of all the things you have to be thankful for. Your future depends very largely on the thoughts you think today. So think positive thoughts of hope, confidence, love and success. You can be happy if you are a productive and useful member of society, share with others and help unselfishly.
Most experts agree that there are no shortcuts to happiness. Even the happy people do not experience joy twenty-four hours a day. A happy person can have a bad day but still experience pleasure in the small things in life. If you're not feeling happy today, fake it. In experiments, people who were manipulated to smile actually felt happier.
Don’t postpone happiness until you reach a certain goal, like getting a promotion or pay raise to go on vacation. Studies show that these effects are short-lived. Don’t focus on negative thoughts; balance that by consciously spending a few minutes every day thinking about the good things in your life. Like eating a balanced meal or getting enough rest, practice this everyday and, each day, try to extend the time you spend on positive thoughts.
Everybody has their own characteristics that lead them in different directions towards happiness. Perhaps, at best, these discussions are useful to provoke thoughts and reactions, which might help you to focus on what can be done to make your own life consistently happy.
Again, there is no rule or special formula that can make a person constantly happy. Instead, happiness comes from developing positive social relationships, enjoyable work, fulfillment, a sense that life has meaning, and joining civic and other social groups.
Can Money Buy You Happiness?
A lot of people share a fairly common misconception. They believe that having lots of money can make you happy. Some even say that the more money you have, the happier you can be. Others believe that having money is not spiritually or socially acceptable, and that money is the root cause of all evil.
Are any of these beliefs really true? To answer this question, begin by asking yourself what money means to you, and how do you treat it when you have it?
Depending on how it is used, money can create powerful, positive changes in the world. Having money allows us to function more easily in the world, it buys food, clothes, provides comfort in our lives and in the lives of others. However, because attachment to money is based on fear, it always creates insecurity.
The desire to have more money, and thereby feel more secure, never ends. Security can never come from money alone. Some of the people who have the most money are also the most insecure. Does this mean you must give up the desire to attain wealth?
Not necessarily.
In and of itself money is neither good nor bad. It is what we choose to do with money that determines if it will have a positive effect on others, society, the world, and ourselves.
So, it cannot be said that money is essential for happiness. But, most people recognize that money is important in the 21st Century because it can give people comfort and freedoms. But, does raising a nation's income, as measured by gross domestic product (GDP), raise the population's overall level of happiness?
Intuitively, you'd think the answer is a definite yes.
However, a survey conducted by The Wall Street Journal found otherwise. Other studies also show that, in many countries, "although economic output has risen steeply over the past decades, there has been no rise in life satisfaction and there has been a substantial increase in depression and distrust."
For example, since World War II, GDP per capita in the U.S. has tripled, but life satisfaction (measured by surveys that ask something like, "overall, how satisfied are you with your life?") has barely changed.
Also Japan and Western Europe had a tremendous rise in GDP per capita since 1958, yet measures of national happiness have been flat. One reason may be that a rising economy produces rising aspirations. There are many villages in the world where people do not own shoes but the people are extremely happy and friendly.
How to Bring Happiness in Your Life
“Don't worry, be happy.” This sounds like such a simplistic phrase, but there is great power and wisdom in it. This tells us to focus on what we want rather than what we don’t want. When we focus on what we want, our actions take us nearer to our goals in life.
One way to guide your life toward happiness is simply to count your blessings. Dr. Myers points to research showing that people who pause each day to reflect on the positive aspects of their lives (for example, their health, friends, family, education, freedom) are more likely to experience positive feelings and happiness.
These are the principles I use to be happy. They work for me, and I hope they work for you:
1) Improve your relationships with friends and family – Happiness starts at home. Start by improving your relationship with your parents, brothers, sisters, and children. Smile when you greet them, do things for them, don't allow them to get angry with you. Maintaining healthy loving relationships and friendships can promote happiness. Remember that love makes you beautiful.
2) Be an optimist - Optimism generates good feelings.
3) Develop a genuine smile and laugh a lot - Act happy - It works. Smile into the mirror for a half hour without stopping. Smiling makes you happy and the more you smile the more happy you become. We all like people who smile. It also makes us more attractive.
4) Pray - Become religious or spiritual - This only works if you believe in God. If you want to be happy then ask God to make you happy. Prayer helps you accomplish things.
5) Be generous and share with others - Give more than you receive because being generous will make you happy.
6) Treat time as a friend - Don't watch the clock.
7) Exercise your mind - Keep yourself busy with some new project or ideas.
8) Work your body - Exercise regularly. Studies show that aerobic exercise is an antidote for mild depression and anxiety. "Happy minds reside in sound bodies," says Dr. Myers.
9) Have fun in life - Keep cool under pressure.
10) Pursue achievable goals.
11) Have high confidence in yourself.
12) Respect the disadvantaged.
13) Age gracefully.
14) Give compliments - Take every opportunity to be complimentary. Want to make someone like you? Every time you meet a person smile and give them a compliment.
15) Be honest - With honesty comes openness. People respect honest and open minded people.
16) Keep an open mind - Most people seem to think that they know everything that they need to know. There's plenty of wisdom to go around.
17) Treat difficulties as challenges –Life's an adventure and every obstacle in life is one of its challenges. Treat life as a game. What fun would a game be if you could never lose?
Conclusion
Being happy is really a choice we make. The secret of Happiness is simple, very simple - what is it? You decide if you want to be happy! Happiness is free. You can feel happiness, this very minute, if you so choose.
If you continue to focus all your energy and attention on what you want, you’ll soon find yourself happy. Realize now that true happiness results from sharing generously of yourself, your mind, emotion and spirit, with all those who come in contact with you.
Be an optimist.
Do kind deeds for others unselfishly. Explore the deeper resources within you by praying to God from your heart. Through sincere prayer and mindful meditation you will attain the highest achievement in life - the discovery of your eternal happiness with God.
We need to set our goals wisely and to develop happy-thought strategies and to surround ourselves with encouraging and positive people.
Pursuing truth, wisdom and a virtuous life - or just getting on with the duties and chores of daily life at work and home, often brings happiness as a by-product. My ultimate goal is to bring happiness to all my friends, family and all souls that come in contact with me. How can I possibly accomplish this?
Simple…I sincerely hope that after reading this message you will SMILE for me.
That will make both you and me happy!
Is the bliss gone from your marriage?
Is the bliss gone from your marriage?
Panel discusses ways to bring it back and make it last.
By LIZ DOUP, Herald Staff Writer
Published Friday, May 23, 1997, in the Miami Herald
ARLINGTON, Va. -- Four years into their marriage, Angela Hight, 28, and Trevor Walker, 30, spend more time finding fault with each other than having fun. She's too messy, says Walker, who's director of a software company. He doesn't listen, says Hight, a research physicist. But for better or worse, the Gaithersburg, Md., couple want their marriage to work. So they're attending a "Fighting for Your Marriage'' workshop that's part of the first "Smart Marriages: Happy Families'' conference, sponsored by the Washington, D.C.-based Coalition for Marriage, Family and Couples Education. It's an informal group of more than 100 academics, ardent feminists, conservative Christians and feel-good family therapists, who spent last weekend at an Arlington, Va., hotel, talking about how to keep couples together.
"Marriage is filled with changes,'' says Diane Sollee, a 53-year-old divorcee and director of the year-old coalition. "You may be a tax lawyer who decides to become a minister. You may say, `I changed my mind; I want to have children.' We need to teach people skills to deal with whatever lies ahead.''
Sounds simple. Divorce, though, remains an American way of life, even if the divorce rate continues to drop from its peak years in 1979 and 1981.
So how can we help make marriage work?
At one extreme is conference speaker Mike McManus, a syndicated columnist from Bethesda, Md., who writes about ethics and religion. McManus speaks with one arm draped around his wife of 31 years. He wants a mandatory four-month waiting period for couples to prepare for marriage and the repeal of no-fault divorce laws. He's also against same-sex marriages.
At the other end: New York therapist Peggy Papp, who wants to show couples how gender-based stereotypes strangle marriages. "Our goal is to save people from miserable marriages, not from divorce,'' she says. "If they want to get out of a miserable marriage, we'll help them get out.''
Classes for marriage
Another area of conflict: the benefit of educational courses offered before and during marriage. Marital instruction covers everything from brief, free chats with clergy to intensive, days-long workshops with books, tapes, exercises and a tab of hundreds, even thousands, of dollars.
The people behind these courses often talk of "new approaches.'' Yet, many of the courses recycle techniques such as empathetic listening, pioneered by psychologists Carl Rogers and Thomas Gordon in the late 1960s.
What should be taught in these course? Who ought to be teaching it? And, more to the point, does any of it work?
Many therapists, armed with anecdotal evidence but also some studies, insist it does.
"I'm so convinced, I give courses as wedding gifts instead of china that they can throw at each other,'' says Sollee, whose two sons received marital-skills courses when they got married.
But sound, scientific research is skimpy, even though premarital-counseling programs have been around since the 1930s, says Karen Blaisure, an assistant professor of psychology at Western Michigan
University who has studied the research.
"Most studies only followed couples for six months or a year,'' Blaisure says. "When you're talking about something that's supposed to support a lifetime commitment, six months isn't very long.''
Legislative fixes
State legislators around the country have jumped into the debate. In at least seven states, including Florida, lawmakers introduced bills during the most recent legislative sessions to make premarital counseling a requirement for getting a marriage license. None of those proposals became law.
Rep. Elaine Bloom, D-Miami Beach, who introduced the Marriage Preparation and Preservation Act of 1997 in the Florida Legislature, says she'll bring the bill back next year.
"I don't base my bills on someone's clinical research,'' Bloom says. "As legislators, we reflect what we perceive society wants, and that's fewer divorces.''
More controversial, lawmakers in at least nine states, including New Jersey and Virginia, tried to modify, or eliminate, no-fault divorce laws.
"Appalling,'' says Papp, the New York therapist. "If people have to document fault, we'll be back to hiring detectives and showing pictures to prove adultery, creating the worst kind of hostility. We need to concentrate on equalizing roles in marriage, so it's not as constraining, and people will want to stay married.''
But even "wanting to'' may not be enough.
Talking, listening
At the marriage workshop, Hight and Walker, the Maryland couple, hear a speaker describe a "healthy'' way to discuss differences: One of the couple should briefly describe a concern while the partner listens. Then, the partner paraphrases what was said to make clear it was understood.
Hight and Walker agree to give this a try, but Hight is skeptical.
"You can try new things,'' she says, noting that, in her home, arguments tend to involve Walker talking on and on while she turns silent and walks away. "But you still can't change who you are.''
She's hardly alone in her skepticism. There are plenty of harried couples trying to build a marriage while juggling jobs and child-rearing and often feeling that a good divorce may be a better solution than a bad marriage.
No benefit
"Sometimes, staying together isn't going to benefit you or the kids,'' offers Martha Sosa, 38, an elementary school media specialist in Miami.
A mother of two, ages 8 and 5, Sosa got divorced nine months ago after 13 years of marriage.
"My son says he likes it better,'' she says, "because he doesn't have to hear us arguing all the time.''
Jeremy Segal, 28, a North Miami graphic artist, plans to marry Andrea Klein, a 28-year-old social worker from Hollywood, next month. They've dated for three years and recently took a marital-skills class. They liked it.
Yet Segal, whose parents divorced when he was 3, doesn't think government should mandate premarital counseling. Nor does he believe that people should be forced to stay in unhappy marriages.
"I know in my heart there are couples who don't belong together,'' he says, "no matter how many communication classes they take.''
Proverbs on Marriage
1. Romantic love is a lightning bolt. Married love is an electric current.
2. Marriage is a mirror in which one sees a reflection of oneself.
3. The source of joy, in marriage as in lovemaking, is union with another. That is why, while there may be pleasure in purchased sex, there is little joy.
4. Similarly in marriage: when love is mutual, joy bubbles over onto all of life; when it is not, nothing is untouched by sadness.
5. In a good marriage one is continuously in love, regardless of anger, hurt, or the longing to be free. The trick is to be aware of it.
6. In time, one may resent the permanence of one’s spouse almost as much as one relies on it.
7. That is why married couples bicker over trivia. For what is annoying at the moment is insufferable over a lifetime.
8. The hatred in a divorce is directly proportional to the love in the marriage, since only a strong hatred can sever a strong love and set the wounded free.
9. Marriage is a bulwark against time. For time is the measure of change, and in marriage two vow never to change.
10. In the end, of course, like the sea to a sandcastle, time sweeps over marriage, whether through death or betrayal. The bit of respite marriage affords is, however, all the Eden one needs for happiness. Or is likely to get.
Marriage
Marriage is the closest kind of friendship.
Years of traffic wear away the lines
Between two souls with similar designs,
Ending more in unity than kinship.
Separate actors must play separate parts:
They must alone be riveted by need.
Far beneath that soil a single seed
Roots itself, tenacious in their hearts.
In love there is a trust beyond the word.
Each finds peace in each, as though the light
Needed the tranquility of night,
Deeper than what silence can be heard.
Marriage
Marriage is an antidote for time
As two stop time by swearing not to change,
Resisting what makes every moment strange,
Removing what makes all alone and blind.
In time, of course, the lovers will succumb
As everything must change, including love,
Granting but the grace that in them moved,
Eternal, though in time an end must come.
Marriage
Marriage
Marriage, as a choice, requires choices.
One must choose not once, but every day.
Life offers us a hundred thousand voices,
Yet those we fail to hear fast fade away.
I choose you with all my wounded heart:
You and our two children. All the rest
Lies in the distance, charming, but apart
From the circle of the ones with whom I'm blessed.
Our marriage isn't easy, but our love
Is still the force that shapes my daily life.
I want us to be happy, and will move
Wherever I must be to be your wife.
I'm yours, and I want you to be mine.
We'll find a way our wishes to combine.
Relationships/Marriage
Relationships teach you lifetime lessons, things
you must build upon in order to have a solid emotional foundation.
Your job is to accept the lesson,
love the person and put what you have
learned to use in all other relationships and areas of your life.
It is said that love is blind but friendship is clairvoyant.
