Take Five: The Art of Apology

Sadly many couples don’t actually know how to apologise and reconcile when they’ve hurt their spouse. People think that it’s obvious, or that it should just be instinctual, or that love should make it all happen spontaneously.   Well it isn’t and it doesn’t.   We see too many wounded couples stuck in a pattern…

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Know Your Spouse’s Unique Love Profile

Falling in love is a conversion experience. Most of us start out as self-centred individuals and suddenly find ourselves caring more about someone else’s happiness than we do our own. Some of the joy that we associate with being ‘in love’ is really that freedom to be outside of ourselves, caught up in the goodness…

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Stop-Reflect-Connect

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Whenever you are making an important decision or disagree about how to go about something, Stop, Reflect and Connect! This tool will help you to avoid an argument by refocusing you on your priority – your spouse and your relationship. Stop! Before the argument escalates any further, call a time out and cool off. Take…

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Complaint to Request

The Unforeseen Truth While deep down we really love each other, all couples inevitably have ‘complaints’ about their spouse. They can be as simple as annoying habits, inconsistent behaviour and frustrating personality traits. Often, the very characteristics that first attracted us become the most infuriating ones of all. You fall in love with his sense…

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The Commitment Challenge #1

Commitment Phobia We’ve heard the phrase bandied around for years, but is it really as simple as someone being afraid of, or threatened by, making a commitment to his or her dating partner? Usually the ‘Commitment Phobia’ accusation is leveled towards the man in the relationship with the related belief that it comes down to…

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The 50-50 Marriage Myth

50-50 Marriage Myth

In our society, a lot people think that marriage is a fifty-fifty arrangement. That we each contribute equally to the relationship. The problem with this kind of thinking, is that it leads us to hold back and to keep score. We fell into this trap earlier in our marriage. When life started to get busy…

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Addicted to Busy

Busy Bees “I’m a very busy person. Don’t waste my time!” How often have we heard that line! Busyness in our culture has become endemic. We don’t know anybody who isn’t busy. Even retirees are busy. Our kids are busier than we ever were, running from this activity, to that ball game, to those training…

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Criticism Cancer

Criticism Can Kill Criticism kills not only the self-esteem of the one criticized, it also kills the spirit of optimism in the criticizer. In marriage it is a deadly cancer, eroding our trust and destroying confidence in our relationship. Criticism damages our sense of worthiness. When we are criticized, our doubts about ourselves are confirmed.…

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