Love Busters
The love you and your spouse have for each other is directly affected by almost all of your behavior. This is a point that I will repeat in most of my remaining concepts and Q&A columns. Until now, I have focused attention on behavior that will meet each other's most important emotional needs. When you behave that way, you are caring for each other. But the resulting Love Bank deposits will not do your marriage much good if other behavior leads to Love Bank withdrawals. So to help you gain control over your behavior so that you can learn to avoid making Love Bank withdrawals, I will introduce you to my next basic concept, Love Busters.
Why would any of us hurt the one we promised to love and cherish?
Lack of empathy is at the core of the problem. I was struck with what we are all up against while watching a Star Trek episode. Spock had volunteered to be possessed by an alien presence so that it could communicate with Captain Kirk of the Starship Enterprise.
As soon as it entered Spock's body, its first reaction was, "Oh, how lonely you must all feel."
You see, in the alien world, they were all connected to each other through telepathy so that each one could feel what everyone else felt. They were all emotionally bonded to each other. But as soon as the alien possessed Spock's body, it realized that we humans are all cut off from each other emotionally. And it viewed our state as incredibly isolated and lonely.
One of the most important consequences of our emotional isolation is that we cannot feel the way we affect others. And that creates the temptation to hurt others because in doing so we don't feel the pain we cause. If we were connected emotionally to others as the aliens were, we would be far less tempted to do anything thoughtless, gaining at someone else's expense. That's because in so doing, we would be hurting ourselves as well.
And that's what I always seem to be battling when I try to encourage one spouse to avoid doing anything that would hurt the other spouse. I cannot seem to trigger empathy. Each spouse complains about how thoughtless the other spouse is, without much awareness of his or her own thoughtlessness.
Lack of empathy helps makes thoughtlessness possible. Since we don't feel what other's feel, we tend to minimize the negative effects we have on others, and consider our thoughtlessness to be benign. An angry outburst is regarded by some as a creative expression. Disrespect is viewed as helping the other spouse gain proper perspective. And a demand is nothing more than encouraging a spouse to do what he or she should have done all along. None of these is seen as one spouse gaining at the other's expense, because the spouse who is inflicting the pain does not feel the pain. But whenever one spouse is the cause of the other's unhappiness, one thing's for sure -- Love Bank withdrawals are taking place.
I call all the ways that spouses are inconsiderate of each other's feelings Love Busters because that what they do -- they destroy the love that a husband and wife have for each other.
I've found that the most common Love Busters in marriage fall into six categories: Selfish Demands, Disrespectful Judgments, Angry Outbursts, Annoying Habits, Independent Behavior and Dishonesty
The first three of these Love Busters are instinctive, yet thoughtless, ways to try to get what you want from each other. When a request doesn't work, a spouse will often revert to a demand ("I don't care how you feel -- do it or else!"). If that doesn't get the job done, a spouse will try disrespectful judgments ("If you had any sense, and were not so lazy and selfish, you would do it"). And then, when all of that fails, an angry outburst often represents the last ditch effort ("I'll see to it that you regret not having done it").
Of course, demands, disrespect and anger don't really get the job done. You generally don't do things for your spouse because of these Love Busters, you do them out of care and consideration. If your spouse is demanding, disrespectful and angry, you tend to be less caring and considerate, leading you to do less for your spouse. Instead of giving your spouse what he or she needs, demands, disrespect and anger cause you to resist. I want you to have what you need in your marriage, but demands, disrespect and anger will not get it for you. They will prevent you from having what you want if you revert to these destructive instincts.
But when you indulge in these three Love Busters, you do more than fail to get what you need -- you also destroy the love your spouse has for you. All of these instincts, and the habits they help create, cause your spouse to be unhappy, and that causes Love Bank withdrawals.
The fourth Love Buster, Annoying Habits, is behavior that is repeated without much thought that bothers your spouse. Marriage is a partnership of incredibly close quarters, where just about anything you or your spouse does is almost sure to affect the other. If you want to stay in love with each other, your habits, even the innocent ones, should make Love Bank deposits, not withdrawals.
The fifth Love Buster is Independent Behavior, the conduct of one spouse that ignores the feelings and interests of the other spouse. If your decisions are made as if your spouse doesn't even exist, you will find yourself running roughshod over your spouse's feelings and your Love Bank account. Since it's usually scheduled and requires some thought to execute, the simplest way to overcome it is to take it off your schedule. And if you follow the Policy of Joint Agreement, Independent Behavior will never find itself on your schedule in the first place.
Finally, the sixth Love Buster, Dishonesty, causes massive Love Bank withdrawals whenever it's discovered. And spouses usually discover each other's dishonesty because of their emotional closeness to each other. If you or your spouse have a tendency to lie or distort the truth, chase that bad habit out of your marriage before it ruins everything.
If you would like to identify Love Busters that are responsible for Love Bank withdrawals in your relationship, first read a summary of each by clicking their names listed below, and then click this name, the Love Busters Questionnaire , and print two copies of the form, one for you and one for your spouse. After you have completed this form, the priorities you give each Love Buster will show you where to begin in sweeping these rascals out of your lives.
Selfish Demands
Disrespectful Judgments
Angry Outbursts
Annoying Habits
Independent Behavior
Dishonesty
If you have a few extra minutes, The Parable of the Net will help show you how Love Busters destroy marriage.
The sixth Love Buster, Dishonesty, is so important to overcome in marriage that I have given it a basic concept of it's own. After you have had a chance to read it, I think you will agree with me that it deserve special attention.
Next Concept:The Policy of Radical Honesty
Honesty and Openness is one of the ten most important emotional needs identified in marriage, which means that when it's met, it can trigger the feeling of love. But it's counterpart, dishonesty, is one of the five most destructive Love Busters. When spouses are dishonest, they destroy the love they have for each other.
But there is a third reason that honesty is crucial in marriage. Honesty is the only way that you and your spouse will ever come to understand each other. Without honesty, the adjustments that are crucial to the creation of compatibility in your marriage cannot be made. Without honesty, your best efforts to resolve conflicts will be wasted because you will not understand each other well enough to find mutually acceptable solutions.
Most couples do the best they can to make each other happy, at least for a while. But their efforts, however sincere, are often misdirected. They aim at the wrong target. Ignorance, not lack of effort, is often the most important cause of their ultimate downfall.
Couples are not only ignorant of ways to improve their marriages; they are often ignorant of the problems themselves. To avoid conflict, they sometimes deliberately misinform each other as to their feelings, personal history, activities, and plans. This not only leads to a failure to meet an important emotional need, and a withdrawal of love units when the deception is discovered, it also makes marital conflicts impossible to resolve. After all, how can you and your spouse solve a problem if your cards are not on the table?
To help you understand how honest you need to be to have a successful marriage, I have written the Policy of Radical Honesty. I call it "radical" because that's how many see my position on the subject. But I view my policy as simply advocating complete honesty in marriage. In our culture I guess that's a radical idea.
The Policy of Radical Honesty
Reveal to your spouse as much
information about yourself as you know;
your thoughts, feelings, habits, likes,
dislikes, personal history, daily activities,
and plans for the future.
To help explain this policy, I have broken it down into four parts:
1. EMOTIONAL HONESTY: Reveal your emotional reactions, both positive and negative, to the events of your life, particularly to your spouse's behavior.
2. HISTORICAL HONESTY: Reveal information about your personal history, particularly events that demonstrate personal weakness or failure.
3. CURRENT HONESTY: Reveal information about the events of your day. Provide your spouse with a calendar of your activities, with special emphasis on those that may affect your spouse.
4. FUTURE HONESTY: Reveal your thoughts and plans regarding future activities and objectives.
To some extent this policy seems like motherhood and apple pie. Who would argue that it's not a good idea to be honest? But in my years of experience as a marriage counselor, I have constantly struggled with the belief of many clients that dishonesty can be a good idea under certain conditions. Moreover, pastors and counselors themselves often advise dishonesty when a spouse has committed a particularly thoughtless act, such as infidelity. And many marital therapists warn against complaining, something that some consider one of the seven deadly sins of marriage. So instead of complaining, spouses often stuff their feelings and try to put a good face on a bad situation.
Granted, dishonesty can be a good short-term solution to marital conflict. It will probably get you off the hook for a few days or months or keep the problem on the back burner. But it's a terrible long-term solution. If you expect to live with each other for the next few years and still be in love, dishonesty can get you into a great deal of trouble.
Because there are so many out there who advocate dishonesty in marriage, I will describe the four parts of my Policy of Radical Honesty, and explain to you why I think they are so important in marriage.
The First Part of the Policy of Radical Honesty:
Emotional Honesty
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© 1995-2009 Marriage BuiThe Policy of Radical Honesty
Emotional Honesty
Reveal your emotional reactions, both
positive and negative, to the events of your life,
particularly to your spouse's behavior.
Some people find it difficult to openly express negative reactions. They may fear that their response will be interpreted as criticism. Or they may feel ashamed of their own reactions, telling themselves they should not feel the way they do. They may want unconditional acceptance from their spouses and consider that their negative reactions prove their own inability to be unconditionally accepting. Whatever the reasons, many spouses try to avoid expressing their negative emotional reactions.
While positive reactions are easier to communicate, many couples have not learned to express these feelings, either. This failure not only misses an important opportunity to accurately communicate basic feelings, but it also misses an opportunity to deposit love units. Whenever your spouse has made you feel good, if you express those feelings clearly and enthusiastically, you'll reward your spouse for having made an appropriate adjustment to you. That, in turn, makes your spouse feel good.
If you want to meet each other's emotional needs, and you want to overcome Love Busters, one essential ingredient is an honest expression of your emotional reactions to each other. What makes a marriage successful is your willingness and ability to accommodate each other's feelings. And without the facts about those feelings, an otherwise happy couple can become very unhappy as the events of life change.
The conditions that existed at the time of your marriage were partly responsible for the love you had for each other. Those conditions made it easy for you to meet each other's emotional needs, and tended to ward off Love Busters. They may have made you feel perfect for each other, because you did not have to do much to make each other happy.
But if you are like most couples, those conditions changed right after your marriage and have continued to change right up to the present. If you have not been able to adjust to those changes, you are probably very disillusioned about your compatibility. What had seemed effortless at first may seem impossible for you now.
But adjustment in marriage is not impossible. In fact, it may be quite a bit easier than you think. Because of the way your brain is put together, you have the ability to make remarkable adjustments to each other throughout life, as your environment changes. But in order to be successful, you must do four things:
First, you must realize that these changes will take place, whether you want them to or not. Many of the circumstances surrounding you cannot be controlled and will be changing constantly.
Second, you must stick to your goal of meeting each other's most important emotional needs, and avoiding Love Busters regardless of the change in conditions. A change can be very distracting, and can cause both of you to lose sight of your primary objectives in life. Don't let these changes cause you to lose sight of each other.
Third, you must be totally committed to making all of your decisions jointly and enthusiastically. Changes in circumstances require new decisions, and each must be made with each other's feelings in mind. Otherwise, the changes will leave one of you in the dust. Don't go on in life unless you are both on board.
And finally, in order to make the best decisions, you must be radically honest with each other about your emotional reactions to the changes in your lives. The best decisions take the emotional reactions of both of you into account simultaneously, but without an honest expression of those reactions, you will be missing the target.
While some couples may fail to make a successful adjustment after feelings are honestly explained, failure is almost guaranteed when the need for adjustment is never communicated. Always take each other's complains seriously. As I mentioned earlier, your emotional reactions are a gauge of whether you are making a good adjustment to each other. If you both feel good, you need no adjustment. If one or both of you feel bad, a change is indicated.
But let me also explain what honesty is not. It is not selfish demands or disrespectful judgments or angry outbursts.
Expressing a feeling is not the same as expressing demands. If you try to tell your spouse what to do, you are not revealing an honest feeling; you are making a demand. If your spouse does something that bothers you, the correct way to express it is simply say that it bothers you. The Policy of Joint Agreement would take over from that point to help you try to resolve the problem.
If you tell your spouse that he or she is wrong about something, you're not being honest, you are being judgmental. While you should be free to express your beliefs and opinions, you should respect your spouse's beliefs and opinions. If you try to "straighten out" your spouse, you are not being honest; you are making a disrespectful judgment. The expression of feeling should not carry judgmental baggage with it.
It goes without saying that angry outbursts are not expressions of honesty, either. When people have them, they often think that they are being honest, but that's their Taker trying to rationalize what is actually cruel and destructive. Whatever it is you have to say when you are angry is not worth saying. Keep that basic principle in mind so that you will keep your mouth shut when you feel angry. When you have recovered from your anger, it's safe to tell your spouse what was bothering you.
Failure to express negative feelings perpetuates the withdrawal of love units. It prevents a resolution to a marital conflict, because the conflict is not expressed. Negative feelings provide evidence that a couple has not yet achieved a successful marital adjustment. More work is needed.
But positive feelings not only offer proof for a successful adjustment, but they also provide a reward to the spouse that has been successful. Don't neglect to tell each other how you feel when you are happy.
Now we're ready to look at the second part of this Policy of Radical Honesty. This part faces the reality that history often repeats itself.
The Second Part of the Policy of Radical Honesty:
Historical Honestynesty
Reveal information about your personal
history, particularly events that
demonstrate personal weakness or failure.
Whenever you and your spouse make a decision together or try to resolve a conflict with the Policy of Joint Agreement, one factor that must never be ignored is your past. That's because mistakes and successes of the past often provide evidence of what's likely to happen in the future.
While many people feel that embarrassing experiences or serious mistakes of the past should be forgotten, most psychologists recognize that these are often signs of present weakness. For example, if someone has ever had an affair, he may be vulnerable to another one. If someone has ever been chemically dependent, he is vulnerable to drugs or alcohol abuse in the future. By expressing past mistakes openly, your spouse can understand your weaknesses, and together you can avoid conditions that tend to create problems for you.
No area of your life should be kept secret. All questions asked by your spouse should be answered fully and completely with periods of poor adjustment in your past given special attention. Not only should you explain your past to your spouse, but you should also encourage your spouse to gather information from those who knew you before you met your spouse. I have encouraged couples that are considering marriage to meet with several significant people from each other's past. It's often a real eye-opener!
I carry this Policy of Radical Honesty about your past all the way to the disclosure of all premarital and extramarital sexual relations. That's because those experiences are among your most important experiences in life, and your spouse should know anything you regard as important. Past sexual experiences also create a contrast effect in marriage, and it's inevitable that you will compare your spouse sexually with all other past sexual relationships. Knowing your sexual history can make present sexual problems much easier to understand.
I've had clients argue that if they tell their spouses about mistakes made decades earlier, their spouses will be crushed and never trust them again. Why not just leave that little demon alone?
My answer is that it's not a "little demon." If you've had an affair, it's an extremely important part of your personal history, and it says something about your predispositions. If you've had an affair in the past, your spouse shouldn't trust you -- I certainly wouldn't.
But what if you haven't strayed since it happened? What if you've seen a pastor regularly to hold you accountable? Why put your spouse through the agony of a revelation that could ruin your relationship forever?
I'd say you don't give your spouse much credit! Honesty does not drive a spouse insane -- dishonesty does. People in general, and women in particular, want to know exactly what their spouses are thinking and feeling. When you hold something back, your spouse tries to guess what it is. If he or she is right, then you must continually lie to cover your tracks. If he or she is wrong, an incorrect understanding of you and your predispositions develops.
Maybe you don't really want to be known for who you are? That's the saddest position of all. You'd rather keep your secret than experience one of life's greatest joys -- to be loved and accepted in spite of your weaknesses.
Some counselors have argued that the only reason people reveal past infidelity is because of anger. They are deliberately trying to hurt their spouses with that information. Or they might be doing it to relieve their own guilt at the expense of their spouse's feelings.
While it's true that the spouse usually feels hurt, and vengeance or feelings of guilt motivate some, whenever correct information is revealed, an opportunity for understanding and change is presented. That opportunity is more important than unhealthy motives or momentary unhappiness.
Some revelations may need to be made in the presence of a professional counselor to help control the emotional damage. Spouses sometimes have difficulty adjusting to revelations that have been kept secret for years. In many cases, they're not reacting to the revelation as much as the fact that they'd been lied to all that time.
Some spouses with emotional weaknesses may need personal counseling to help them adjust to the reality of their spouses' past. The saints they thought they married turn out to be not so saintly. But the most negative reactions to truth that I've witnessed have never destroyed a person or a marriage. It's dishonesty that destroys intimacy, the feeling of love, and marriages.
When a couple first see me for counseling, I have them complete my Personal History Questionnaire, which systematically reviews many of the significant events of their past. I ask them to share their answers with each other and feel free to ask any questions that would be triggered by them.
I offer you the same opportunity to investigate each other's past. I have posted that questionnaire for you to copy and complete. Simply click the name of the questionnaire in the previous paragraph and be sure to make two copies, one for both of you. Leave nothing out and be willing to pursue any line of inquiry that will help you better understand each other's past.
The Third Part of the Policy of Radical Honesty:
Current Honestyy of Radical Honesty
Current Honesty
Reveal information about the events of your
day. Provide your spouse with a calendar
of your activities, with special emphasis on
those that may affect your spouse.
After six years of marriage, Ed discovered that it was easier to have a sexual relationship with a woman at the office than with his wife, Jennifer. As a result, he found Peggy a welcome solution to his sexual frustration. He spent time alone with her several times a week, and their sexual relationships was as fulfilling as he could have ever imagined.
Ed justified this infidelity by assuming he was doing Jennifer a favor by not imposing his sexual requirements upon her. Whenever Jennifer wanted to make love to him, he happily accommodated her, but she didn't feel a sexual need more than once or twice a month.
Ed didn't want to share information about his daily activities with Jennifer, since honesty would have ruined any hope of continuing this very satisfying solution. Moreover, the announcement of this relationship would have upset her. He still loved her very much and would not have wanted to put her through the grief of such a disclosure. So to preserve a temporary solution to his problem and to keep Jennifer from experiencing intense emotional pain, he felt that dishonesty was justified.
In good marriages, couples become so interdependent that sharing a daily schedule is essential to their coordination of activities. But in weak marriages, couples are reluctant to provide their schedules, because they are often engaged in an assortment of Love Busters. They may know that their spouses would object to their activities, so they tell themselves, What they don't know won't hurt them. They have what I call a "secret second life."
But there are many who really have nothing to hide; yet they feel the need for privacy. They are offended when their spouse asks where they've been or what they've done. They feel that their spouse should trust them, and not assume the worst.
I'm dead-set against privacy in marriage, because it creates an unnecessary barrier to problem solving. When you and your spouse married, two became one. That means that prior to marriage, you had no one but yourself to consider when you made choices, and now you have each other to consider. There should be no part of your life that is off limits to your spouse, because literally everything that either of you do will ultimately affect each other. Privacy breeds incompatibility because it represents a part of your life that is off limits to accommodation.
Even when activities are innocent, it's extremely important for your spouse to understand what you do with your time. Be easy to check up on and find in an emergency. Give each other your daily schedules so you can communicate about how you spend your time. Since almost every thing you do will affect your spouse, it is important to explain what it is you do.
If Jennifer and Ed had established a habit of exchanging daily information early in their marriage, his affair would have been almost impossible to arrange. And if they had negotiated with the Policy of Joint Agreement, his sexual problem would have been addressed and resolved.
Honesty is a terrific way to protect your spouse from potentially damaging activities. By knowing that you'll be telling your spouse what you've been up to, you're far less likely to get either of you into trouble.
The Fourth Part of the Policy of Radical Honesthe Policy of Radical Honesty:
Future Honesty
Reveal your thoughts and plans regarding
future activities and objectives.
After having made such a big issue of revealing past indiscretions, you can imagine how I feel about revealing future plans. They're much easier to discuss with your spouse, yet many couples make plans independently of each other.
Some couples don't explain their plans because they don't want to change them, even if their spouses express negative reactions. They feel that explaining a future plan may prepare the evening for war, and their spouses will successfully scuttle the plan.
Some don't explain their future plans because they don't think their spouses would be interested. There's nothing upsetting about the plan, so there'd be no point in revealing it.
But even if your plans are innocent, when you fail to tell your spouse your future plans, you're being dishonest. You don't really know what your spouse's reaction will be, and by failing to give advance notice, you may create a problem for the future. Besides, if you and your spouse are partners in life, your plans are important to both of you, whether your spouse feels that way or not.
You may feel your plans are best for both you and your spouse. Once your spouse sees the plan succeed, he or she will be grateful that you went ahead with it. Or, you may feel that if you wait for your spouse's approval, you will never accomplish anything. Perhaps your spouse is so conservative that if you wait for his or her approval, you think you'll miss every opportunity that comes your way.
Regardless of how you feel about revealing your plans, failure to do so will leave your spouse in the dark. While no love units are withdrawn at the time you're deceitful, they're almost sure to be withdrawn when your spouse realizes you've held back information. It also sets up the loss of more love units if your plans fails to take your spouse's feelings into account.
How many hours of waking time to you have at your disposal? Do you schedule any or all of that time? Do you and your spouse share your weekly schedules with each other before you commit yourselves to that time?
Since your schedule each week is part of your future plans, every hour you schedule should be discussed with your spouse before you firm them up. I suggest that every Sunday afternoon at 3:30, you and your spouse set aside one-half hour to go over your schedules for the coming week. That way you will not only know what each of you is doing that week, but you will have an opportunity to change any part of the schedule.
Of course, it would make sense for you to discuss your schedule on a daily basis, so that each new item could be reviewed as it comes along. But the reason that I suggest a final review on Sunday afternoon, is to get you into the habit of giving each other a chance to veto anything in either of your schedules that does not have your enthusiastic agreement. Get used to the idea that you simply cannot do something that your spouse does not like. And give your spouse an opportunity to react to whatever it is you are planning to do.
Now we will switch gears. So far, I have introduced Basic Concepts that help you make Love Bank deposits (Emotional Needs) and help you avoid making Love Bank withdrawals (Love Busters). But there is another topic that no couple should ever ignore, and that's how to negotiate. You already know that you can't make demands to get what you want. And you can't be disrespectful or angry. What's left?
What's left is thoughtful and respectful negotiation. Once you become skilled negotiators, you will not only find real solutions to your problems, but the very process of finding those solutions will be enjoyable for both of you.
But before I show you how to become skilled negotiators, I will show you why negotiating can be so tough in marriagemail this article | send feedback
The Giver and the Taker
Have you ever suspected your spouse of having two personalities -- one that is caring and considerate and one that seems impossible to get along with? I'm sure you've not only noticed, but you've probably been horrified by the impossible one. I call these two personalities the Giver and the Taker.
We all have them, Givers and Takers, and they make marital problem solving much more difficult than it should be. To help you understand why it's so difficult to communicate in marriage, and why it's so hard to be consistently kind and considerate, I'll explain to you who these characters are and how they make marriage so difficult.
The Giver is the part of you that follows the rule: do whatever you can to make the other person happy and avoid anything that makes the other person unhappy, even if it makes you unhappy. It's the part of you that wants to make a difference in the lives of others, and it grows out of a basic instinct that we all share, a deep reservoir of love and concern for those around us.
But the Giver is only half of the story. The other half is the Taker. It's the part of you that follows the rule: do whatever you can to make yourself happy and avoid anything that makes yourself unhappy, even if it makes others unhappy. It's the part of you that wants the most out of life, and it grows out of your basic instinct for self-preservation.
In everyday life, our Givers and Takers usually solve problems together. They recognize our need to give and take simultaneously. For example, when we buy groceries, we give money and take groceries. We don't give more money than the grocer charges us and we don't take groceries without paying for them.
But in marriage, a strange thing happens to the way our Givers and Takers operate. They seem to work independently of each other. Either the Giver is in charge, and we give unconditionally to our spouses, or the Taker is in charge where we take what we want from our spouses without giving anything in return.
When the Giver is in charge, we are loving and considerate. But we tend to make personal sacrifices to see to it that our spouses are happy and fulfilled, because our Takers are not there to defend our personal interests and our Givers do not care how we feel.
But when the Taker is in charge, we are rude, demanding and inconsiderate. All we seem to think about is ourselves, and what our spouses can do to make us happy. We expect our spouses to make sacrifices for us, because our Takers don't care how our spouses feel.
I want to emphasize to you that this is normal behavior in marriage. You might think you're married to a crazy person, or you may think you're crazy yourself, but let me assure you, marriage is one of the very few conditions that bring out the pure Giver and Taker in each of us. And that usually makes us seem much crazier than we really are.
It should be no surprise to you that it isn't the Giver that ruins marriages -- it's the Taker. But the Giver plays a very important role in creating the problem. It's the effort of the Giver to give our spouses anything they want that sets up the Taker for it's destructive acts. After you have been giving, giving, giving to your spouse, and receiving little in return (because you haven't bargained for much), your Taker rises up to straighten out the situation. It sees the unfairness of it all, and steps in to balance the books. But instead of coming to a more balanced arrangement, where you get something for what you give, the Taker just moves the Giver out of the picture altogether. It says, "I've been giving enough, now it's your turn to give."
Sound familiar? We've all been through it, but it doesn't work. All our Takers do is rouse our spouses' Taker and before we can say, "Bull in a china closet," we're having fight.
Which brings up a very important observation -- The Taker's instinctive strategy for getting what we need in marriage is to make demands, show disrespect and have an angry outburst. Does that also sound familiar? They are the stupid instincts that I call, Love Busters. And that's precisely what the Taker usually does when given control of our marriage -- they ruin the love we have for each other.
But I'm getting a little ahead of myself. Before you can understand fully how Takers make us argue instead of negotiate, I need to explain my next concept to you.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
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A Summary of
Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
You have just been introduced to all the Basic Concepts that I use whenever I try to save a marriage. If you apply them all to your marriage, you will do what most couples want to do, but have failed to do -- fall in love and stay in love. And that's what ultimately saves marriage -- restoring the feeling of love.
Of course, it takes much more than just the feeling of love to build a successful marriage. It takes your willingness and ability to care for and protect each other. But that feeling of incredible attraction is the best litmus test of your success in giving each other the care and protection that you need. If you are both in love, your Takers are convinced that the relationship is a good deal for both of you, and will not interfere with what's going on. Your Givers have free reign to provide each other the best of what you both have to offer.
When you are in love, your emotions help you meet each other's emotional needs. They provide instincts that you may not have even known you have -- instincts to be affectionate, sexual, conversational, recreational, honest and admiring. These all seem to come naturally when you are in love.
But when you fall out of love, everything that will help your marriage seems unnatural. Your instincts turn against marital recovery, and toward divorce. That's why I've created these Basic Concepts -- to help you do what it takes to restore your love for each other when you are not in love, when you don't feel like doing any of them. And then once your love is restored, these concepts will help you stay in love for the rest of your lives.
I present my summary of basic concepts in a slightly different order than they were first presented to you. When they are presented briefly, they're a little more logical when presented this way.
Basic Concept #1: The Love Bank
In my struggle to learn how to save marriages, I eventually discovered that the best way to do it was to teach couples how to fall in love with each other -- and stay in love. So I created a concept that I called the Love Bank to help couples understand how people fall in and out of love. This concept, perhaps more than any other that I created, helped couples realize that almost everything they did affected their love for each other either positively or negatively. And that awareness set most of them on a course of action that preserved their love and saved their marriages.
Within each of us is a Love Bank that keeps track of the way each person treats us. Everyone we know has an account and the things they do either deposit or withdraw love units from their accounts. It's your emotions' way of encouraging you to be with those who make you happy. When you associate someone with good feelings, deposits are made into that person's account in your Love Bank. And when the Love Bank reaches a certain level of deposits (the romantic love threshold), the feeling of love is triggered. As long as your Love Bank balance remains above that threshold, you will experience the feeling of love. But when it falls below that threshold, you will lose that feeling. You will like anyone with a balance above zero, but you will only be in love with someone whose balance is above the love threshold.
However, your emotions do not simply encourage you to be with those who make you happy -- they also discourage you from being with those who make you unhappy. Whenever you associate someone with bad feelings, withdrawals are made in your Love Bank. And if you withdraw more than you deposit, your Love Bank balance can fall below zero. When that happens the Love Bank turns into the Hate Bank. You will dislike those with moderate negative balances, but if the balance falls below the hate threshold, you will hate the person.
Try living with a spouse you hate! Your emotions are doing everything they can to get you out of there -- and divorce is one of the most logical ways to escape.
Couples usually ask for my advice when they are just about ready to throw in the towel. Their Love Banks have been losing love units so long that they are now deeply in the red. And their negative Love Bank accounts make them feel uncomfortable just being in the same room with each other. They cannot imagine surviving marriage for another year, let alone ever being in love again.
But that's my job -- to help them fall in love with each other again. I encourage them to stop making Love Bank withdrawals, and start making Love Bank deposits. I created all of the remaining Basic Concepts to help couples achieve those objectives.
Basic Concept #2: Instincts and Habits
Instincts are behavioral patterns that we are born with, and habits are patterns that we learn. Both of them tend to be repeated again and again almost effortlessly. They are important in our discussion of what it takes to be in love because it's our behavior that makes deposits and withdrawals from Love Banks, and our instincts and habits make up most of our behavior.
Instincts and habits can make Love Bank deposits, so it is imperative to know how to create those habits because once they are learned, deposits are made repeatedly and almost effortlessly.
Unfortunately, many of our instincts and habits, such as angry outbursts, contribute to Love Bank withdrawals. Since they are repeated so often, they play a very important role in the annihilation of Love Bank accounts. If we are to stop Love Bank withdrawals, we must somehow stop destructive instincts and habits in their tracks. Instincts are harder to stop than habits, but they can both be avoided.
As we discuss the remaining concepts, keep in mind the value of a good habit, and the harm of a bad habit, because their effect on Love Bank balances are multiplied by repetition.
Basic Concept #3: The Most Important Emotional Needs
How can you deposit love units into each other's Love Banks the fastest? That's a question I asked literally hundreds of couples when I was first learning how to save marriages. Eventually their answer became clear to me -- you must meet each other's most important emotional needs.
You and your spouse fell in love with each other because you made each other very happy, and you made each other happy because you met some of each other's important emotional needs. The only way you and your spouse will stay in love is to keep meeting those needs. Even when the feeling of love begins to fade, or when it's gone entirely, it's not necessarily gone for good. It can be recovered whenever you both go back to making large Love Bank deposits.
First, be sure you know what each other's most important emotional needs are (complete the Emotional Needs Questionnaire). Then, learn to meet the needs that are rated the highest in a way that is fulfilling to your spouse, and enjoyable for you, too.
It's likely that you and your spouse do not prioritize your needs in the same order of importance. A highly important need for you may not be as important to your spouse. So you may find yourself trying to meet needs that seem unimportant to you. But your spouse depends on you to meet those needs, and it's the most effective and efficient way for you make large Love Bank deposits.
Basic Concept #4: The Policy of Undivided Attention
Unless you and your spouse schedule time each week for undivided attention, it will be impossible to meet each other's most important emotional needs. So to help you and your spouse clear space in your schedule for each other, I have written the Policy of Undivided Attention: Give your spouse your undivided attention a minimum of fifteen hours each week, using the time to meet the emotional needs of affection, conversation, recreational companionship and sexual fulfillment. This policy will help you avoid one of the most common mistakes in marriage -- neglecting each other.
This Basic Concept not only helps guarantee that you will meet each other's emotional needs, but it also unlocks the door to the use of all the other basic concepts. Without time for undivided attention you will not be able to avoid Love Busters and you will not be able to negotiate effectively. Time for undivided attention is the necessary ingredient for everything that's important in marriage.
And yet, as soon as most couples marry, and especially when children arrive, couples usually replace their time together with activities of lesser importance. You probably did the same thing. You tried to meet each other's needs with time "left over," but sadly, there wasn't much time left over. Your lack of private time together may have become a great cause of unhappiness, and yet you felt incapable of preventing it. You may have also found yourself bottling up your honest expression of feelings because there was just no appropriate time to talk.
Make your time to be alone with each other your highest priority -- that way it will never be replaced by activities of lesser value. Your career, your time with your children, maintenance of your home, and a host of other demands will all compete for your time together. But if you follow the Policy of Undivided Attention, you will not let anything steal from those precious and crucial hours together.
I suggest that you (a) spend time away from children and friends whenever you give each other your undivided attention; (b) use the time to meet the emotional needs of affection, conversation, recreational companionship, and sexual fulfillment; and (c) schedule at least fifteen hours together each week. When you were dating, you gave each other this kind of attention and you fell in love. When people have affairs, they also give each other this kind of attention to keep their love for each other alive. Why should courtship and affairs be the only times love is created? Why can't it happen in marriage as well? It can, if you set aside time every week to give each other undivided attention.
Basic Concept #5: Love Busters
When you meet each other's most important emotional needs, you become each other's source of greatest happiness. But if you are not careful, you can also become each other's source of greatest unhappiness.
It's pointless to deposit love units if you withdraw them right away. So in addition to meeting important emotional needs, you must be sure to protect your spouse, and the Love Bank, from withdrawals. And paying attention to how your everyday behavior can make each other unhappy does that.
You and your spouse were born to be demanding, disrespectful, angry, annoying, independent (insensitive) and dishonest. These are normal human traits that I call Love Busters because they destroy the feeling of love spouses have for each other. But if you promise to avoid being the cause of your spouse's unhappiness, you will do whatever it takes to overcome these destructive tendencies for your spouse's protection. By eliminating Love Busters, you will not only be protecting your spouse, but you will also be preserving your spouse's love for you.
Basic Concept #6: The Policy of Radical Honesty
It isn't easy to be honest. Honesty is an unpopular value these days, and most couples have not made this commitment to each other. Many marriage counselors and clergymen argue that honesty is not always the best policy. They believe that it's cruel to disclose past indiscretions and it's selfish to make such disclosures. While it makes you feel better to get a mistake off your chest, it causes your partner to suffer. So, they argue, the truly caring thing to do is to lie about your mistakes or at least keep them tucked away.
And if it's compassionate to lie about sins of the past, why isn't it also compassionate to lie about sins of the present -- or future? To my way of thinking, it's like letting the proverbial camel's nose under the tent. Eventually you will be dining with the camel. Either honesty is always right, or you'll always have an excuse for being dishonest.
To help remind couples how important honesty is in marriage, I have written the Policy of Radical Honesty: Reveal to your spouse as much information about yourself as you know; your thoughts, feelings, habits, likes, dislikes, personal history, daily activities, and plans for the future.
Self-imposed honesty with your spouse is essential to your marriage's safety and success. Honesty will not only bring you closer to each other emotionally, it will also prevent the creation of destructive habits that are kept secret from your partner.
The Policy of Radical Honesty combined with the Policy of Joint Agreement are two guidelines that will help you create an open and integrated lifestyle, one that will guarantee your love for each other. They also prevent the creation of a secret second life where infidelity, the greatest threat to your marriage, can grow like mold in a damp, dark cellar.
Basic Concept #7: The Giver and Taker
Have you ever thought that your spouse is possessed? One moment he or she is loving and thoughtful, and the next you are faced with selfishness and thoughtlessness. Trust me, it's not a demon you're up against, it's the two sides of our personalities. I call them the Giver and the Taker.
All of us want to make a difference in the lives of other. We want others to be happy, and we want to contribute to their happiness. When we feel that way, our Giver is influencing us. The Giver's rule is do whatever you can to make others happy and avoid anything that makes others unhappy, even if it makes you unhappy. It encourages us to use that rule in our relationships with other people.
But we also want the best for ourselves. We want to be happy, too. When we feel that way, our Taker is influencing us. The Taker's rule is do whatever you can to make yourself happy, and avoid anything that makes yourself unhappy, even if it makes others unhappy. If that rule ever makes sense to you, it's because your Taker is in control.
These two primitive aspects of our personality are usually balanced in our dealings with others. But in marriage they tend to take turns being in charge. And that leads to most of the problems that couples encounter. If we take the advice of our Giver, we are willing to suffer to make our spouse happy, and if we take the advice of our Taker, we are willing to let our spouse suffer to make us happy. In either case the advice we are given is short sighted because someone always gets hurt.
Basic Concept #8: The Three States of Mind in Marriage
The Giver and Taker create moods that I call states of mind. These states of mind have a tremendous influence on the way a husband and wife try to resolve conflicts. But in each of the three states of mind, negotiation is almost impossible. That's what makes negotiation, in general, so tough in marriage.
When we are in love and happy, we are usually in the State of Intimacy. That state of mind is controlled by the Giver, which encourages us to follow the Giver's rule: do whatever you can to make your spouse happy and avoid anything that makes your spouse unhappy, even if it makes you unhappy. That rule can lead to habits that may be good for our spouse, but can be disastrous for us because we are not negotiating with our own interests in mind.
Sadly, flawed agreements made in the state of Intimacy can lead to our own unhappiness, and that in turn wakes the slumbering Taker. As long as we are happy, our Taker has nothing to do, but when we start feeling unhappy, our Taker rises to our rescue and triggers the State of Conflict. With the Taker now in charge, we are encouraged to follow the rule: do whatever you can to make yourself happy, and avoid anything that makes yourself unhappy, even if it makes others unhappy. The Taker also encourages us to be demanding, disrespectful and angry in an effort to force our spouse to make us happy. Fighting is the Taker's favorite "negotiating" strategy.
When fighting doesn't work, and we are still unhappy, the Taker encourages us to take a new course of action that triggers the State of Withdrawal. Instead of trying to force our spouse to make us happy, our Taker wants us to give up on our spouse entirely. We don't want our spouse to do anything for us, and we certainly don't want to do anything for our spouse. In this state of mind we are emotionally divorced.
How can couples work their way back to the state of Intimacy once they find themselves trapped in the state of Withdrawal? And once they are back, how can they stay there? The answers to those questions are found in the next Basic Concept.
Basic Concept #9: The Policy of Joint Agreement
Marital instincts do not lead to fair negotiation. They either lead to giving away the store (state of Intimacy) or robbing the bank (state of Conflict). And in the state of Withdrawal, no one even feels like negotiating. Yet, in order to meet each other's most important needs and avoid Love Busters consistently and effectively, fair negotiation is crucial in marriage.
You need a rule to help you override the shortsighted advice of your Giver and Taker. Their advice is shortsighted because regardless of the rule, someone gets hurt. We get hurt when we follow the Giver's advice and our spouse gets hurt when we follow the Taker's advice. So I've created a rule to guarantee that no one gets hurt, and that's the ultimate goal in fair negotiation. I call this rule the Policy of Joint Agreement: Never do anything without an enthusiastic agreement between you and your spouse.
Almost everything you do affects each other. So it's very important to know what that effect will be before you actually do it. The Policy of Joint Agreement will help you remember to consult with each other to be sure you avoid being the cause of each other's unhappiness. It also makes negotiation necessary, regardless of your state of mind. If you agree to this policy, you will not be able to do anything without the enthusiastic agreement of the other, so it forces you to discuss your plans, and negotiate with each other's feelings in mind. Without safe and pleasant negotiation, you will simply not be able to reach an enthusiastic agreement.
Basic Concept #10: Four Guidelines for Successful Negotiation
If you and your spouse are in conflict about anything, I recommend that you do nothing until you can both agree enthusiastically about a resolution. But how should you go about coming to that agreement? I suggest you follow four essential guidelines.
Guideline 1: Set ground rules to make negotiation pleasant and safe.
Ground rule 1: Try to be pleasant and cheerful throughout negotiations
Ground rule 2: Put safety first. Do not make demands, show disrespect, or become angry when you negotiate, even if your spouse makes demands, shows disrespect or becomes angry with you.
Ground rule 3: If you reach an impasse and you do not seem to be getting anywhere, or if one of you is starting to make demands, show disrespect or become angry, stop negotiating and come back to the issue later.
Guideline 2: Identify the problem from both perspectives with mutual respect for those perspectives.
Guideline 3: Brainstorm with abandon - give your creativity a chance to discover solutions that would make you both happy. Carry a pad and pencil with you to jot down ideas as you think of them throughout the day.
Guideline 4: Choose the solution that meets the conditions of the Policy of Joint Agreement best - mutual and enthusiastic agreement.
Whenever a conflict arises keep in mind the importance of finding a solution that will deposit as many love units as possible, while avoiding withdrawals. And be sure that the way you find that solution also deposits love units and avoids withdrawals.
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Basic Concepts
How Dr. Harley Learned to Save Marriages
The Love Bank
Instincts and Habits
The Most Important Emotional Needs
The Policy of Undivided Attention
Love Busters
The Policy of Radical Honesty
The Giver & Taker
Three States of Mind in Marriage
The Policy of Joint Agreement
Four Guidelines for Successful Negotiation
A Summary of Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
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A Summary of
Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
You have just been introduced to all the Basic Concepts that I use whenever I try to save a marriage. If you apply them all to your marriage, you will do what most couples want to do, but have failed to do -- fall in love and stay in love. And that's what ultimately saves marriage -- restoring the feeling of love.
Of course, it takes much more than just the feeling of love to build a successful marriage. It takes your willingness and ability to care for and protect each other. But that feeling of incredible attraction is the best litmus test of your success in giving each other the care and protection that you need. If you are both in love, your Takers are convinced that the relationship is a good deal for both of you, and will not interfere with what's going on. Your Givers have free reign to provide each other the best of what you both have to offer.
When you are in love, your emotions help you meet each other's emotional needs. They provide instincts that you may not have even known you have -- instincts to be affectionate, sexual, conversational, recreational, honest and admiring. These all seem to come naturally when you are in love.
But when you fall out of love, everything that will help your marriage seems unnatural. Your instincts turn against marital recovery, and toward divorce. That's why I've created these Basic Concepts -- to help you do what it takes to restore your love for each other when you are not in love, when you don't feel like doing any of them. And then once your love is restored, these concepts will help you stay in love for the rest of your lives.
I present my summary of basic concepts in a slightly different order than they were first presented to you. When they are presented briefly, they're a little more logical when presented this way.
Basic Concept #1: The Love Bank
In my struggle to learn how to save marriages, I eventually discovered that the best way to do it was to teach couples how to fall in love with each other -- and stay in love. So I created a concept that I called the Love Bank to help couples understand how people fall in and out of love. This concept, perhaps more than any other that I created, helped couples realize that almost everything they did affected their love for each other either positively or negatively. And that awareness set most of them on a course of action that preserved their love and saved their marriages.
Within each of us is a Love Bank that keeps track of the way each person treats us. Everyone we know has an account and the things they do either deposit or withdraw love units from their accounts. It's your emotions' way of encouraging you to be with those who make you happy. When you associate someone with good feelings, deposits are made into that person's account in your Love Bank. And when the Love Bank reaches a certain level of deposits (the romantic love threshold), the feeling of love is triggered. As long as your Love Bank balance remains above that threshold, you will experience the feeling of love. But when it falls below that threshold, you will lose that feeling. You will like anyone with a balance above zero, but you will only be in love with someone whose balance is above the love threshold.
However, your emotions do not simply encourage you to be with those who make you happy -- they also discourage you from being with those who make you unhappy. Whenever you associate someone with bad feelings, withdrawals are made in your Love Bank. And if you withdraw more than you deposit, your Love Bank balance can fall below zero. When that happens the Love Bank turns into the Hate Bank. You will dislike those with moderate negative balances, but if the balance falls below the hate threshold, you will hate the person.
Try living with a spouse you hate! Your emotions are doing everything they can to get you out of there -- and divorce is one of the most logical ways to escape.
Couples usually ask for my advice when they are just about ready to throw in the towel. Their Love Banks have been losing love units so long that they are now deeply in the red. And their negative Love Bank accounts make them feel uncomfortable just being in the same room with each other. They cannot imagine surviving marriage for another year, let alone ever being in love again.
But that's my job -- to help them fall in love with each other again. I encourage them to stop making Love Bank withdrawals, and start making Love Bank deposits. I created all of the remaining Basic Concepts to help couples achieve those objectives.
Basic Concept #2: Instincts and Habits
Instincts are behavioral patterns that we are born with, and habits are patterns that we learn. Both of them tend to be repeated again and again almost effortlessly. They are important in our discussion of what it takes to be in love because it's our behavior that makes deposits and withdrawals from Love Banks, and our instincts and habits make up most of our behavior.
Instincts and habits can make Love Bank deposits, so it is imperative to know how to create those habits because once they are learned, deposits are made repeatedly and almost effortlessly.
Unfortunately, many of our instincts and habits, such as angry outbursts, contribute to Love Bank withdrawals. Since they are repeated so often, they play a very important role in the annihilation of Love Bank accounts. If we are to stop Love Bank withdrawals, we must somehow stop destructive instincts and habits in their tracks. Instincts are harder to stop than habits, but they can both be avoided.
As we discuss the remaining concepts, keep in mind the value of a good habit, and the harm of a bad habit, because their effect on Love Bank balances are multiplied by repetition.
Basic Concept #3: The Most Important Emotional Needs
How can you deposit love units into each other's Love Banks the fastest? That's a question I asked literally hundreds of couples when I was first learning how to save marriages. Eventually their answer became clear to me -- you must meet each other's most important emotional needs.
You and your spouse fell in love with each other because you made each other very happy, and you made each other happy because you met some of each other's important emotional needs. The only way you and your spouse will stay in love is to keep meeting those needs. Even when the feeling of love begins to fade, or when it's gone entirely, it's not necessarily gone for good. It can be recovered whenever you both go back to making large Love Bank deposits.
First, be sure you know what each other's most important emotional needs are (complete the Emotional Needs Questionnaire). Then, learn to meet the needs that are rated the highest in a way that is fulfilling to your spouse, and enjoyable for you, too.
It's likely that you and your spouse do not prioritize your needs in the same order of importance. A highly important need for you may not be as important to your spouse. So you may find yourself trying to meet needs that seem unimportant to you. But your spouse depends on you to meet those needs, and it's the most effective and efficient way for you make large Love Bank deposits.
Basic Concept #4: The Policy of Undivided Attention
Unless you and your spouse schedule time each week for undivided attention, it will be impossible to meet each other's most important emotional needs. So to help you and your spouse clear space in your schedule for each other, I have written the Policy of Undivided Attention: Give your spouse your undivided attention a minimum of fifteen hours each week, using the time to meet the emotional needs of affection, conversation, recreational companionship and sexual fulfillment. This policy will help you avoid one of the most common mistakes in marriage -- neglecting each other.
This Basic Concept not only helps guarantee that you will meet each other's emotional needs, but it also unlocks the door to the use of all the other basic concepts. Without time for undivided attention you will not be able to avoid Love Busters and you will not be able to negotiate effectively. Time for undivided attention is the necessary ingredient for everything that's important in marriage.
And yet, as soon as most couples marry, and especially when children arrive, couples usually replace their time together with activities of lesser importance. You probably did the same thing. You tried to meet each other's needs with time "left over," but sadly, there wasn't much time left over. Your lack of private time together may have become a great cause of unhappiness, and yet you felt incapable of preventing it. You may have also found yourself bottling up your honest expression of feelings because there was just no appropriate time to talk.
Make your time to be alone with each other your highest priority -- that way it will never be replaced by activities of lesser value. Your career, your time with your children, maintenance of your home, and a host of other demands will all compete for your time together. But if you follow the Policy of Undivided Attention, you will not let anything steal from those precious and crucial hours together.
I suggest that you (a) spend time away from children and friends whenever you give each other your undivided attention; (b) use the time to meet the emotional needs of affection, conversation, recreational companionship, and sexual fulfillment; and (c) schedule at least fifteen hours together each week. When you were dating, you gave each other this kind of attention and you fell in love. When people have affairs, they also give each other this kind of attention to keep their love for each other alive. Why should courtship and affairs be the only times love is created? Why can't it happen in marriage as well? It can, if you set aside time every week to give each other undivided attention.
Basic Concept #5: Love Busters
When you meet each other's most important emotional needs, you become each other's source of greatest happiness. But if you are not careful, you can also become each other's source of greatest unhappiness.
It's pointless to deposit love units if you withdraw them right away. So in addition to meeting important emotional needs, you must be sure to protect your spouse, and the Love Bank, from withdrawals. And paying attention to how your everyday behavior can make each other unhappy does that.
You and your spouse were born to be demanding, disrespectful, angry, annoying, independent (insensitive) and dishonest. These are normal human traits that I call Love Busters because they destroy the feeling of love spouses have for each other. But if you promise to avoid being the cause of your spouse's unhappiness, you will do whatever it takes to overcome these destructive tendencies for your spouse's protection. By eliminating Love Busters, you will not only be protecting your spouse, but you will also be preserving your spouse's love for you.
Basic Concept #6: The Policy of Radical Honesty
It isn't easy to be honest. Honesty is an unpopular value these days, and most couples have not made this commitment to each other. Many marriage counselors and clergymen argue that honesty is not always the best policy. They believe that it's cruel to disclose past indiscretions and it's selfish to make such disclosures. While it makes you feel better to get a mistake off your chest, it causes your partner to suffer. So, they argue, the truly caring thing to do is to lie about your mistakes or at least keep them tucked away.
And if it's compassionate to lie about sins of the past, why isn't it also compassionate to lie about sins of the present -- or future? To my way of thinking, it's like letting the proverbial camel's nose under the tent. Eventually you will be dining with the camel. Either honesty is always right, or you'll always have an excuse for being dishonest.
To help remind couples how important honesty is in marriage, I have written the Policy of Radical Honesty: Reveal to your spouse as much information about yourself as you know; your thoughts, feelings, habits, likes, dislikes, personal history, daily activities, and plans for the future.
Self-imposed honesty with your spouse is essential to your marriage's safety and success. Honesty will not only bring you closer to each other emotionally, it will also prevent the creation of destructive habits that are kept secret from your partner.
The Policy of Radical Honesty combined with the Policy of Joint Agreement are two guidelines that will help you create an open and integrated lifestyle, one that will guarantee your love for each other. They also prevent the creation of a secret second life where infidelity, the greatest threat to your marriage, can grow like mold in a damp, dark cellar.
Basic Concept #7: The Giver and Taker
Have you ever thought that your spouse is possessed? One moment he or she is loving and thoughtful, and the next you are faced with selfishness and thoughtlessness. Trust me, it's not a demon you're up against, it's the two sides of our personalities. I call them the Giver and the Taker.
All of us want to make a difference in the lives of other. We want others to be happy, and we want to contribute to their happiness. When we feel that way, our Giver is influencing us. The Giver's rule is do whatever you can to make others happy and avoid anything that makes others unhappy, even if it makes you unhappy. It encourages us to use that rule in our relationships with other people.
But we also want the best for ourselves. We want to be happy, too. When we feel that way, our Taker is influencing us. The Taker's rule is do whatever you can to make yourself happy, and avoid anything that makes yourself unhappy, even if it makes others unhappy. If that rule ever makes sense to you, it's because your Taker is in control.
These two primitive aspects of our personality are usually balanced in our dealings with others. But in marriage they tend to take turns being in charge. And that leads to most of the problems that couples encounter. If we take the advice of our Giver, we are willing to suffer to make our spouse happy, and if we take the advice of our Taker, we are willing to let our spouse suffer to make us happy. In either case the advice we are given is short sighted because someone always gets hurt.
Basic Concept #8: The Three States of Mind in Marriage
The Giver and Taker create moods that I call states of mind. These states of mind have a tremendous influence on the way a husband and wife try to resolve conflicts. But in each of the three states of mind, negotiation is almost impossible. That's what makes negotiation, in general, so tough in marriage.
When we are in love and happy, we are usually in the State of Intimacy. That state of mind is controlled by the Giver, which encourages us to follow the Giver's rule: do whatever you can to make your spouse happy and avoid anything that makes your spouse unhappy, even if it makes you unhappy. That rule can lead to habits that may be good for our spouse, but can be disastrous for us because we are not negotiating with our own interests in mind.
Sadly, flawed agreements made in the state of Intimacy can lead to our own unhappiness, and that in turn wakes the slumbering Taker. As long as we are happy, our Taker has nothing to do, but when we start feeling unhappy, our Taker rises to our rescue and triggers the State of Conflict. With the Taker now in charge, we are encouraged to follow the rule: do whatever you can to make yourself happy, and avoid anything that makes yourself unhappy, even if it makes others unhappy. The Taker also encourages us to be demanding, disrespectful and angry in an effort to force our spouse to make us happy. Fighting is the Taker's favorite "negotiating" strategy.
When fighting doesn't work, and we are still unhappy, the Taker encourages us to take a new course of action that triggers the State of Withdrawal. Instead of trying to force our spouse to make us happy, our Taker wants us to give up on our spouse entirely. We don't want our spouse to do anything for us, and we certainly don't want to do anything for our spouse. In this state of mind we are emotionally divorced.
How can couples work their way back to the state of Intimacy once they find themselves trapped in the state of Withdrawal? And once they are back, how can they stay there? The answers to those questions are found in the next Basic Concept.
Basic Concept #9: The Policy of Joint Agreement
Marital instincts do not lead to fair negotiation. They either lead to giving away the store (state of Intimacy) or robbing the bank (state of Conflict). And in the state of Withdrawal, no one even feels like negotiating. Yet, in order to meet each other's most important needs and avoid Love Busters consistently and effectively, fair negotiation is crucial in marriage.
You need a rule to help you override the shortsighted advice of your Giver and Taker. Their advice is shortsighted because regardless of the rule, someone gets hurt. We get hurt when we follow the Giver's advice and our spouse gets hurt when we follow the Taker's advice. So I've created a rule to guarantee that no one gets hurt, and that's the ultimate goal in fair negotiation. I call this rule the Policy of Joint Agreement: Never do anything without an enthusiastic agreement between you and your spouse.
Almost everything you do affects each other. So it's very important to know what that effect will be before you actually do it. The Policy of Joint Agreement will help you remember to consult with each other to be sure you avoid being the cause of each other's unhappiness. It also makes negotiation necessary, regardless of your state of mind. If you agree to this policy, you will not be able to do anything without the enthusiastic agreement of the other, so it forces you to discuss your plans, and negotiate with each other's feelings in mind. Without safe and pleasant negotiation, you will simply not be able to reach an enthusiastic agreement.
Basic Concept #10: Four Guidelines for Successful Negotiation
If you and your spouse are in conflict about anything, I recommend that you do nothing until you can both agree enthusiastically about a resolution. But how should you go about coming to that agreement? I suggest you follow four essential guidelines.
Guideline 1: Set ground rules to make negotiation pleasant and safe.
Ground rule 1: Try to be pleasant and cheerful throughout negotiations
Ground rule 2: Put safety first. Do not make demands, show disrespect, or become angry when you negotiate, even if your spouse makes demands, shows disrespect or becomes angry with you.
Ground rule 3: If you reach an impasse and you do not seem to be getting anywhere, or if one of you is starting to make demands, show disrespect or become angry, stop negotiating and come back to the issue later.
Guideline 2: Identify the problem from both perspectives with mutual respect for those perspectives.
Guideline 3: Brainstorm with abandon - give your creativity a chance to discover solutions that would make you both happy. Carry a pad and pencil with you to jot down ideas as you think of them throughout the day.
Guideline 4: Choose the solution that meets the conditions of the Policy of Joint Agreement best - mutual and enthusiastic agreement.
Whenever a conflict arises keep in mind the importance of finding a solution that will deposit as many love units as possible, while avoiding withdrawals. And be sure that the way you find that solution also deposits love units and avoids withdrawals.
Affection
Affection is the expression of care. It symbolizes security, protection, comfort and approval -- vital ingredients in any relationship. When one spouse is affectionate toward the other, the following messages are sent:
1. You are important to me. I will care for you and protect you.
2. I'm concerned about the problems you face and will be there for you when you need me.
Learn to be more affectionate
A simple hug can say those things. And there are many other ways to show our affection: A greeting card or an "I love you" note; a bouquet of flowers; holding hands; walks after dinner; back rubs; phone calls; and conversations with thoughtful and loving expressions. All of these can effectively communicate affection.
Affection is, for many, the essential cement of a relationship. Without it, many feel totally alienated. With it, they become emotionally bonded. If you feel terrific when your spouse is affectionate, and you feel terrible when there is not enough of it, you have the emotional need for affection.
Next Emotional Need:
Sexual Fulfillment
Sexual Fulfillment
When you married, you and your spouse promised to be faithful to each other for life. You agreed to be each other's only sexual partner. You made this commitment because you trusted each other to meet your sexual needs, to be sexually available and responsive to each other. The emotional need for sex, then, is a very exclusive emotional need. If you have this need, you will be very dependent on your spouse to meet it. You have no other ethical choices.
But in most marriages, one spouse, usually the husband, has a much greater need for sex than the other. This tends to create a significant conflict if his need is not being met as often as he would like or the way he would like it to be met. That's why it is very important for you and your spouse to understand which one of you has the greatest need for sex, and how you can meet that need frequently and effectively for each other. Without that understanding and skill, you are likely to join the majority of marriages where the need for sex is not being adequately met.
Most people know whether or not they have a need for sex, but in case there is any uncertainty, I will point out some of the most obvious symptoms.
A sexual need usually pre-dates your relationship with each other, and is somewhat independent of your relationship. While you may have discovered a deep desire to make love to your spouse since you've been in love, it isn't quite the same thing as a sexual need. Wanting to make love when you are in love is sometimes merely a reflection of wanting to be emotionally and physically close.
However, one dead give-away for having a sexual need is sexual fantasies. If you have imagined what it would be like having your sexual need met in the most fulfilling ways, you probably have a sexual need. The more the fantasy is employed, the greater your
Learn more about Sexual Fulfillment
need. And the way your sexual need is met in your fantasy is usually a good indicator of your sexual predispositions and orientation.
The need for sex and the need for affection are often confused with one another. To help you sort them out, think of it this way: affection is an act of love (hugging, kissing, hand-holding, etc.) that is non-sexual and can be shared with friends, relatives, children and even pets with absolutely no sexual intent. However, if your affection tends to have a sexual motive, it is a symptom of your need for sex, not your need for affection.
If you tend to feel happy and contented when you make love, and you feel frustrated when you don't make love often enough or the way you want to make love, you have a need for sexual fulfillment.
Next Emotional Need:
Conversation
Most Popular Links
• The Marriage Builders� Discussion Forum
• How to Survive Infidelity
• The Most Important Emotional Needs
• Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
• Coping with Infidelity:
Part 1 - How Do Affairs Begin?
• A Summary of Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
• Love Busters
• The Emotional Needs Questionnaire
• Q&A Columns
• The Policy of Joint Agreement
Worth Looking Into
The Marriage Builders® Home Study Course | Fall In Love, Stay In Love
CUSTOMIZED PLAN with Marriage Coach, Steven W. Harley, M.S.
Click Here!
Home | Site Tour | Meet Dr. Harley | Basic Concepts | Q&A Columns | Articles | Discussion Forum | Local Help
Bookstore | Courses, Seminar and Accountability | Coaching Center | Questio
Conversation
Unlike the need for sex, conversation is not an emotional need that can or should be met exclusively in marriage. Our need for conversation can ethically be met by almost anyone. But if it is one of your most important emotional needs, whoever meets it best will deposit so many love units, you may fall in love with that person. So if it's your need, it's crucial to your marital happiness that your spouse is the one who meets it the best and most often.
The need for conversation is not met by simply talking to someone. It is met when the conversation is enjoyable for both persons involved. Good conversation is characterized by the following: (1) using it to inform and investigate each other, (2) focusing attention on topics of mutual interest, (3) balancing the conversation so both have an equal opportunity to talk, and (4) giving each other undivided attention while talking to each other.
Conversation fails to meet this need when (1) demands are made, (2) disrespect is shown, (3) one or both become angry, or (4) when it is used to dwell on mistakes of the past or present. Unless conversation is mutually enjoyable, a couple is better off not talking to each other at all. An unpleasant conversation not only fails to meet the emotional need, but it also makes it less likely that there will be an opportunity to meet the need in the future. That's because we tend to prevent our spouse from meeting our needs if earlier attempts were painful to us.
Men and women don't have too much difficulty talking to each other during courtship. That's a time of information-gathering for both partners. Both are highly motivated to discover each other's likes and dislikes, personal background, current
Learn to meet the need of Conversation
interests and plans for the future. But after marriage, many women find that the man who would spend hours talking to her on the telephone, now seems to have lost all interest in talking to her, and spends his spare time watching television or reading.
If your need for conversation was fulfilled during courtship, you also expect it to be met after marriage. And if you fell in love because your need for conversation was met by your spouse during courtship, you risk falling out of love if that need is not met during marriage.
Do you have a craving just to talk to someone? Do you pick up the telephone just because you feel like talking? If you see conversation as a practical necessity, primarily as a means to an end, you probably don't have much of a need for it. But if you use conversation "just to talk," and enjoy conversation in its own right, and are frustrated when you haven't been able to talk to someone for a while, consider it to be one of your most important emotional needs.
Next Emotional Need:
Recreational Companionship
Recreational Companionship
Before you were married, chances are pretty good that you planned your dates around your favorite recreational activities. That's because when it's an important emotional need, recreational companionship can often deposit enough love units to trigger romantic love. And since you wanted your relationship to flourish, you probably chose activities that you both enjoyed.
But you may have made the mistake of doing whatever the one with the greatest need for recreational companionship wanted to do. That's what happened to my wife, Joyce, and me. She was willing to join me in all of the recreational activities I liked most -- right up to the day we were married. But after marriage, she announced that she would only be joining me in activities that she also enjoyed. And it turned out that she shared very few of my recreational interests.
Most couples whose marriages begin the way mine did make a crucial mistake -- they go their separate ways. He joins his friends in recreational activities he enjoys most and leaves his wife to find her own recreational companions for activities that interest her. That's a formula for marital disaster. If someone else of the opposite sex joins either of you in your favorite recreational activities, you are at risk to fall in love with that person. Besides, if you are not together when you are enjoying yourselves the most, you are squandering an opportunity to deposit love units.
Fortunately, Joyce and I took the path that led to marital fulfillment. We exchanged activities that only I enjoyed for new activities that we both enjoyed. We remained each other's favorite recreational companions after marriage even though most of our recreational activities changed. And it's a good thing, because recreational companionship is definitely one of my most important emotional needs.
Become your spouses' favorite recreational companion
Think about it for a moment in terms of the Love Bank. How much do you enjoy these activities, and how many love units would your spouse be depositing whenever you enjoyed them together? What a waste it would be if someone else got credit for all those love units. And if it were someone of the opposite sex, it would be downright dangerous.
Who should get credit for all those love units? The one you should love the most, your spouse. That's precisely why I encourage couples to be each other's favorite recreational companions. It's one of the simplest ways to deposit love units.
The need for recreational companionship combines two needs into one. First, there is the need to be engaged in recreational activities and second, the need to have a companion. To determine if you have this need, first ask yourself if you have a craving for certain recreational activities. Then ask yourself if the activities require a companion for fulfillment. If the answer is yes to both questions, include recreational companionship on your list of emotional needs.
Next Emotional Need:
Honesty and Openness
Honesty and Openness
Most of us want an honest relationship with our spouse. But some people have a need for honesty and openness -- it gives them a sense of security and helps them become emotionally bonded to the one who meets that need.
Those with a need for honesty and openness want accurate information about their spouses' thoughts, feelings, habits, likes, dislikes, personal history, daily activities and plans for the future. If their spouse
Learn how to meet the need of Honesty and Openness
does not provide honest and open communication, trust is undermined and the feelings of security can eventually be destroyed. They cannot trust the signals that are being sent and feel they have no foundation on which to build a solid relationship. Instead of adjusting, they feel off balance; instead of growing together, they feel as if they are growing apart.
Honesty and openness helps build compatibility in marriage. When you and your spouse openly reveal the facts of your past, your present activities, and your plans for the future, you are able to make intelligent decisions that take each other's feelings into account. And that's how you create compatibility -- by making decisions that work well for both of you simultaneously.
But aside from the practical considerations of honesty and openness, those with this need feel happy and fulfilled when their spouses reveal their most private thoughts to them, and feel very frustrated when they are hidden. That reaction is evidence of an emotional need, and if that is the way you feel, include honesty and openness as one of your most important emotional needs.
Next Emotional Need:
Physical Attractiveness
Physical Attractiveness
For many, physical attractiveness can be one of the greatest sources of love units. If you have this need, an attractive person will not only get your attention, but may distract you from whatever it was you were doing. In fact, that's what may have first drawn you to your spouse -- his or her physical attractiveness.
There are some who consider this need to be temporary and important only in the beginning of a relationship. Some feel that after a couple get to know each other better, physical attractiveness should take a back seat to deeper and more intimate needs. And I've even heard some suggest that those with a need for physical attractiveness are immature or spiritually weak -- even subhuman!
But I don't judge important emotional needs, and I don't think you should either. The question you should ask is, what need when met deposits the most love units? If it's physical attractiveness, it should not be ignored. For many, the need for physical attractiveness not only helps create a relationship, but it continues on throughout marriage, and love units are deposited whenever the spouse is seen -- if he or she is physically attractive.
Learn how to be an attractive spouse
Among the various aspects of physical attractiveness, weight generally gets the most attention. Almost all of the complaints I hear regarding a spouse's loss of physical attractiveness are about being overweight. And when diet and exercise bring the spouse back to a healthy size, physical attractiveness almost always returns. However, choice of clothing, hair style, makeup, and personal hygiene also come together to make a person attractive. Since attractiveness is usually in the eyes of the beholder, you are the ultimate judge of what is attractive to you.
If the attractiveness of your spouse makes you feel great, and loss of that attractiveness would make you feel very frustrated, you should probably include this category on your list of important emotional needs.
Financial Support
People often marry for the financial security that they expect their spouse to provide them. In other words, part of the reason they marry is for money.
But there are others who marry before financial security becomes much of a consideration. Yet, as years go by, if a spouse is unemployed, underemployed, the other spouse can become very frustrated and unhappy. The need for financial support seems to develop after they have been married for a while, especially after children arrive.
It may be difficult for you to know how much you need financial support, especially if you were recently married or if your spouse has always been gainfully employed. But what if, before marriage, your spouse had told you not to expect any income from him or her. Would it have affected your decision to marry? Or, what if your spouse could not find work, and you had to financially support him or her throughout life? Would that withdraw love units?
You may have a need for financial support if you expect your spouse to earn a
Learn to meet the need of
Financial Support
living. But you definitely have that need if you do not expect to be earning a living yourself, at least during part of your marriage.
What constitutes financial support? Earning enough to buy everything you could possibly desire, or earning just enough to get by? Different couples would answer this differently, and the same couples might answer differently in different stages of life. That's why this need can be difficult to meet -- it can change over time.
Like many of these emotional needs, financial support is sometimes hard to talk about. As a result, many couples have hidden expectations, assumptions and resentments. How much money does your spouse have to earn before you feel frustrated about his or her paycheck? Your analysis will help you determine if you have a need for financial support, and if so, whether or not this need is being met.
Another point to remember is that when an important emotional need is met, love units are deposited in very large numbers. In other words, if someone were to meet this need for you, might you fall in love with that person? Does a person's income or wealth make him or her more attractive to you? And are those without money unattractive? If so, you probably have a need for financial support.
Next Emotional Need:Domestic Support
The need for domestic support is a time bomb. At first it seems irrelevant, a throwback to more primitive times. But for many couples, the need explodes after a few years of marriage, surprising both spouses.
Domestic support involves the creation of a peaceful and well-managed home environment. It includes cooking meals, washing dishes, washing and ironing clothes, house cleaning and child care. If you have the need for domestic support, when your spouse does some of these things, you feel very fulfilled, and when it is not done you feel very annoyed.
In earlier generations, it was assumed that all husbands had this need and all wives would naturally meet it. Times have changed, and needs have changed along with them. Now, many of the men I counsel would rather have their wives meet their needs for affection or conversation, needs which have traditionally been more characteristic of women. And many women, especially career women, gain a great deal of pleasure having their husbands create a peaceful and well-managed home environment for them. But on average, men still express this need more often than women.
Marriage usually begins with a willingness of both spouses to share domestic responsibilities. Newlyweds commonly wash dishes together, make the bed together, and divide many household tasks. The groom welcomes the help he gets from his wife,
Learn to meet the need of
Domestic Support
helping him do what he's been doing alone as a bachelor. At this point in marriage, neither of them would identify domestic support as an important emotional need. But the time bomb is ticking.
When does the need for domestic support explode? When the children arrive! Children create huge needs -- both a greater need for income and greater domestic responsibilities. The previous division of labor is now obsolete. Both spouses must take on new responsibilities -- and which ones will they take?
At this point in your marriage, especially if you do not have children, you may find no need for domestic support at all. But if you find yourself very appreciative of your spouse's cooking, cleaning, washing and childcare, and are very frustrated when they are not forthcoming, make sure that domestic support is on your list of important emotional needs.
Next Emotional Need:
Family CommitmentFamily Commitment
In addition to a greater need for income and domestic responsibilities, the arrival of children may create in you the need for your spouse to become active in the moral and educational development of the children. I call that need family commitment. As is true for the need for financial and domestic support, if you do not have any children just yet, you may not sense this need. But upon their arrival, a change may take place that you didn't anticipate.
Evidence of this need is a craving for your spouse's involvement in the training of your children. When he or she is helping to care for them, you
Learn to meet the need of
Family Commitment
feel very fulfilled, and when they are neglected you feel very frustrated.
This is not just child care -- feeding, clothing or watching over children to keep them safe. Child care falls under the category of domestic support. Family commitment, on the other hand, is taking a responsibility for how the children will turn out, teaching them the values of cooperation and care for each other. It is spending quality time with your children to help insure happiness and success for them as adults.
But the need for family commitment is not met by just any form of training. It is only met when the training is enthusiastically approved by you. It can all be ruined if your spouse uses training methods and objectives that violate your standards. Your participation and agreement regarding training methods and objectives are essential before this need can be met.
We all want our children to be successful, but if you have the need for family commitment, your spouse's participation in family activities that guarantee that outcome will deposit so many love units that it will trigger your feeling of love for him or her. And your spouse's neglect of your children will threaten that love.
Next Emotional Need:
AdmirationAdmiration
If you have the need for admiration, you may have fallen in love with your spouse partly because of his or her compliments to you. Some people just love to be told that they are appreciated. Your spouse may also have been careful not to criticize you because criticism may hurt you deeply if you have this need.
Many of us have a deep desire to be respected, valued and appreciated by our spouse. We need to be affirmed clearly and often. There's nothing wrong with feeling that
Learn to meet the need of Admiration
way. Even God wants us to appreciate Him.
Admiration is one of the easiest needs to meet. Just a word of appreciation, and presto, you've made someone's day. On the other hand, it's also easy to be critical. A trivial word of rebuke can set some people on their heels, ruining their day and withdrawing love units at an alarming rate.
Your spouse may have the power to build up or deplete his or her account in your Love Bank with just a few words of admiration or criticism. If you are affected that easily, be sure to add admiration to your list of important emotional needs.
Back to Emotional Needs
Most Popular Links
• The Marriage Builders� Discussion Forum
• How to Survive Infidelity
• The Most Important Emotional Needs
• Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
• Coping with Infidelity:
Part 1 - How Do Affairs Begin?
• A Summary of Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
• Love Busters
• The Emotional Needs Questionnaire
• Q&A Columns
• The Policy of Joint Agreement
Worth Looking Into
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Click Here!
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Affection is the expression of care. It symbolizes security, protection, comfort and approval -- vital ingredients in any relationship. When one spouse is affectionate toward the other, the following messages are sent:
1. You are important to me. I will care for you and protect you.
2. I'm concerned about the problems you face and will be there for you when you need me.
Learn to be more affectionate
A simple hug can say those things. And there are many other ways to show our affection: A greeting card or an "I love you" note; a bouquet of flowers; holding hands; walks after dinner; back rubs; phone calls; and conversations with thoughtful and loving expressions. All of these can effectively communicate affection.
Affection is, for many, the essential cement of a relationship. Without it, many feel totally alienated. With it, they become emotionally bonded. If you feel terrific when your spouse is affectionate, and you feel terrible when there is not enough of it, you have the emotional need for affection.
Next Emotional Need:
Sexual Fulfillment
Sexual Fulfillment
When you married, you and your spouse promised to be faithful to each other for life. You agreed to be each other's only sexual partner. You made this commitment because you trusted each other to meet your sexual needs, to be sexually available and responsive to each other. The emotional need for sex, then, is a very exclusive emotional need. If you have this need, you will be very dependent on your spouse to meet it. You have no other ethical choices.
But in most marriages, one spouse, usually the husband, has a much greater need for sex than the other. This tends to create a significant conflict if his need is not being met as often as he would like or the way he would like it to be met. That's why it is very important for you and your spouse to understand which one of you has the greatest need for sex, and how you can meet that need frequently and effectively for each other. Without that understanding and skill, you are likely to join the majority of marriages where the need for sex is not being adequately met.
Most people know whether or not they have a need for sex, but in case there is any uncertainty, I will point out some of the most obvious symptoms.
A sexual need usually pre-dates your relationship with each other, and is somewhat independent of your relationship. While you may have discovered a deep desire to make love to your spouse since you've been in love, it isn't quite the same thing as a sexual need. Wanting to make love when you are in love is sometimes merely a reflection of wanting to be emotionally and physically close.
However, one dead give-away for having a sexual need is sexual fantasies. If you have imagined what it would be like having your sexual need met in the most fulfilling ways, you probably have a sexual need. The more the fantasy is employed, the greater your
Learn more about Sexual Fulfillment
need. And the way your sexual need is met in your fantasy is usually a good indicator of your sexual predispositions and orientation.
The need for sex and the need for affection are often confused with one another. To help you sort them out, think of it this way: affection is an act of love (hugging, kissing, hand-holding, etc.) that is non-sexual and can be shared with friends, relatives, children and even pets with absolutely no sexual intent. However, if your affection tends to have a sexual motive, it is a symptom of your need for sex, not your need for affection.
If you tend to feel happy and contented when you make love, and you feel frustrated when you don't make love often enough or the way you want to make love, you have a need for sexual fulfillment.
Next Emotional Need:
Conversation
Most Popular Links
• The Marriage Builders� Discussion Forum
• How to Survive Infidelity
• The Most Important Emotional Needs
• Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
• Coping with Infidelity:
Part 1 - How Do Affairs Begin?
• A Summary of Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
• Love Busters
• The Emotional Needs Questionnaire
• Q&A Columns
• The Policy of Joint Agreement
Worth Looking Into
The Marriage Builders® Home Study Course | Fall In Love, Stay In Love
CUSTOMIZED PLAN with Marriage Coach, Steven W. Harley, M.S.
Click Here!
Home | Site Tour | Meet Dr. Harley | Basic Concepts | Q&A Columns | Articles | Discussion Forum | Local Help
Bookstore | Courses, Seminar and Accountability | Coaching Center | Questio
Conversation
Unlike the need for sex, conversation is not an emotional need that can or should be met exclusively in marriage. Our need for conversation can ethically be met by almost anyone. But if it is one of your most important emotional needs, whoever meets it best will deposit so many love units, you may fall in love with that person. So if it's your need, it's crucial to your marital happiness that your spouse is the one who meets it the best and most often.
The need for conversation is not met by simply talking to someone. It is met when the conversation is enjoyable for both persons involved. Good conversation is characterized by the following: (1) using it to inform and investigate each other, (2) focusing attention on topics of mutual interest, (3) balancing the conversation so both have an equal opportunity to talk, and (4) giving each other undivided attention while talking to each other.
Conversation fails to meet this need when (1) demands are made, (2) disrespect is shown, (3) one or both become angry, or (4) when it is used to dwell on mistakes of the past or present. Unless conversation is mutually enjoyable, a couple is better off not talking to each other at all. An unpleasant conversation not only fails to meet the emotional need, but it also makes it less likely that there will be an opportunity to meet the need in the future. That's because we tend to prevent our spouse from meeting our needs if earlier attempts were painful to us.
Men and women don't have too much difficulty talking to each other during courtship. That's a time of information-gathering for both partners. Both are highly motivated to discover each other's likes and dislikes, personal background, current
Learn to meet the need of Conversation
interests and plans for the future. But after marriage, many women find that the man who would spend hours talking to her on the telephone, now seems to have lost all interest in talking to her, and spends his spare time watching television or reading.
If your need for conversation was fulfilled during courtship, you also expect it to be met after marriage. And if you fell in love because your need for conversation was met by your spouse during courtship, you risk falling out of love if that need is not met during marriage.
Do you have a craving just to talk to someone? Do you pick up the telephone just because you feel like talking? If you see conversation as a practical necessity, primarily as a means to an end, you probably don't have much of a need for it. But if you use conversation "just to talk," and enjoy conversation in its own right, and are frustrated when you haven't been able to talk to someone for a while, consider it to be one of your most important emotional needs.
Next Emotional Need:
Recreational Companionship
Recreational Companionship
Before you were married, chances are pretty good that you planned your dates around your favorite recreational activities. That's because when it's an important emotional need, recreational companionship can often deposit enough love units to trigger romantic love. And since you wanted your relationship to flourish, you probably chose activities that you both enjoyed.
But you may have made the mistake of doing whatever the one with the greatest need for recreational companionship wanted to do. That's what happened to my wife, Joyce, and me. She was willing to join me in all of the recreational activities I liked most -- right up to the day we were married. But after marriage, she announced that she would only be joining me in activities that she also enjoyed. And it turned out that she shared very few of my recreational interests.
Most couples whose marriages begin the way mine did make a crucial mistake -- they go their separate ways. He joins his friends in recreational activities he enjoys most and leaves his wife to find her own recreational companions for activities that interest her. That's a formula for marital disaster. If someone else of the opposite sex joins either of you in your favorite recreational activities, you are at risk to fall in love with that person. Besides, if you are not together when you are enjoying yourselves the most, you are squandering an opportunity to deposit love units.
Fortunately, Joyce and I took the path that led to marital fulfillment. We exchanged activities that only I enjoyed for new activities that we both enjoyed. We remained each other's favorite recreational companions after marriage even though most of our recreational activities changed. And it's a good thing, because recreational companionship is definitely one of my most important emotional needs.
Become your spouses' favorite recreational companion
Think about it for a moment in terms of the Love Bank. How much do you enjoy these activities, and how many love units would your spouse be depositing whenever you enjoyed them together? What a waste it would be if someone else got credit for all those love units. And if it were someone of the opposite sex, it would be downright dangerous.
Who should get credit for all those love units? The one you should love the most, your spouse. That's precisely why I encourage couples to be each other's favorite recreational companions. It's one of the simplest ways to deposit love units.
The need for recreational companionship combines two needs into one. First, there is the need to be engaged in recreational activities and second, the need to have a companion. To determine if you have this need, first ask yourself if you have a craving for certain recreational activities. Then ask yourself if the activities require a companion for fulfillment. If the answer is yes to both questions, include recreational companionship on your list of emotional needs.
Next Emotional Need:
Honesty and Openness
Honesty and Openness
Most of us want an honest relationship with our spouse. But some people have a need for honesty and openness -- it gives them a sense of security and helps them become emotionally bonded to the one who meets that need.
Those with a need for honesty and openness want accurate information about their spouses' thoughts, feelings, habits, likes, dislikes, personal history, daily activities and plans for the future. If their spouse
Learn how to meet the need of Honesty and Openness
does not provide honest and open communication, trust is undermined and the feelings of security can eventually be destroyed. They cannot trust the signals that are being sent and feel they have no foundation on which to build a solid relationship. Instead of adjusting, they feel off balance; instead of growing together, they feel as if they are growing apart.
Honesty and openness helps build compatibility in marriage. When you and your spouse openly reveal the facts of your past, your present activities, and your plans for the future, you are able to make intelligent decisions that take each other's feelings into account. And that's how you create compatibility -- by making decisions that work well for both of you simultaneously.
But aside from the practical considerations of honesty and openness, those with this need feel happy and fulfilled when their spouses reveal their most private thoughts to them, and feel very frustrated when they are hidden. That reaction is evidence of an emotional need, and if that is the way you feel, include honesty and openness as one of your most important emotional needs.
Next Emotional Need:
Physical Attractiveness
Physical Attractiveness
For many, physical attractiveness can be one of the greatest sources of love units. If you have this need, an attractive person will not only get your attention, but may distract you from whatever it was you were doing. In fact, that's what may have first drawn you to your spouse -- his or her physical attractiveness.
There are some who consider this need to be temporary and important only in the beginning of a relationship. Some feel that after a couple get to know each other better, physical attractiveness should take a back seat to deeper and more intimate needs. And I've even heard some suggest that those with a need for physical attractiveness are immature or spiritually weak -- even subhuman!
But I don't judge important emotional needs, and I don't think you should either. The question you should ask is, what need when met deposits the most love units? If it's physical attractiveness, it should not be ignored. For many, the need for physical attractiveness not only helps create a relationship, but it continues on throughout marriage, and love units are deposited whenever the spouse is seen -- if he or she is physically attractive.
Learn how to be an attractive spouse
Among the various aspects of physical attractiveness, weight generally gets the most attention. Almost all of the complaints I hear regarding a spouse's loss of physical attractiveness are about being overweight. And when diet and exercise bring the spouse back to a healthy size, physical attractiveness almost always returns. However, choice of clothing, hair style, makeup, and personal hygiene also come together to make a person attractive. Since attractiveness is usually in the eyes of the beholder, you are the ultimate judge of what is attractive to you.
If the attractiveness of your spouse makes you feel great, and loss of that attractiveness would make you feel very frustrated, you should probably include this category on your list of important emotional needs.
Financial Support
People often marry for the financial security that they expect their spouse to provide them. In other words, part of the reason they marry is for money.
But there are others who marry before financial security becomes much of a consideration. Yet, as years go by, if a spouse is unemployed, underemployed, the other spouse can become very frustrated and unhappy. The need for financial support seems to develop after they have been married for a while, especially after children arrive.
It may be difficult for you to know how much you need financial support, especially if you were recently married or if your spouse has always been gainfully employed. But what if, before marriage, your spouse had told you not to expect any income from him or her. Would it have affected your decision to marry? Or, what if your spouse could not find work, and you had to financially support him or her throughout life? Would that withdraw love units?
You may have a need for financial support if you expect your spouse to earn a
Learn to meet the need of
Financial Support
living. But you definitely have that need if you do not expect to be earning a living yourself, at least during part of your marriage.
What constitutes financial support? Earning enough to buy everything you could possibly desire, or earning just enough to get by? Different couples would answer this differently, and the same couples might answer differently in different stages of life. That's why this need can be difficult to meet -- it can change over time.
Like many of these emotional needs, financial support is sometimes hard to talk about. As a result, many couples have hidden expectations, assumptions and resentments. How much money does your spouse have to earn before you feel frustrated about his or her paycheck? Your analysis will help you determine if you have a need for financial support, and if so, whether or not this need is being met.
Another point to remember is that when an important emotional need is met, love units are deposited in very large numbers. In other words, if someone were to meet this need for you, might you fall in love with that person? Does a person's income or wealth make him or her more attractive to you? And are those without money unattractive? If so, you probably have a need for financial support.
Next Emotional Need:Domestic Support
The need for domestic support is a time bomb. At first it seems irrelevant, a throwback to more primitive times. But for many couples, the need explodes after a few years of marriage, surprising both spouses.
Domestic support involves the creation of a peaceful and well-managed home environment. It includes cooking meals, washing dishes, washing and ironing clothes, house cleaning and child care. If you have the need for domestic support, when your spouse does some of these things, you feel very fulfilled, and when it is not done you feel very annoyed.
In earlier generations, it was assumed that all husbands had this need and all wives would naturally meet it. Times have changed, and needs have changed along with them. Now, many of the men I counsel would rather have their wives meet their needs for affection or conversation, needs which have traditionally been more characteristic of women. And many women, especially career women, gain a great deal of pleasure having their husbands create a peaceful and well-managed home environment for them. But on average, men still express this need more often than women.
Marriage usually begins with a willingness of both spouses to share domestic responsibilities. Newlyweds commonly wash dishes together, make the bed together, and divide many household tasks. The groom welcomes the help he gets from his wife,
Learn to meet the need of
Domestic Support
helping him do what he's been doing alone as a bachelor. At this point in marriage, neither of them would identify domestic support as an important emotional need. But the time bomb is ticking.
When does the need for domestic support explode? When the children arrive! Children create huge needs -- both a greater need for income and greater domestic responsibilities. The previous division of labor is now obsolete. Both spouses must take on new responsibilities -- and which ones will they take?
At this point in your marriage, especially if you do not have children, you may find no need for domestic support at all. But if you find yourself very appreciative of your spouse's cooking, cleaning, washing and childcare, and are very frustrated when they are not forthcoming, make sure that domestic support is on your list of important emotional needs.
Next Emotional Need:
Family CommitmentFamily Commitment
In addition to a greater need for income and domestic responsibilities, the arrival of children may create in you the need for your spouse to become active in the moral and educational development of the children. I call that need family commitment. As is true for the need for financial and domestic support, if you do not have any children just yet, you may not sense this need. But upon their arrival, a change may take place that you didn't anticipate.
Evidence of this need is a craving for your spouse's involvement in the training of your children. When he or she is helping to care for them, you
Learn to meet the need of
Family Commitment
feel very fulfilled, and when they are neglected you feel very frustrated.
This is not just child care -- feeding, clothing or watching over children to keep them safe. Child care falls under the category of domestic support. Family commitment, on the other hand, is taking a responsibility for how the children will turn out, teaching them the values of cooperation and care for each other. It is spending quality time with your children to help insure happiness and success for them as adults.
But the need for family commitment is not met by just any form of training. It is only met when the training is enthusiastically approved by you. It can all be ruined if your spouse uses training methods and objectives that violate your standards. Your participation and agreement regarding training methods and objectives are essential before this need can be met.
We all want our children to be successful, but if you have the need for family commitment, your spouse's participation in family activities that guarantee that outcome will deposit so many love units that it will trigger your feeling of love for him or her. And your spouse's neglect of your children will threaten that love.
Next Emotional Need:
AdmirationAdmiration
If you have the need for admiration, you may have fallen in love with your spouse partly because of his or her compliments to you. Some people just love to be told that they are appreciated. Your spouse may also have been careful not to criticize you because criticism may hurt you deeply if you have this need.
Many of us have a deep desire to be respected, valued and appreciated by our spouse. We need to be affirmed clearly and often. There's nothing wrong with feeling that
Learn to meet the need of Admiration
way. Even God wants us to appreciate Him.
Admiration is one of the easiest needs to meet. Just a word of appreciation, and presto, you've made someone's day. On the other hand, it's also easy to be critical. A trivial word of rebuke can set some people on their heels, ruining their day and withdrawing love units at an alarming rate.
Your spouse may have the power to build up or deplete his or her account in your Love Bank with just a few words of admiration or criticism. If you are affected that easily, be sure to add admiration to your list of important emotional needs.
Back to Emotional Needs
Most Popular Links
• The Marriage Builders� Discussion Forum
• How to Survive Infidelity
• The Most Important Emotional Needs
• Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
• Coping with Infidelity:
Part 1 - How Do Affairs Begin?
• A Summary of Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
• Love Busters
• The Emotional Needs Questionnaire
• Q&A Columns
• The Policy of Joint Agreement
Worth Looking Into
The Marriage Builders® Home Study Course | Fall In Love, Stay In Love
CUSTOMIZED PLAN with Marriage Coach, Steven W. Harley, M.S.
Click Here!
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© 1995-2009 Marriage Bui
As soon as I realized that a large Love Bank balance triggered the feeling of love, I went to work trying to discover what spouses could do for each other that would make the largest Love Bank deposits. I would ask couples, "What could your spouse do for you that would make you the happiest?" That very question focused on a core issue in marriage -- the issue of care. I could have asked the question, "How would you like your spouse to care for you?" As it turns out, care in marriage is doing what it takes to make each other happy.
When you were married, you and your spouse both promised to care for each other, and you expected that care from each other. You were in love, and you were highly motivated to make each other happy. But it might not have occurred to you at the time that if you didn't care for each other the right way, you might lose your love for each other. And along with your loss of love, you might lose your willingness to care for each other.
At the time, you probably did not know what caring for each other the right way meant. You thought that your commitment to care for each other would be sufficient to sustain your love. Even today, you may still be in the dark as to what it takes to care for each other the right way.
If that's the case, let me explain to you what care in marriage is: To care the right way, you must make large Love Bank deposits. And I've found that the best way to make those deposits is to meet each other's most important emotional needs.
What is an emotional need? It is a craving that, when satisfied, leaves you with a feeling of happiness and contentment, and, when unsatisfied, leaves you with a feeling of unhappiness and frustration. There are probably thousands of emotional needs. A need for birthday parties, peanut butter sandwiches, Monday Night Football, I could go on and on. Some people have some of those needs while others have different needs. If you feel good doing something, or if someone does something for you that makes you feel good, an emotional need has been met.
But not all emotional needs are created equally. When some are met, you may only feel comfortable--they make small Love Bank deposits. There are others, however, that can make you feel downright euphoric. In fact they make you so happy that you're likely to fall in love with the person that meets them. I call those our most important emotional needs because they make the largest Love Bank deposits of all. And those are the very same emotional needs that a husband and wife expect each other to meet in marriage.
By now you can probably see where I'm headed. My first goal when counseling a couple is to help them identify their most important emotional needs. Once those needs are identified, I help them learn to meet those needs for each other. I want them to make the largest deposits possible into each other's Love Banks. If all goes well, they begin making those large deposits and eventually they are in love with each other.
When I first began using this approach to saving marriages, I didn't know what made people the happiest in marriage -- I didn't know what emotional needs would be the most important. So I had to ask hundreds of men and women that question, "What could your spouse do for you that would make you the happiest?"
As spouses explained what they wanted most, I classified their desires into emotional need categories. And almost all those I interviewed described one or more of only ten emotional needs as being most important to them (admiration, affection, conversation, domestic support, family commitment, financial support, honesty and openness, physical attractiveness, recreational companionship and sexual fulfillment). Very few ever named a most important emotional need that was not included in this list of ten.
I also made a revolutionary discovery that helped me understand why husbands and wives tended not to meet each other's most important emotional needs. Whenever I asked couples to list their needs according to what they needed most, men would list them one way and women the opposite way. Of the 10 emotional needs, the five listed as most important by men were usually the five least important for women, and vice-versa.
What an insight! It is no wonder that husbands and wives have so much difficulty meeting each other's needs: They lack empathy. They are willing to do for each other what they appreciate the most, but it turns out that their efforts are misdirected. What they appreciate the most, their spouses appreciate the least!
Pay close attention to this next point I am about to make, because it is one of the most misunderstood aspects of my entire program.
Everyone is unique. While men on average pick a particular set of five emotional needs as their most important and women on average pick another set of five, any given man or woman can and do pick various combinations of the ten. So even though I know the most important emotional needs of the average man and woman, I don't know the emotional needs of any particular husband or wife.
I'm in the business of trying to save all marriages, not just average marriages, so I encourage each couple to ignore what I say about average male and female needs and identify those that are unique to them. That way each spouse's list of the most important emotional needs reflects what he or she appreciates the most. When they meet those needs for each other, they create the greatest happiness, and trigger a mutual feeling of love.
These conclusions are reflected in my book His Needs, Her Needs where I explain how couples build romantic love by learning how to meet each other's most important emotional needs. Readers are encouraged to identify these needs by using the Emotional Needs Questionnaire that I provide at the back of the book. Then I encourage them to become experts at meeting those needs. This questionnaire is also available to you on this website. Just click, Emotional Needs Questionnaire, to discover the most important emotional needs for you and your spouse. Be sure to print two copies so you and your spouse each have one.
Before you fill out the questionnaire read a short description of each need that I've provided for you so that you will be accurate in the choices you make.
Affection
Sexual Fulfillment
Conversation
Recreational Companionship
Honesty and Openness
Physical Attractiveness
Financial Support
Domestic Support
Family Commitment
Admiration
Once you have identified each other's most important emotional needs, your next step is to learn how to meet them. I've written several Q&A columns to help you achieve that objective. Listed below are some of those columns.
Affection
How to Meet the Need for Affection
Sexual Fulfillment
How to Meet the Need for Sexual Fulfillment
Changing a Willingness to Make Love into a Desire to Make Love
How to Overcome Pain During Intercourse?
How to Overcome Sexual Aversion?
What to Do When Your Spouse Has an Addiction to Pornography
Conversation
What to do When Your Conversation Becomes Boring and Unpleasant
Recreational Companionship
Why Should a Couple Be Together When They Are the Happiest?(Part 1)
What to Do When Your Recreational Companionship Becomes Boring and Unpleasant (Part 1)
What to Do When Your Recreational Companionship Becomes Boring and Unpleasant (Part 2)
Before we leave the very important topic of how to make Love Bank deposits, I want you to understand how important it is for you to schedule enough time to meet each other's most important emotional needs. You simply will not do a very good job making each other happy while doing something else or in your spare time--you need to schedule quality time each week to give each other your undivided attention. I make this crucial point in the Policy of Undivided Attention.
Next Concept:
The Policy of Undivided Attention
Most Popular Links
• The Marriage Builders� Discussion Forum
• How to Survive Infidelity
• The Most Important Emotional Needs
• Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
• Coping with Infidelity:
Part 1 - How Do Affairs Begin?
• A Summary of Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
• Love Busters
• The Emotional Needs Questionnaire
• Q&A Columns
• The Policy of Joint Agreement
Worth Looking Into
The Marriage Builders® Home Study Course | Fall In Love, Stay In Love
CUSTOMIZED PLAN with Marriage Coach, Steven W. Harley, M.S.
Click Here!
Home | Site Tour | Meet Dr. Harley | Basic Concepts | Q&A Columns | Articles | Discussion Forum | Local Help
Bookstore | Courses, Seminar and Accountability | Coaching Center | Questionnaires | Marriage Builders® Radio | Radio Archive
| Feedback | Privacy Policy | Contact Us |
When you were married, you and your spouse both promised to care for each other, and you expected that care from each other. You were in love, and you were highly motivated to make each other happy. But it might not have occurred to you at the time that if you didn't care for each other the right way, you might lose your love for each other. And along with your loss of love, you might lose your willingness to care for each other.
At the time, you probably did not know what caring for each other the right way meant. You thought that your commitment to care for each other would be sufficient to sustain your love. Even today, you may still be in the dark as to what it takes to care for each other the right way.
If that's the case, let me explain to you what care in marriage is: To care the right way, you must make large Love Bank deposits. And I've found that the best way to make those deposits is to meet each other's most important emotional needs.
What is an emotional need? It is a craving that, when satisfied, leaves you with a feeling of happiness and contentment, and, when unsatisfied, leaves you with a feeling of unhappiness and frustration. There are probably thousands of emotional needs. A need for birthday parties, peanut butter sandwiches, Monday Night Football, I could go on and on. Some people have some of those needs while others have different needs. If you feel good doing something, or if someone does something for you that makes you feel good, an emotional need has been met.
But not all emotional needs are created equally. When some are met, you may only feel comfortable--they make small Love Bank deposits. There are others, however, that can make you feel downright euphoric. In fact they make you so happy that you're likely to fall in love with the person that meets them. I call those our most important emotional needs because they make the largest Love Bank deposits of all. And those are the very same emotional needs that a husband and wife expect each other to meet in marriage.
By now you can probably see where I'm headed. My first goal when counseling a couple is to help them identify their most important emotional needs. Once those needs are identified, I help them learn to meet those needs for each other. I want them to make the largest deposits possible into each other's Love Banks. If all goes well, they begin making those large deposits and eventually they are in love with each other.
When I first began using this approach to saving marriages, I didn't know what made people the happiest in marriage -- I didn't know what emotional needs would be the most important. So I had to ask hundreds of men and women that question, "What could your spouse do for you that would make you the happiest?"
As spouses explained what they wanted most, I classified their desires into emotional need categories. And almost all those I interviewed described one or more of only ten emotional needs as being most important to them (admiration, affection, conversation, domestic support, family commitment, financial support, honesty and openness, physical attractiveness, recreational companionship and sexual fulfillment). Very few ever named a most important emotional need that was not included in this list of ten.
I also made a revolutionary discovery that helped me understand why husbands and wives tended not to meet each other's most important emotional needs. Whenever I asked couples to list their needs according to what they needed most, men would list them one way and women the opposite way. Of the 10 emotional needs, the five listed as most important by men were usually the five least important for women, and vice-versa.
What an insight! It is no wonder that husbands and wives have so much difficulty meeting each other's needs: They lack empathy. They are willing to do for each other what they appreciate the most, but it turns out that their efforts are misdirected. What they appreciate the most, their spouses appreciate the least!
Pay close attention to this next point I am about to make, because it is one of the most misunderstood aspects of my entire program.
Everyone is unique. While men on average pick a particular set of five emotional needs as their most important and women on average pick another set of five, any given man or woman can and do pick various combinations of the ten. So even though I know the most important emotional needs of the average man and woman, I don't know the emotional needs of any particular husband or wife.
I'm in the business of trying to save all marriages, not just average marriages, so I encourage each couple to ignore what I say about average male and female needs and identify those that are unique to them. That way each spouse's list of the most important emotional needs reflects what he or she appreciates the most. When they meet those needs for each other, they create the greatest happiness, and trigger a mutual feeling of love.
These conclusions are reflected in my book His Needs, Her Needs where I explain how couples build romantic love by learning how to meet each other's most important emotional needs. Readers are encouraged to identify these needs by using the Emotional Needs Questionnaire that I provide at the back of the book. Then I encourage them to become experts at meeting those needs. This questionnaire is also available to you on this website. Just click, Emotional Needs Questionnaire, to discover the most important emotional needs for you and your spouse. Be sure to print two copies so you and your spouse each have one.
Before you fill out the questionnaire read a short description of each need that I've provided for you so that you will be accurate in the choices you make.
Affection
Sexual Fulfillment
Conversation
Recreational Companionship
Honesty and Openness
Physical Attractiveness
Financial Support
Domestic Support
Family Commitment
Admiration
Once you have identified each other's most important emotional needs, your next step is to learn how to meet them. I've written several Q&A columns to help you achieve that objective. Listed below are some of those columns.
Affection
How to Meet the Need for Affection
Sexual Fulfillment
How to Meet the Need for Sexual Fulfillment
Changing a Willingness to Make Love into a Desire to Make Love
How to Overcome Pain During Intercourse?
How to Overcome Sexual Aversion?
What to Do When Your Spouse Has an Addiction to Pornography
Conversation
What to do When Your Conversation Becomes Boring and Unpleasant
Recreational Companionship
Why Should a Couple Be Together When They Are the Happiest?(Part 1)
What to Do When Your Recreational Companionship Becomes Boring and Unpleasant (Part 1)
What to Do When Your Recreational Companionship Becomes Boring and Unpleasant (Part 2)
Before we leave the very important topic of how to make Love Bank deposits, I want you to understand how important it is for you to schedule enough time to meet each other's most important emotional needs. You simply will not do a very good job making each other happy while doing something else or in your spare time--you need to schedule quality time each week to give each other your undivided attention. I make this crucial point in the Policy of Undivided Attention.
Next Concept:
The Policy of Undivided Attention
Most Popular Links
• The Marriage Builders� Discussion Forum
• How to Survive Infidelity
• The Most Important Emotional Needs
• Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
• Coping with Infidelity:
Part 1 - How Do Affairs Begin?
• A Summary of Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts
• Love Busters
• The Emotional Needs Questionnaire
• Q&A Columns
• The Policy of Joint Agreement
Worth Looking Into
The Marriage Builders® Home Study Course | Fall In Love, Stay In Love
CUSTOMIZED PLAN with Marriage Coach, Steven W. Harley, M.S.
Click Here!
Home | Site Tour | Meet Dr. Harley | Basic Concepts | Q&A Columns | Articles | Discussion Forum | Local Help
Bookstore | Courses, Seminar and Accountability | Coaching Center | Questionnaires | Marriage Builders® Radio | Radio Archive
| Feedback | Privacy Policy | Contact Us |
how to be a man !
What does it mean to be a man today? How can men consciously express their masculinity without becoming cold or closed-hearted on the one hand… or wimpy and emasculated on the other? What’s the most loving way for a conscious man to express himself?
Here are 10 ways to live more consciously as a man:
1. Make real decisions.
A man understands and respects the power of choice. He lives a life of his own creation. He knows that life stagnates when he fails to decide and flourishes when he chooses a clear path.
When a man makes a decision, he opens the door he wants and closes the doors he doesn’t want. He locks onto his target like a guided missile. There’s no guarantee he’ll reach his target, and he knows this, but he doesn’t need such guarantees. He simply enjoys the sense of inevitability that comes from pushing the launch button.
A man doesn’t require the approval of others. He’s willing to follow his heart wherever it leads him. When a man is following his heart-centered path, it’s of little consequence if the entire world is against him.
2. Put your relationships second.
A man who claims his #1 commitment in life is his relationship partner (or his family) is either too dishonest or too weak to be trusted. His loyalties are misplaced. A man who values individuals above his own integrity is a wretch, not a free thinker.
A man knows he must commit to something greater than satisfying the needs of a few people. He’s not willing to be domesticated, but he is willing to accept the responsibility that comes with greater challenges. He knows that when he shirks that duty, he becomes something less than a man. When others observe that the man is unyieldingly committed to his values and ideals, he gains their trust and respect, even when he cannot gain their direct support. The surest way for a man to lose the respect of others (as well as his self-respect) is to violate his own values.
Life will test the man to see if he’s willing to put loyalty to others ahead of loyalty to his principles. The man will be offered many temptations to expose his true loyalties. A man’s greatest reward is to live with integrity, and his greatest punishment is what he inflicts upon himself for placing anything above his integrity. Whenever the man sacrifices his integrity, he loses his freedom… and himself as well. He becomes an object of pity.
3. Be willing to fail.
A man is willing to make mistakes. He’s willing to be wrong. He’d rather try and fail than do nothing.
A man’s self-trust is one of his greatest assets. When he second-guesses himself by worrying about failure, he diminishes himself. An intelligent man considers the prospect of failure, but he doesn’t preoccupy himself with pointless worry. He accepts that if a failure outcome occurs, he can deal with it.
A man grows more from failure than he does from success. Success cannot test his resolve in the way that failure can. Success has its challenges, but a man learns more about himself when he takes on challenges that involve risk. When a man plays it safe, his vitality is lost, and he loses his edge.
4. Be confident.
A man speaks and acts with confidence. He owns his attitude.
A man doesn’t adopt a confident posture because he knows he’ll succeed. He often knows that failure is a likely outcome. But when the odds of success are clearly against him, he still exudes confidence. It isn’t because he’s ignorant or suffering from denial. It’s because he’s proving to himself that he has the strength to transcend his self-doubt. This builds his courage and persistence, two of his most valuable allies.
A man is willing to be defeated by the world. He’s willing to be taken down by circumstances beyond his control. But he refuses to be overwhelmed by his own self-doubt. He knows that when he stops trusting himself, he is surely lost. He’ll surrender to fate when necessary, but he won’t surrender to fear.
5. Express love actively.
A man is an active giver of love, not a passive receiver. A man is the first to initiate a conversation, the first to ask for what’s needed, and the first to say “I love you.” Waiting for someone else to make the first move is unbecoming of him. The universe does not respond positively to his hesitation. Only when he’s in motion do the floodgates of abundance open.
Man is the out-breath of source energy. It is his job — his duty — to share his love with the world. He must wean himself from suckling the energy of others and become a vibrant transmitter of energy himself. He must allow that energy to flow from source, through him, and into the world. When he assumes this role, he has no doubt he is living as his true self.
6. Re-channel sex energy.
A man doesn’t hide his sexuality. If others shrink from him because he’s too masculine, he allows them to have their reaction. There’s no need for him to lower his energy just to avoid frightening the timid. A man accepts the consequences of being male; he makes no apologies for his nature.
A man is careful not to allow his energy to get stuck at the level of lust. He re-channels much of his sexual energy into his heart and head, where it can serve his higher values instead of just his animal instincts. (You can do this by visualizing the energy rising, expanding, and eventually flowing throughout your entire body and beyond.)
A man channels his sexual energy into his heart-centered pursuits. He feels such energy pulsing within him, driving him to action. He feels uncomfortable standing still. He allows his sexual energy to explode through his heart, not just his genitals.
7. Face your fears.
For a man, being afraid of something is reason enough to do it. A man’s fear is a call to be tested. When a man hides from his fears, he knows he’s fallen out of alignment with his true self. He feels weak, depressed, and helpless. No matter how hard he tries to comfort himself and achieve a state of peace, he cannot overcome his inner feeling of dread. Only when facing his fears does a man experience peace.
A man makes a friend of risk. He doesn’t run and hide from the tests of fear. He turns toward them and engages them boldly.
A man succeeds or fails. A coward never makes the attempt. Specific outcomes are of less concern to a man than his direction.
A man feels like a man whenever he faces the right way, staring straight into his fears. He feels even more like a man when he advances in the direction of his fears, as if sailing on the winds of an inner scream.
8. Honor the masculinity of other men.
When a man sees a male friend undertaking a new venture that will clearly lead to failure, what does the man do? Does he warn his friend off such a path? No, the man encourages his friend to continue. The man knows it’s better for his friend to strike out confidently and learn from the failure experience. The man honors his friend’s decision to reach out and make the attempt. The man won’t deny his friend the benefits of a failure experience. The man may offer his friend guidance, but he knows his friend must fail repeatedly in order to develop self-trust and courage.
When you see a man at the gym struggling to lift a heavy weight, do you jump in and say, “Here… let me help you with that. Maybe the two of us can lift it together”? No, that would rob him of the growth experience — and probably make a quick enemy of him as well.
The male path is filled with obstacles. It typically includes more failures than successes. These obstacles help a man discover what’s truly important to him. Through repeated failures a man learns to persist in the pursuit of worthy goals and to abandon goals that are unworthy of him.
A man can handle being knocked down many times. For every physical setback he experiences, he enjoys a spiritual advancement, and that is enough for him.
9. Accept responsibility for your relationships.
A man chooses his friends, lovers, and associates consciously. He actively seeks out the company of people who inspire and challenge him, and he willingly sheds those who hold him back.
A man doesn’t blame others for his relationship problems. When a relationship is no longer compatible with his heart-centered path, he initiates the break-up and departs without blame or guilt.
A man holds himself accountable for the relationships he allows into his life. He holds others accountable for their behavior, but he holds himself accountable for his decision to tolerate such behavior.
A man teaches others how to treat him by the relationships he’s willing to allow into his life. A man refuses to fill his life with negative or destructive relationships; he knows that’s a form of self-abuse.
10. Die well.
A man’s great challenge is to develop the inner strength to express his true self. He must learn to share his love with the world without holding back. When a man is satisfied that he’s done that, he can make peace with death. But if he fails to do so, death becomes his enemy and haunts him all the days of his life.
A man cannot die well unless he lives well. A man lives well when he accepts his mortality and draws strength from knowing that his physical existence is temporary. When a man faces and accepts the inevitability of death… when he learns to see death as his ally instead of his enemy… he’s finally able to express his true self. So a man isn’t ready to live until he accepts that he’s already dead.
How to Be a Woman?
Now who will write “How to Be a Woman”?
I’ll tell you what. If you can write the “How to Be a Woman” article, go ahead and post it on your site, and email me a link to it. Next week I’ll make a post linking to all the quality submissions. Erin and I will select the article we consider the most insightful, and that link will be given special prominence at the top of the results post. So basically the prize is a permanent link and free traffic.
I’ll only link to new articles I believe offer genuine value to the reader (i.e. interesting, original ideas), so don’t bother submitting a sloppily written fluff piece or an old article just to get a link. I’d rather link to 5 thoughtful articles than 50 mediocre ones. If you can write reasonably well, you should be fine.
There are no requirements for how you format such an article (you don’t have to follow the ten-item format above). You can use any personal style you like, including writing a strictly humorous piece. The main consideration is how much value and insight you deliver.
Let’s give this a deadline of about 4 days, so all submissions must be received by 7pm PST (that’s GMT-8) on Tuesday, May 13. I’ll post the results as soon as Erin and I have had sufficient time to review the submissions. I’ve never done this before, so I have no idea how many submissions we’ll get, but I imagine it will be somewhere between 1 and 50.
You don’t have to be a woman to submit a “How to Be a Woman” article, but there’s a good chance it will help.
P.S. If you happen to be offended by all or part of this article, you should be able to find plenty more articles that offend you in the Archives.
Update May 14, 2008: The “How to Be a Woman” challenge is now closed, so we’re no longer considering new submissions. 52 submissions were received – Wow! Erin and I will read through all of them, and I’ll make a summary post as soon as we’re done.
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This entry was posted on Friday, May 9th, 2008 at 6:12 pm and is filed under Consciousness & Awareness, Courage & Fear, Personal Development, Purpose, Relationships. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.
26 Responses to “How to Be a Man”
How to Be a Woman at The Wise Turtle Speaks Says:
May 10th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
[...] by Steve Pavlina’s How to Be a Man post, I’m following up with my own take, as a woman, and as a philosopher of everything that [...]
How to be a Woman
Here are 10 ways to live more consciously as a man:
1. Make real decisions.
A man understands and respects the power of choice. He lives a life of his own creation. He knows that life stagnates when he fails to decide and flourishes when he chooses a clear path.
When a man makes a decision, he opens the door he wants and closes the doors he doesn’t want. He locks onto his target like a guided missile. There’s no guarantee he’ll reach his target, and he knows this, but he doesn’t need such guarantees. He simply enjoys the sense of inevitability that comes from pushing the launch button.
A man doesn’t require the approval of others. He’s willing to follow his heart wherever it leads him. When a man is following his heart-centered path, it’s of little consequence if the entire world is against him.
2. Put your relationships second.
A man who claims his #1 commitment in life is his relationship partner (or his family) is either too dishonest or too weak to be trusted. His loyalties are misplaced. A man who values individuals above his own integrity is a wretch, not a free thinker.
A man knows he must commit to something greater than satisfying the needs of a few people. He’s not willing to be domesticated, but he is willing to accept the responsibility that comes with greater challenges. He knows that when he shirks that duty, he becomes something less than a man. When others observe that the man is unyieldingly committed to his values and ideals, he gains their trust and respect, even when he cannot gain their direct support. The surest way for a man to lose the respect of others (as well as his self-respect) is to violate his own values.
Life will test the man to see if he’s willing to put loyalty to others ahead of loyalty to his principles. The man will be offered many temptations to expose his true loyalties. A man’s greatest reward is to live with integrity, and his greatest punishment is what he inflicts upon himself for placing anything above his integrity. Whenever the man sacrifices his integrity, he loses his freedom… and himself as well. He becomes an object of pity.
3. Be willing to fail.
A man is willing to make mistakes. He’s willing to be wrong. He’d rather try and fail than do nothing.
A man’s self-trust is one of his greatest assets. When he second-guesses himself by worrying about failure, he diminishes himself. An intelligent man considers the prospect of failure, but he doesn’t preoccupy himself with pointless worry. He accepts that if a failure outcome occurs, he can deal with it.
A man grows more from failure than he does from success. Success cannot test his resolve in the way that failure can. Success has its challenges, but a man learns more about himself when he takes on challenges that involve risk. When a man plays it safe, his vitality is lost, and he loses his edge.
4. Be confident.
A man speaks and acts with confidence. He owns his attitude.
A man doesn’t adopt a confident posture because he knows he’ll succeed. He often knows that failure is a likely outcome. But when the odds of success are clearly against him, he still exudes confidence. It isn’t because he’s ignorant or suffering from denial. It’s because he’s proving to himself that he has the strength to transcend his self-doubt. This builds his courage and persistence, two of his most valuable allies.
A man is willing to be defeated by the world. He’s willing to be taken down by circumstances beyond his control. But he refuses to be overwhelmed by his own self-doubt. He knows that when he stops trusting himself, he is surely lost. He’ll surrender to fate when necessary, but he won’t surrender to fear.
5. Express love actively.
A man is an active giver of love, not a passive receiver. A man is the first to initiate a conversation, the first to ask for what’s needed, and the first to say “I love you.” Waiting for someone else to make the first move is unbecoming of him. The universe does not respond positively to his hesitation. Only when he’s in motion do the floodgates of abundance open.
Man is the out-breath of source energy. It is his job — his duty — to share his love with the world. He must wean himself from suckling the energy of others and become a vibrant transmitter of energy himself. He must allow that energy to flow from source, through him, and into the world. When he assumes this role, he has no doubt he is living as his true self.
6. Re-channel sex energy.
A man doesn’t hide his sexuality. If others shrink from him because he’s too masculine, he allows them to have their reaction. There’s no need for him to lower his energy just to avoid frightening the timid. A man accepts the consequences of being male; he makes no apologies for his nature.
A man is careful not to allow his energy to get stuck at the level of lust. He re-channels much of his sexual energy into his heart and head, where it can serve his higher values instead of just his animal instincts. (You can do this by visualizing the energy rising, expanding, and eventually flowing throughout your entire body and beyond.)
A man channels his sexual energy into his heart-centered pursuits. He feels such energy pulsing within him, driving him to action. He feels uncomfortable standing still. He allows his sexual energy to explode through his heart, not just his genitals.
7. Face your fears.
For a man, being afraid of something is reason enough to do it. A man’s fear is a call to be tested. When a man hides from his fears, he knows he’s fallen out of alignment with his true self. He feels weak, depressed, and helpless. No matter how hard he tries to comfort himself and achieve a state of peace, he cannot overcome his inner feeling of dread. Only when facing his fears does a man experience peace.
A man makes a friend of risk. He doesn’t run and hide from the tests of fear. He turns toward them and engages them boldly.
A man succeeds or fails. A coward never makes the attempt. Specific outcomes are of less concern to a man than his direction.
A man feels like a man whenever he faces the right way, staring straight into his fears. He feels even more like a man when he advances in the direction of his fears, as if sailing on the winds of an inner scream.
8. Honor the masculinity of other men.
When a man sees a male friend undertaking a new venture that will clearly lead to failure, what does the man do? Does he warn his friend off such a path? No, the man encourages his friend to continue. The man knows it’s better for his friend to strike out confidently and learn from the failure experience. The man honors his friend’s decision to reach out and make the attempt. The man won’t deny his friend the benefits of a failure experience. The man may offer his friend guidance, but he knows his friend must fail repeatedly in order to develop self-trust and courage.
When you see a man at the gym struggling to lift a heavy weight, do you jump in and say, “Here… let me help you with that. Maybe the two of us can lift it together”? No, that would rob him of the growth experience — and probably make a quick enemy of him as well.
The male path is filled with obstacles. It typically includes more failures than successes. These obstacles help a man discover what’s truly important to him. Through repeated failures a man learns to persist in the pursuit of worthy goals and to abandon goals that are unworthy of him.
A man can handle being knocked down many times. For every physical setback he experiences, he enjoys a spiritual advancement, and that is enough for him.
9. Accept responsibility for your relationships.
A man chooses his friends, lovers, and associates consciously. He actively seeks out the company of people who inspire and challenge him, and he willingly sheds those who hold him back.
A man doesn’t blame others for his relationship problems. When a relationship is no longer compatible with his heart-centered path, he initiates the break-up and departs without blame or guilt.
A man holds himself accountable for the relationships he allows into his life. He holds others accountable for their behavior, but he holds himself accountable for his decision to tolerate such behavior.
A man teaches others how to treat him by the relationships he’s willing to allow into his life. A man refuses to fill his life with negative or destructive relationships; he knows that’s a form of self-abuse.
10. Die well.
A man’s great challenge is to develop the inner strength to express his true self. He must learn to share his love with the world without holding back. When a man is satisfied that he’s done that, he can make peace with death. But if he fails to do so, death becomes his enemy and haunts him all the days of his life.
A man cannot die well unless he lives well. A man lives well when he accepts his mortality and draws strength from knowing that his physical existence is temporary. When a man faces and accepts the inevitability of death… when he learns to see death as his ally instead of his enemy… he’s finally able to express his true self. So a man isn’t ready to live until he accepts that he’s already dead.
How to Be a Woman?
Now who will write “How to Be a Woman”?
I’ll tell you what. If you can write the “How to Be a Woman” article, go ahead and post it on your site, and email me a link to it. Next week I’ll make a post linking to all the quality submissions. Erin and I will select the article we consider the most insightful, and that link will be given special prominence at the top of the results post. So basically the prize is a permanent link and free traffic.
I’ll only link to new articles I believe offer genuine value to the reader (i.e. interesting, original ideas), so don’t bother submitting a sloppily written fluff piece or an old article just to get a link. I’d rather link to 5 thoughtful articles than 50 mediocre ones. If you can write reasonably well, you should be fine.
There are no requirements for how you format such an article (you don’t have to follow the ten-item format above). You can use any personal style you like, including writing a strictly humorous piece. The main consideration is how much value and insight you deliver.
Let’s give this a deadline of about 4 days, so all submissions must be received by 7pm PST (that’s GMT-8) on Tuesday, May 13. I’ll post the results as soon as Erin and I have had sufficient time to review the submissions. I’ve never done this before, so I have no idea how many submissions we’ll get, but I imagine it will be somewhere between 1 and 50.
You don’t have to be a woman to submit a “How to Be a Woman” article, but there’s a good chance it will help.
P.S. If you happen to be offended by all or part of this article, you should be able to find plenty more articles that offend you in the Archives.
Update May 14, 2008: The “How to Be a Woman” challenge is now closed, so we’re no longer considering new submissions. 52 submissions were received – Wow! Erin and I will read through all of them, and I’ll make a summary post as soon as we’re done.
ShareThis
Discuss this post in the Steve Pavlina forum.
Use the 7 universal growth principles to achieve major breakthroughs in your habits, career, finances, relationships, health, and spiritual development. Get the book Personal Development for Smart People today.
Related Articles
No related posts
This entry was posted on Friday, May 9th, 2008 at 6:12 pm and is filed under Consciousness & Awareness, Courage & Fear, Personal Development, Purpose, Relationships. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.
26 Responses to “How to Be a Man”
How to Be a Woman at The Wise Turtle Speaks Says:
May 10th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
[...] by Steve Pavlina’s How to Be a Man post, I’m following up with my own take, as a woman, and as a philosopher of everything that [...]
How to be a Woman
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