Archive for June, 2010

Do you consider yourself an empathic spouse/partner?

One of the truisms I’ve learned in my work as a psychologist and couples counselor is that healthy marriages and relationships are created, not found. And to create a relationship that brings fulfillment to your life takes a certain set of relationship tools or skills.

While there are many different skills that can help you build a stronger union (e.g., effective communication skills), one of the most important relationship skills is the ability to meaningfully understand your spouse’s/partner’s point of view—to empathize or to see the world through his/her eyes.

Empathy acts as a bridge to your spouse’s/partner’s psychological and emotional world, thereby increasing understanding, deepening mutual trust and, ultimately, intimacy (empathic responses can deepen both emotional intimacy and physical intimacy).

Relationship Help: Empathy Isn’t Always Easy

Improving a skill takes practice. The belief that mutual understanding should be automatic in loving relationships (and not require ongoing effort) is dangerous and can, over time, erode the foundation of your marriage/relationship.

It’s important for you (and your partner) to take the time and energy needed to improve your empathic ability in an effort to increase the trust and intimacy that is central to the health of your marriage/relationship.

What’s Needed for Empathy to Thrive in Your Relationship?

You must give you partner permission to have her/his own reactions.

As the differences between you and your partner become apparent over time, so will the frustrations inherent in some of those differences. Very often dissimilarities are viewed as obstacles rather than assets that bring life and energy to a partnership.

Establish a daily intention to challenge yourself any time you think your spouse/partner “should” be feeling a certain way–a way that makes sense to you; a way that’s similar to how you would react. Establishing intentions that acknowledge and appreciate differences can be a powerful means to change.

You may literally need to repeat to yourself: “She is not me. She’s her own person with her own way of seeing the world. She has every right to her reactions.” After repeating this to yourself several times, repeat it another ten times. As is the norm when learning any new skill, consider repetition the rule of thumb in changing attitudes that prohibit empathy.

This process can be helpful because it is often our own emotional reactions and viewpoints that block us from empathizing and appreciating our partner’s reactions (and unique perspectives).  Remember, in doing this, you’re not required to abandon your own perspective, but rather, you are temporarily placing your perspective on hold so that you can be a more understanding and empathic spouse/partner.

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Until next time,

Rich Nicastro, Ph.D.

Whether we like to admit it or not, our childhood relationships can still cast an unwelcome shadow on how we react to our spouse/partner. In other words, the long-arm of your childhood experiences might be influencing the type of spouse/partner you are today.

Let’s look at a brief example of how this played out for one husband.

Relationship Help: When unfinished emotional business blocks empathy.

Kevin often became annoyed at his wife Kathleen’s exuberance and expressions of joy. He would constantly accuse her of “over-reacting.” Rather than sharing in his wife’s love of life, he would recoil and become agitated.

The couple’s friends loved spending time with Kathleen because the hope and optimism she often expressed was contagious. Her husband’s response was confusing to Kathleen’s friends who started to avoid Kevin.

Then Kathleen shared a piece of information about her husband’s childhood that shed light on his puzzling reactions: Whenever Kevin became excited as a child (or when he expressed any emotional intensity), he would be severely punished by his abusive, alcoholic father. Though he was unaware of it, his wife’s joyous, expressive nature caused Kevin to be flooded with anxiety—her reactions unconsciously reminded Kevin of the trouble he got into when he acted that way.

In this example, Kevin’s past was standing in the way of him being an emotionally present and compassionate husband.

If you are unable (or unwilling) to empathize with your spouse/partner’s experience, the clue to your resistance may involve unfinished emotional business from your past (just like Kevin).

Relationship Help Self-Reflective Action Step:

If you’re unable to open yourself up emotionally and experience the gifts of intimacy (i.e., you’re unable to share yourself emotionally and share in your spouse/partner’s emotional experiences), ask yourself questions to tease out the reasons for your defensive stance.

Some straightforward questions, such as, “Why is this so difficult for me?” and “Is this reminding me of something painful from my childhood?” might just get you moving in the right direction.

Marriage/Relationship Resources

If you’re interested in learning more about how your past can be impacting your marriage/relationship, checkout my workbook: Take Control of Your Relationship: Don’t Let Your Past Dictate Your Future.

To receive my relationship and marriage help tips each month, subscribe to my free Relationship Advice Newsletter.

(The following post is an excerpt from my workbook, The Art of Forgiveness: The Key Ingredient in Every Relationship. The premise is that daily acts of forgiveness are vital for a healthy relationship and meaningful intimacy. Many of the couples who seek my relationship help and marriage advice are stuck because they lack a collaborative forgiveness mindset–a mindset we can all cultivate with practice).

“He who cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he must pass himself.”

~George Herbert

All couples should work toward adopting a collaborative forgiveness mindset.

When you work toward collaborative forgiveness, you strive to create an atmosphere that acknowledges the importance of WE instead of simply “I.”  Building a collaborative atmosphere of forgiveness is an ongoing, elastic process that allows for mistakes and errors—it allows two fallible humans to come together and work as a team; it allows you and your partner to stumble and err as you both attempt to navigate the complexities and mysteries of an intimate union.

Collaborative forgiveness is a judgment-free atmosphere that still gives you and your partner permission to challenge one another to be the best partner/spouse/person possible. Challenging one another when appropriate is very different from criticizing and judging each other. Challenging occurs within the fabric of support and connection; criticizing breaks apart the “we” of the relationship and is fueled by a right versus- wrong mindset. Criticism places someone into a superior role (the person who is “right”) and the other person then exists in a shame-based, inferior role (the person who is “wrong”).

When your relationship is overwhelmed by criticism, finger-pointing and condemnation, the trust and safety that are vital for intimacy will never be realized.

The cancerous growth of criticism is one reason why so many couples drift apart and fail to maintain the connection essential to a long-term successful relationship.

Openness and Acceptance: Essential ingredients to collaborative forgiveness.

How do you practice creating an atmosphere of collaborative forgiveness?

To create an atmosphere of collaborative forgiveness, it is your job and responsibility to monitor your own critical thoughts (and your partner should do the same). The goal is to become aware of all the ways in which you judge your partner (and others). If your knee-jerk reaction in reading this is, “Hold on a second, I don’t judge him/her!” just hear me out on this one.

Over the last fifteen years I’ve had many clients practice thought-monitoring (keeping a journal of their thoughts throughout the day). This is an effective way to become more mindful of the subtleties of your experiences. And whenever they give serious attention toward becoming mindful of their attitudes and thoughts, a large percent of them are surprised to discover how many critical, judgment-based thoughts are actually a part of their daily life.

Many of these thoughts are fleeting and can be so automatic that you probably aren’t even aware of them. Even subtle judgments can have a profound, negative impact on you and your marriage/relationship. A mindset consisting of judgment and criticism is the polar opposite of the acceptance needed for collaborative forgiveness to grow.

Relationship Help: Self-reflection Action Step

To become mindful of the role of criticalness in your life and in your relationship, I’d like you to take the following challenge:

Monitor your thinking for one week.

Simply be mindful of the thoughts you are having, especially while interacting with others.

To help you stay on task, it is recommended that you keep a journal of the thoughts you become aware of.

During this exercise be aware of all comparisons (comparisons are sometimes subtle) that you make between yourself and others.

To make the gifts of forgiveness a regular part of your marriage/relationship, check out my 170-page Art of Forgiveness Workbook.

Emotional intimacy requires emotional presence.

Part of the responsibility of being in a marriage or relationship is showing up day to day emotionally present for your spouse/partner. It’s easy to walk around like a zombie, distracted by the never-ending “to do” list floating around in your head.

Unfortunately, it seems like more and more couples struggle with being fully present for each other and also in their lives in general.

The commitment to your spouse/partner (that “for better or worse” vow) sends the message that you aren’t going anywhere, anytime soon. Now it’s time to go a step beyond that traditional commitment and make a commitment that’s vital for the health of your marriage/relationship:

Your Presence Commitment.

A Presence Commitment goes something like this:

“Each day I will take time out of my busy schedule to share myself with my spouse/partner. During these moments I will work to be emotionally grounded so that I can focus only on him/her and the unfolding moment.”

Are you ready to make an emotional presence commitment?

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And don’t forget to check out my new Marriage Enrichment Workbook special offer.

There is often a central theme that cuts across the different marital complaints and relationship problems that bring couples to couples counseling:

Almost all are struggling with a loss of emotional intimacy—they no longer feel a deep, fulfilling connection to one another.

How can we love someone so deeply yet struggle to remain emotionally connected to this person?

While many factors can lead to a breakdown in intimacy, let’s turn our attention to how you can enhance the emotional connection that is central to marriage and committed relationships.

7 Paths to Greater Emotional Intimacy:

1. Being clear about what makes you feel emotionally safe and communicating this with your spouse/partner;

2. Realizing that it isn’t your spouse/partner’s job to meet all of your needs (an “I-want-what-I-want-when-I-want-it” attitude has undone many marriages and will only lead to frustration and strain your marriage/relationship);

3. Appreciating and acknowledging the effort your spouse/partner makes, even when s/he misses the mark;

4. Temporarily placing your needs on hold from time to time in order to make your spouse or partner a priority;

5. Leaving your “self” (the recognizable you) at times in order to step into your partner’s emotional world—doing your best to understand her/his perspective (even when you disagree with it!);

6. Remembering to nurture your own interests and desires (as well as your spouse’s/partner’s);

7. Challenging and bringing out the best in each other (being respectful when giving each other feedback and keeping your ego in check so that you can be open to, receive and grow from your partner’s feedback).

Once you share the above list with your partner, the challenge is to find ways to incorporate each of the above points into your marriage/relationship—turning these relationship tips into tangible behaviors.

And don’t forget that the emotional connection that is so important to a fulfilling relationship is seldom steady. There may be days when you simply wake up in a bad mood (for whatever reason) and need extra emotional space from your mate, and at other times, you’ll feel the need for extra support and emotional closeness.

So don’t expect continual emotional bliss, but you also shouldn’t settle for extended periods of emotional disconnection.

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