Work On Your Relationships Like They Matter. . .
Article written by BridgeMaker guest contributor Tess Marshall. Please visit her at The Bold Life.
People often ask my husband and I how we’ve managed to stay together over the years (38). They often ask us for “our secret.” There is no secret.
It’s hard to believe after saying your marriage vows that your relationship is on the brink of no return. Something happened that either is so trivial as leaving cookie crumbs in the bed or maybe a major insult to injury that tested your trust for your partner. Even the more advanced relationships can get snagged on the smallest of disputes. The current recession doesn’t make it any better, sometimes financial hardships and challenges can make your relationship worse. During the economic stress, we often do not realize what is going right and what your partner is trying to do to make life easier for you both. The only thing that everyone agrees on and that is noticeable, is how you both are irritating each other.
As pessimistic comments start building, you can find that you are going full speed at negativity and its default mode will most likely end up becoming the blame game. That’s when your struggles to get along with each other begin to become more frequent. Being mean and contemptible will often prompt you to say or do things that you may regret latter. You get caught up in the moment. Everyone knows in order to win an argument, it is the survival of the fittest, who can insult the worse or make the other person feel like a heel for their needs that continue to go unmet.
Our hearts are heavy. We have all watched in horror as the aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti unwound leaving a catastrophe for survivors and aid workers to comprehend and work through. And now, we witness the real courage of the families left without news or closure in the United States and Haiti waiting on news of their loved ones. There are some that believe we as people have become immune and desensitized to implausible injuries and blood. After watching the events unfold in Haiti, that statement can no longer be true. We have been forced to watch and endure the pain of the families and orphaned children left behind and the agony of not knowing from those that are waiting many miles from this unforeseen tragedy.
It has been joy and happiness on one hand when survivors are found. And then grief and sorrow when hearing the news there were no survivors at some of the search locations. Our hearts ache at public outcries to aid workers to look here or there and in doing so, that life is not found. We view our television sets with incomprehension as we observe the mass graves and hear stories of the smell attached to death.
What makes Brett Favre keep ticking? For all intensive purposes Brett Favre was finished as a quarterback in the NFL. His had played for 19 years, 308 consecutive starts, and two retirements and held some of the best NFL passing records in his career. However, he never closed the door to playing again. If you remember, no one really knew with certainty that he would stay retired.
Then on August 18, 2009, something happened. Brett Favre signed a two year deal with the Minnesota Vikings. And the rest as they say is history. He is having the best time of his career, not only professionally, but personally. Unfortunately, he won’t be taking part in the Super Bowl this year.
There are many reasons why marriages fail. If yours is on the brink and you want an answer to the question ‘can i save my marriage?’, I have some helpful information for you.
First of all you need to honestly assess your marriage. Is there really anything left worth saving? Sometimes the answer to that is no and you have no choice but to move on. But, if you honestly feel like you still care for your spouse and that there is still a lot of love and good in your relationship, the next thing you need to do is honestly evaluate your role in the break down of your marriage.
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Leslie Vernick, counselor and social worker, has witnessed the devastating effects of emotional abuse. Many, including many in the church, have not addressed this form of destruction in families and relationships because it is difficult to talk about. With godly guidance and practical experience, Vernick offers an empathetic approach to recognizing an emotionally destructive relationship and addresses the symptoms and the damage with biblical tools. Readers will understand how to:
This practical and thorough resource will help countless individuals, families, and churches view abuse from God’s perspective and understand how vital it is for victims to embrace His freedom from the physical, emotional, spiritual, and generational effects of emotionally destructive relationships.
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Love takes work, but, when it comes to relationships, it pays to work smarter. This book, a revised and updated edition of a therapist-recommended classic, shows you how to work smarter in your relationship. This book helps you improve communication, cope better with problems, and resolve conflicts in healthy and creative ways. Each chapter teaches an essential skill, based on cognitive behavioral therapy, which can lead to greater happiness and deeper intimacy.
New in this edition is a chapter on using acceptance skills, developed from the revolutionary new acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), which help you learn to accept your partner without judgment and structure your relationship based on a consciously chosen set of core values.
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While anger deserves our attention and respect, women still learn to silence our anger, to deny it entirely, or to vent it in a way that leaves us feeling helpless and powerless. In this vivid, engaging and eminently wise work, Dr. Lerner teaches women to identify the true sources of anger and to use anger as a powerful vehicle for creating meaningful and lasting change. The challenge of anger is at the heart of our struggle with intimacy, self-esteem, and joy. The Dance of Anger has inspired more "You changed my life" stories from both women and men than perhaps any other bestseller on the American scene today.
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"Life Strategies", published to coincide with the start of Phillip McGraw's role on Oprah's "Change Your Life TV", gave powerful, straightforward advice on shaping your life and then making dramatic changes. In "Relationship Rescue" McGraw applies this expertise to relationships, explaining how to repair and maintain them using his unique 7-step relationship rescue plan. He can help you to diagnose what is wrong in a relationship, take personal responsibility, escape wrong thinking, embrace relationship truths, learn the formula for success, renegotiate a relationship and learn to live with love and harmony.
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A groundbreaking, practical program for transforming troubled relationships into positive ones
“This is the best book on relationships I have ever read. . . . John Gottman has decoded the subtle secrets that can either enrich or destroy the quality of our ties with others.” Daniel B. Wile, Ph.D., author of After the Fight: Using Your Disagreements to Build a Stronger Relationship
“John Gottman is our leading explorer of the inner world of relationships. In The Relationship Cure, he has found gold once again.”William J. Doherty, Ph.D., author of Take Back Your Marriage: Sticking Together in a World That Pulls Us Apart
“When he says his five steps will help you build better connections with the people you care about, you know that they have been demonstrated to work.” E. Mavis Heatherington, Ph.D., professor of psychology, University of Virginia
From the country’s foremost relationship expert and New York Times bestselling author Dr. John M. Gottman comes a powerful, simple five-step program, based on twenty years of innovative research, for greatly improving all of the relationships in your life—with spouses and lovers, children, siblings, and even your colleagues at work. In The Relationship Cure, Dr. Gottman:
* Reveals the key elements of healthy relationships, emphasizing the importance of what he calls “emotional connection”
* Introduces the powerful new concept of the emotional “bid,” the fundamental unit of emotional connection
* Provides remarkably empowering tools for improving the way you bid for emotional connection and how you respond to others’ bids
