Couples Therapy Couples therapy consists of focusing on the feelings that each partner brings to a relationship and how these feelings are being misunderstood.   Being misunderstood elicits a host of feelings that prohibit the flow of positive feeling and leads to an increase of loneliness that spawns sadness, hurt, anger, and more. Feelings in a couple usually are very intense, because increased vulnerability has been risked and expectation raised. Many hope for correction of family of origin pain, raising the stakes for increased joy, anticipating a form of unconditional love. When increased pain results, a major disappointment takes place. In sessions each partner grows in self awareness, recognizing when and how and what elicits the troubling feelings. Efforts are made to increase empathy over judgment, silence over sarcasm, and discover what lies beneath the hurt. It is most important that each partner accepts that he or she has to change if progress is to be made. Often the lessons learned and modeled in the original family are overwhelming each partner. My thirty five years of treating couples has taught me that modern man and woman are pair bonded; it is in our bones and genes to yearn for closeness to one other. Any couple can be helped to increase their happiness if effort and time are spent on learning new ways of relating. Here are a few ideas that surface in couple therapy. Excessive self love. While looking into a pond, Narcissus fell so in love with his own image he spent the remainder of his life wandering the world looking for someone as beautiful as he. He would not have made a good spouse and neither does anyone with excessive pride. Projecting onto your partner, the habit of feeling or accusing your spouse of your hidden fears. The excessively jealous partner needs to examine her own fears of infidelity. Denial of your shadow side, accepting that the 7 deadly sins: pride, sloth, envy, jealousy, lust, anger, gluttony are alive and well in you and cannot be hidden in a close relationship. Confusing spouse with a parent Dependency, the core of intimacy, is widely denied and avoided, we bring an innate fear of needing another, its degree of acceptance varying according to our past experiences with showing our needs to others. Pursuit of unconscious motivation, our pride, rage, fear and other flaws are due to experiences outside of our awareness, in childhood trauma or pain that has left its mark on behavior. In a couple feeling is often communicated by presence. In short time one intuits the anger, disappointment, distrust of the partner whether it is expressed or not. Yet the expression is most important to avoid misunderstanding. Even psychics get divorced. No partner, including yours, has the tools to read your mind. Yet each person longs for this mind reading love that would do away with asking and the burden of exposing dependency. It is virtually impossible to under estimate the negative energy that resentment can create in a relationship. Be aware of your resentment and speak to your partner about it or your resentment will grow and contaminate interaction.   In my experience no one enters couple therapy without deep fear and anxiety. The risk is high but necessary. If you are having unpleasantness in your marriage, couple therapy is an invaluable tool in helping you correct a problem that will usually grow worse. IN PRAISE OF TEARS: Some experiences hurt so deeply they need to be mourned each day. This practice is a core piece of the foundation for a well adjusted life. You cannot get through life without pain. The measure of happiness turns on how we handle pain. This bears repeating, merits a place on your makeup mirror. Put it in your own words. Cry or depression, which one? “Who walks in sorrow, walks o holy ground. ”said Oscar Wilde. Could it be that if thee were more acknowledgement of hurt and sorrow, violence would diminish, in the self, in intimacy, and in the world. There is a connection between the repression of one emotion on the other emotions. The vein that feeds the cantankerous comes from the sorrow pool in the heart. If this be true, why is there not more expression of sadness? Because it hurts to be sad. Because society has judged expression of hurt, “he went to pieces” right there in the street. “That’s enough for now. ”, parents say to the crying child. Our social fear of public emotion is based on fear that the overwhelmed chaos of our inner life will overcome us if it gets outside. One might judge a therapist by the number of tissues used in a week. Men have been taught to hold emotion, particularly sadness, in.  Crying is for sissies. This restraint may partially explain why men continue to die younger than women. A single consult can begin a self help journey that will enrich your emotional life. Contact us for more info