We Can Start the Revolution At Home
All year long our Thursdays with ThirdPath webinars are exploring the “courageous conversations” we need to have – at work and home – to follow an integrated approach to work and life.
Want ideas to help start your “courageous conversations” at home? The following two authors have great advice on how to jump start the process.
Let Go of the Score Sheet …
When the give and take feels unfair within a relationship, couples often start keeping score of the growing injustices.
To break the negative cycle and reconnect in a more positive way, Dr B. Hibbs, author of Try To See It My Way, guides couples through four steps.
Step one – Recognize when something has felt “unfair.” This can be difficult and it may even feel like you are putting your relationship at risk. It also means opening yourself up to the role you have played in the situation – although you might not be responsible for 50% of the problem, each of us always plays some role.
Step two – Acknowledge the harmful consequences of the situation – and do this in a way that shows compassion and curiosity to help each of you better understand what’s going on and to hold yourselves personally accountable.
Step three – Identify actions that can help restore a sense of fairness – some might be small “everyday changes” (not reading email at dinner and asking about each other’s day), some might be “high-impact changes” (coming to couples therapy or changing jobs).
Step four – By following this process, couples will develop new and creative answers AND begin to regain trust. Or as Dr Hibbs says, “As your reserves of trust rise, feelings of love and security flow. Your relationship begins an upward, hopeful spiral.”
Reignite the Flame…
Ask Esther Perel what the challenges are for couples in the bedroom, and she’d say it’s our culture’s deep ambivalence around sexuality, and in particular “eroticism in the context of family.”
Ms. Perel’s book includes lots of great advice to counter this message as well as helpful case studies couples can use to rekindle the flames.
For example, she introduces us to Stephanie and Warren, a couple where the father works full time and the mom cares for the children full time. Ms. Perel uses this case study to illustrate how some times, our ambivalence around being parents while also continuing to enjoy our sexuality, may mean the energy once channeled towards the couple, is now channeled only towards the children.
Perel observes, “There are regular playdates for Jake but only three dates a year for Stephanie and Warren: two birthday and one anniversary. There is the latest kids’ fashion for Sophia, but only college sweats for Stephanie. The couple rents twenty G-rated movies for every R-rated movie. And there are languorous hugs for the kids while the grown-ups must survive on a diet of quick pecks.”
To avoid this problem, she reminds couples, “Eroticism in the home requires active engagement and willful intent … We must unpack our ambivalence about pleasure, and challenge our pervasive discomfort with sexuality, particularly in the context of family.”