Areas › Your marriage
Your marriage
What keeps a marriage well is not the big gestures. It is knowing each other, turning towards each other in ordinary moments, staying regulated when it gets hot, and repairing quickly when it goes wrong. Most of the practices here take under five minutes.
Narrowed down
2 practicesTheme · Knowing your partner
How long you have · Five minutes
When · Under stress
Under the reactive feeling you show, anger or coldness, there is a softer primary one: fear, hurt, or loneliness. Reach for that and share it.
The heat we show a partner, criticism or withdrawal, is usually a secondary emotion covering a tender primary one underneath. Naming the softer…
If you are the one who goes quiet and pulls away, name the fear behind it and step back in: I shut you out because I was afraid of failing you.
Withdrawing looks like coldness but is usually self-protection from a fear of not being enough. Coming out from behind the wall, naming the fear, and…