Areas › Your marriage › Listening and understanding
Do not stay hidden. Tell your partner about your day, your worries, your inner world.
Hiding your reality to protect them keeps you strangers. Let them know you.
Qur’an and Sunnah
God brought their hearts together (Quran 8:63). Hearts are joined by opening to one another, a closeness only He fully makes.
وَأَلَّفَ بَيۡنَ قُلُوبِهِمۡۚ لَوۡ أَنفَقۡتَ مَا فِي ٱلۡأَرۡضِ جَمِيعࣰ ا مَّآ أَلَّفۡتَ بَيۡنَ قُلُوبِهِمۡ وَلَٰكِنَّ ٱللَّهَ أَلَّفَ بَيۡنَهُمۡۚ إِنَّهُۥ عَزِيزٌ حَكِيمࣱ
and with the believers, and brought their hearts together. Even if you had given away everything in the earth you could not have done this, but God brought them together: God is mighty and wise
Qur’an 8:63read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
What the research says
Emotional closeness depends on being known; regularly opening your inner world, not just asking about theirs, is what keeps the bond alive.
Gottman, J.; Coan, J.; Carrere, S.; Swanson, C. (1998). Predicting Marital Happiness and Stability from Newlywed Interactions. Journal of Marriage and the Family doi
Newlywed interaction patterns; accepting influence; soft start-up.
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Why it works
Ongoing honest self-disclosure is what keeps two people knowing, and bonded to, each other.
Where this sits: Gottman method, Build Love Maps (self-disclosure); How to Be a Great Listener.
This one is still a draft. It is waiting on a scholar and a clinician to read it before it is published.