The Best Feeling in the World
The BEST FEELING in the world is being with someone who WANTS YOU as much as YOU WANT THEM.
Move toward Your Partner
A marriage does not remain healthy and survive hardship by chance. Instead, such longevity is the result of thousands of decisions to move toward your partner, rather than away, especially when things are tough.
~Poonam Sharma, PhD
Love and Presence
When you love someone, the best thing you can offer is your presence.
How can you love if you are not there?
~Thich Nhat Hanh
The Key to Being Desired
Physical attractiveness may have drawn you and your husband to one another, but your emotional attractiveness is the real key to being desired by your partner over the long run.
Vulnerability Glues Us Together
In the following blog post from The Huffington Post, Terry Gaspard, MSW, LICSW, reveals the pivotal role of vulnerability in sustaining a marriage:
In my over 20 years of counseling couples, I’ve come to realize that vulnerability is the key to a lasting union and that shame and fear are two of the main reasons why couples get entrenched in power struggles that can lead to divorce. Opening up to our partner can make us feel vulnerable and exposed, but it is the most important ingredient of a trusting, intimate relationship. One of the biggest challenges that couples face is being vulnerable with a romantic partner. After all, with over 40 percent of adults growing up in a divorced family, healthy templates for intimacy may have been in short supply. In other cases, many of us were raised in homes where showing vulnerability was seen was a weakness.
What drives our fear of being vulnerable? Dr. Brene Brown, a distinguished author and researcher, informs us that vulnerability is often viewed as a weakness, but it’s actually a strength. In her landmark book Daring Greatly, she explains that vulnerability is the core of all emotions and feelings. She writes, “To feel is to be vulnerable. To believe that vulnerability is a weakness is to believe that feeling is a weakness. To foreclose on our emotional life out of fear that the costs will be too high is to walk away from the very thing that gives purpose and meaning to living.”
In Daring Greatly, Dr. Brown defines vulnerability as uncertainty, risk, and emotional exposure. Given this definition, the act of loving someone and allowing them to love you may be the ultimate risk. Love is uncertain. It’s risky because there are no guarantees and your partner could leave you without a moment’s notice — or betray you or stop loving you. In fact, exposing your true feelings may mean that you are at greater risk for being criticized or hurt.
Continue reading at:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/terry-gaspard-msw-licsw/relationship-vulnerability_b_3999535.html
Trust Love
Trust is built over the years, one experience at a time. That’s why it’s so painful when trust is shattered. Any time you feel betrayed, the level of trust in your partner is affected. Maybe he failed to stick up for you when your mother-in-law criticized you. Perhaps, he made a nasty comment in the middle of a fight. Or, worst case scenario, you discovered that he is involved with someone else.
Once you have been hurt, you have to evaluate whether it is worth your while to rebuild trust. If your partner has a long history of betraying you, you may need to give serious thought to whether things will ever change. However, when the transgressions are relatively minor and infrequent, working through the hurt can actually deepen your bond.
When the betrayal is more significant, like in the case of an extramarital affair, it is important to assess whether you and your husband have enough commitment to the marriage to do the hard work of rebuilding trust. He has to have enough remorse and understanding of your pain to earn your trust back. And, at some point, you have to be willing to let go of your desire to “make him pay” for the pain he caused you. Trust can only be rebuilt with tremendous courage, commitment, and persistence by both of you.
Pain can actually serve as a motivator to tend to your relationship and keep it on track. Believe it or not, a marriage can actually end up on more solid ground when the two of you open yourselves up to learning from the sorrow you have caused one another and use it to strengthen your relationship.
