I am learning a lot talking to my daughter about today’s dating culture. She sent me a New York Times article the other day on the end of courtship that described her experience to a tee – Hooking up and hanging out!

Young adults today have ways to instantly access their social network with text messaging, Facebook, Face Time and other social media. These great modern social technologies used to connect with people seem to be making it harder to meet someone special.

OK, I am going to date myself. I can remember calling Martha (my wife) for the first time to ask her out on a date. My parents had a rotary phone in the front hallway. I took the phone into the large walk-in front hall closet where I could get some privacy and I called Martha to ask her out to see a movie on the following Saturday night.

Those were the days when we had no message machines, smart phones, email, text messaging, Facebook, twitter, etc. If she didn’t pick up the phone, I couldn’t leave her a message. If the phone gave me a busy signal, I’d have to call her later. I had no instant way to get a message to her.

When we had our date, we went to downtown Hartford, walked around the newly constructed Constitution Plaza and went out to movie. We had a plan. We wanted to get to know each other. We weren’t casually hooking up or hanging out. We were on a date!

Today, getting together seems so spontaneous, so casual, and so “let’s see what happens.” Young adults don’t go on “traditional” dates any more. Using today’s technology allows people to avoid the anxiety of asking someone out on a date. I was very anxious and nervous when I called Martha for the first time. I was pretty sure she wanted to see me again after we first met, but I was still afraid to call her.

Today, it seems that instant messaging is a much easier way to avoid the uncomfortable feelings around connecting with someone. You can be casual. You can be non-committal. You can ask the person to join you and your friends. You can do the group thing and hope some “spark” happens.

Here are my recommendations. Whether you are female or male, you can ask someone for a date. It sounds like this, “Would you go out on a date with me?” They can say “Yes” or “No.”

Stop using all that technology. Put some thought into what you want to do with that person. Call the person up on the phone (like in the old days) and ask them out on a formal date with you. Let them know that you want to get to know them. Take sex off the table. Agree that both of you will contribute financially if that would work. Don’t go on the Internet to find out about them beforehand. Don’t ask your group of friends to join you.

Plan something together that would be special to do, just for the two of you. Have the whole evening be an opportunity to get to know each other. That’s the whole idea. Be curious about them. If you enjoy each other’s company, you can always go out on another date. Then again, you don’t have to if you don’t want to.

Asking someone on a date can be nerve racking. It can be anxiety provoking. It is also exciting. A date is fun. Over time, courting each other is really special.

Try this: If you want to get to know someone, let him or her know that. Don’t hookup. Don’t hangout. Get courageous. Ask them out on a date.

One of the important lessons that Martha and I learned early in our marriage was that expressing emotions is a natural and normal part of any human relationship. Feelings seem to come and go. It is easy to label some feelings as “good” and other feelings as “bad.” It is true that some feelings, like anger, fear and embarrassment can be difficult to experience, but that does not make them “bad” feelings or even negative feelings. They are simply feelings.

When you can learn to embrace and accept what you are feeling, you may notice that the feeling you are having will dissipate and even disappear. I have friend, a psychologist, who taught me this when I was studying in my graduate program.

I was upset and angry for having taken on too many commitments and afraid that I wasn’t going to be prepared for a lecture I was scheduled to give. I felt paralyzed in taking action so I called my friend. I wanted to tell him the whole story about how I had too much work to do and how I had to cancel my speaking engagement.

As I began to tell him my story, he did something extraordinary.  He asked, “What are you feeling?” I said, “I am angry. I am afraid I won’t be prepared for the lecture.” He said, “OK. Is it OK to feel those feelings?” I said, “No, it isn’t!” He said, “OK. Is it OK to not want to have those feelings?” I said, “Yes, it is OK to feel that way!” At that moment, something amazing happened. Those feelings of anger and fear started to disappear.

I saw that I was not allowing myself to embrace the feelings I was having. I didn’t want to be experiencing anger and fear. My good friend had given me a way to accept what I was feeling: It was OK not to want to feel what I was feeling. Through that brief exchange, I was able to embrace not only how I was being about my feelings, but also the feelings themselves. Rather than my feelings having me, I was having my feelings.

My friend didn’t tell me that I shouldn’t be feeling those feelings. He didn’t give me advice about how I should feel or what I should do. He allowed me to identify what I was feeling and see that I was not allowing myself to have those feelings. I ended up preparing and giving that lecture.

In early years of our relationship, Martha and I learned to help each other to identify and accept our feelings whatever they were. We didn’t tell each other not to have them; we learned to have what we were feeling.

I remember coming home one day from work, distressed and angry. Martha met me at the door, recognized that I was out of sorts as I began to launch into a story about my boss, my work, life in general and everything else I could think of that was upsetting me in that moment. She didn’t ask me why I felt the way I did. She asked me two questions. “What are you feeling?” and “What happened?” I said, “I’m annoyed. The meeting got moved to this Monday and I have to write a big report this weekend instead of next weekend.” I was able to get right to the point. She then said, “I understand, what do you need?” As I felt heard and understood, my anger and upset disappeared and, with Martha’s support, I could then look realistically about what I was going to have to do that weekend.

Learning to accept and embrace each other’s feelings in your marriage is a gift you give each other. Knowing that whatever you may be feeling at any moment can dissipate and, even, disappear, if you name it, share it with your partner and allow it to be there without having to justify or rationalize it gives you a way to contribute powerfully to each other.

Avoid asking each other “why?” You will simply invite justification. By using “What questions” and asking “What are you feeling?” and “What happened?,” you’re better able to understand what is going on in each other’s lives and what may have triggered the feelings you’re experiencing. As you embrace your feelings, they will lesson and you will be freed up to deal effectively with your circumstances.

In the United States today, society is rapidly moving to a time when all people, regardless of sexual orientation, will have equal opportunity under the law to get married. At present, same-sex marriage is legal in seventeen states and the District of Columbia.  Same sex marriage in Utah, which was the eighteenth state to legalize such unions, has been halted by the Supreme Court and is currently under appeal.**

The face of marriage has been transforming over the past four decades. When abortion became legal in the 1970s and women were granted the legal right to choose to have children, childbirth became separated from the fundamental design of marriage. Cohabiting couples, single parent families and married couples choosing not to have children have increased. Many individuals wanted to find a life partner with whom they could create a marriage focused on self-expression and fulfillment. Raising children became one choice, among many, that a couple could make.

Some marriage experts have been concerned that the institution of traditional marriage between a man and a woman has grown more fragile. In addition to the efforts to legalize same-sex marriage, many people base their concern on the continuing high divorce rate, the declining marriage rate and the numbers of people in alternative lifestyles. Their concern is that these social trends have significant consequences for the stability of the family and for the well-being of children.

In 2011, a panel of renowned social scientists and marriage experts made 30 specific conclusions around the importance of marriage in American society (Wilcox, 2011). Their report said that, among other things, children are more likely to thrive, enjoy greater family stability and have better relationships when they grow up in a married family with both their father and their mother. Also, the likelihood of these children failing at marriage later in their own lives decreases. There is also evidence that adolescents who grow up in stable lesbian partnerships do as well as those children who grow up in stable heterosexual families (van Gelderen, L., Bos H. & Gartrell N., et al., 2012). In fifty years, it will be interesting to study the well-being of children raised in stable homes of couples in legal same-sex marriages of either sex compared to stable homes of couples in heterosexual marriages.

The 2011 panel also found that children of married couples have greater economic advantages because married couples build more wealth than either cohabiting couples or single parent homes. Children who live in two parent families tend to enjoy better physical health on average, than do children who grow up in other family lifestyles. One wonders what role partnership in long-term marriage plays in fostering happy healthy children, independent of the genetics, the sex or the sexual orientation of the both parents. My vision is that children will be nurtured, feel loved and grow to their greatest potential in healthy and vibrant families of both heterosexual and same-sex married couples where partnership is a way of relating to each other and a way of living.

 References

van Gelderen, L., Bos H., Gartrell N., et al. (2012) Quality of life of adolescents raised from birth by lesbian mothers. Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics. 33(1), 1-7.

Wilcox, W.B. (2011). Why marriage matters, third edition: Thirty Conclusions from the social sciences. New York, N.Y.: The Institute for American Values.

**Same-sex marriage became legal in the United States on June 26, 2015, when the Supreme Court struck down all state bans on same-sex marriage in all fifty states.  The Supreme Court also required all states to honor out-of-state same-sex marriages.

Martha and I wish each and every one of you

a loving and joyous holiday season

and

a very happy new year in 2014!

Andy

If your grown kids are leaving home, going off to college, getting married or starting a new job, there is good news. Many couples at this stage are spending more quality time together. Marital satisfaction increases as the quality of your interactions and conversations improve with each other.

The empty nest phase of your life is a time for renewed focus on your marital relationship. It is a time when taking care of your health becomes vital to being able to shift attention to new dreams or dreams you may have been putting off for years. It is a time to look forward to enjoying each other, close friends and your grandchildren.

At this time of life, it is not uncommon for you and your spouse to have a yearning to reconnect with each other. All the hard work you have been putting into your marriage over the years has given you an opportunity to enjoy creating the next phase of your lives together on your terms! Living lives that are creative, self-expressed and purposeful and sharing together on that journey can be exciting for both of you.

There are challenges. You also may find yourselves in the midst of other life transitions, such as the completion of your career, the death of your parents or the birth of grandchildren. You also might be making make major shifts in your roles at home.

This is a time to explore what you really care about. Rediscover simple pleasures like working in the garden, traveling and getting together with friends. Take on projects that require your joint attention and a team effort. Here are some questions for you to explore with each other:

• What’s coming to a close in your lives? What disappointments or regrets can you let go of? What dreams have you not yet fulfilled? What have you accomplished in your lives together? What challenges have you overcome? What sweet moments of joy have you shared together over the years?
• Where do you find yourselves in life today? What new challenges or obstacles are you facing? What limitations are you now experiencing, physically, financially or otherwise? What are you concerned about? What is the quality of your life together? What do you appreciate about each other and your relationship?
• What’s opening up in your lives? What do you long for? What new dreams are you having? What passions are bubbling up inside? What are you yearning for? What vision do you now have for your future? What do you want to accomplish? What contribution do you want to make to your families, to your community and to the world?

The empty nest phase of marriage is a time in your life when you can create a new purpose for yourselves, as individuals and for your marriage. What are you being called to do? Where do you want to focus your attention? What is most important to you now? What are your unique gifts as a couple? What are you building? What is the impact do you want your lives and your marriage to have on others?

Spend time with each other and have conversations to explore some of these questions together. Not only will you have more time to spend together but also the quality of that time will expand. Your empty nest will begin to fill with new dreams, new contribution and new purpose!

Thanksgiving is just around the corner. I am looking forward to being together with family and eating bountifully. As usual, this holiday comes at a very busy time of the year for Martha and me and reminds me just how seldom I give thanks for anything, let alone the wonderful life we have. Martha, I want to spend a moment and thank you for a few things.

Martha, I am grateful for the life we have shared for over forty years. Life with you is wonderful, as in filled with wonder!!

I appreciate so many things about you and our relationship. First, you work with great vision and purpose. You always have. Your ability to connect with colleagues and contribute your passion and your wisdom inspires me.

I want to thank you to your straightforward and honest approach to life. I always know where you stand and I know that we can work out any difficulty or concern.

I love how much you love and regard each person in our family. You are a kind and loving wife, an extraordinary and generous mother and fun and doting grandmother. I marvel at how you stay connected with everyone, all the time!

I am thankful for every opportunity I have to sit in our living room, walk in the neighborhood, or dine out together and just talk about whatever there is to talk about. It is fun to make future plans, talk through issues or just share what we’ve with up to over the last week. I love that you let me know, even after four decades, that you enjoy being with me!

Martha, you are my greatest champion. Thank you for loving me so consistently and for so long! Thanks for letting me know when I am being a jerk and accepting those parts of me that can be annoying. Your capacity to forgive knocks me over.

Lastly, thank you for your partnership and for the dreams we have fulfilled, for the life we have created and for all the plans we have yet to hatch. I love you.

I am starting to get into the Thanksgiving spirit!

Oscar Wilde wrote, “Ultimately, the bond of all companionship, whether in marriage or in friendship, is conversation, and conversation must have a common basis…”

Over a lifetime, a married couple expresses all kinds of feelings, viewpoints, opinions, judgments, and ideas in conversation with each other. Their conversations can, at times, be creative, productive, and affirming or they can be reactive, static and conflicting. Couples may share what is going on in their lives, solve issues, create a vision for the future or make plans of action. Couples may talk about what is working or blame each other for what isn’t working. They may argue and even stop talking to each other for long periods of time. They may have conversations that express their commitment to creating partnership on a daily basis or that argue for “the way that it is and always will be” in their relationship.

David Bohm (1996) in his treatise on dialogue examines the nature of communication between people. He suggests that one way to think about communication is that it is used to convey information, points or view or opinions in a unidirectional way. A person may have a specific idea or meaning they want to convey to another person. In such communication, an individual is solely concerned with his point of view being heard. In other words, the person is attached to his own perspective and not interested or ready to consider different ideas, opinions or viewpoints. If another person doesn’t agree with the idea(s) he shares, the person may feel the need to defend his point of view and fail to connect in a meaningful way with his listener.

You could say that the person who is communicating is not ready to shift his (or her) view, has a fundamental lack of awareness of the other person’s point of view and is listening from what he or she already knows. You can imagine if two people are talking to each other this way, neither person is really listening to the other; they simply want to say what they have to say. I have been at many cocktail parties when someone will say something, then another person will say something else that changes the topic altogether. Or two people are simply stating their points of view about something without any real connection or commitment to having a conversation about the subject matter. Such conversations are reactive, static and identity-driven where people are more interested in being right about their points of view than in connecting with each other.

Bohm (1996) distinguishes discussion from true dialogue. The word discussion has the same root word as concussion or percussion, which means to “break up.” In a discussion, individuals express their own points of view and bat them back and forth. At best, they are attempting to come to some agreement, but in actuality each person is attempting to dominate others with their opinions or perspectives. Bohm (1996) suggests that, in this kind of conversation, the point of the interaction is to win others over to one’s own point of view. In such conversations, being focused on the content of what is being said is most important, often to the detriment of the quality of the relationship with the person or persons with whom one is conversing. These kinds of conversations are essentially reactive, don’t tend to create anything new and are focused on winning and losing.

Bohm (1996) suggests that a creative conversation or dialogue involves two or more people who are more interested in understanding each other rather than just being right and defending their points of view. The essential nature of conversation is that it is an exchange of ideas, feelings or points or view between people where the individuals are interested in listening to and understanding each other. People convey different meanings in what they are saying and listen for what is being expressed or created in the conversation. Bohm (1996) suggests that, in dialogue, two people create something new together.

In creative conversations, there is a commitment to win-win or to the relationship winning. Bohm (1996) writes that, when conversations are generative, no one person is attempting to win or dominate the conversation; the idea is to have a conversation that is mutually satisfying to both individuals. Each person takes care to understand the other and to listen for what new understanding is emerging in the conversation. No one person is attempting to be right or have his viewpoint prevail. In conversations that are creative in nature, both parties are usually aware that their viewpoints are just that: They are points of view. It is difficult and nearly impossible to have the experience of loving and caring connection with another person when one person has to be right about their point of view.

In creative conversations, a couple is able talk with each other in meaningful ways that enhance the quality of their relationship and their marriage.  Learning to have such conversations is a powerful way for a couple to nurture their partnership.

Reference

Bohm, D. (1996). On Dialogue. Routledge: New York, New York.

In the summer of 2005, Martha and I were living in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, with two of our three children, and starting to think about coming back home to the United States. Martha’s four-year expatriate contract with an international bank would be coming to an end in a year’s time, our eldest daughter was getting married the following year and our middle daughter was getting ready for her freshman year at a university in Boston.

One afternoon as we were sitting down to have a conversation about our future, Martha said, “Let’s create a collage.” My first thought was, “No, let’s not. That’s a stupid idea.” After a short time of recalcitrance on my part, I succumbed to her obvious enthusiasm. We pulled out magazines, paste, scissors and a piece of poster board we had in the closet. As we looked through the magazines, we began tearing out and sharing pictures with each other that represented our shared life together. These pictures depicted images of the kind of life we enjoy and what’s important to us. After we cut out the pictures and pasted them on the poster board, we put the collage up on the mantelpiece.

With the collage as a framework for our planning, we started talking about, “What’s next in our lives?” We chose the year 2017, a twelve-year period, in which we could envision what we’d like to accomplish together. Twelve years was a long time, long enough so life wasn’t necessarily predictable and long enough for us to take a big view of our relationship.

We shared what we each wanted to accomplish individually as well as what we wanted to have together. Our vision also included what we hoped for our three adult children, knowing full well that their lives were theirs to determine. We had a conversation for about an hour and then typed up what we had envisioned in a Word document that started with the phrase, “By the year 2017…”

Last week, I found that document in one of the folders in my computer, labeled “Our Future 2017.” I hadn’t seen it in 8 years. There were items on the list that we had clearly accomplished and there were items that, while not yet fulfilled, are still completely possible in the next four years. I showed Martha and we smiled broad smiles together. Here are some of the accomplishments we had envisioned on that day in Amsterdam and have since been fulfilled:

• We own a home in Boston
• Martha earned her Ph.D. degree
• We have continued to vacation at Squam Lake in New Hampshire
• Andy has written a book on partnership marriage
• We have a network of friends and colleagues all over the world
• Martha has worked with many international organizations
• Andy has worked with many couples, individually and in workshops
• We’re involved in many collaborative projects together
• We have continued to travel the world

We no longer have the collage we made that day. We regret that it was lost (discarded?) in our move to Boston. In another document, I had saved some of the words that described the quality of life that those images had called forth: Playfulness, being together, beauty, adventure, mystery, inspiration and wisdom. I thanked Martha for her brilliant idea of creating a collage together that day in 2005. It will be soon be time for us to create another one!

Over the past year, I’ve been writing a book on partnership in marriage. The focus of my book is the power of conversation in marriage and how couples, by having important conversations, can create a fulfilling and enduring partnership over a lifetime. Here’s an excerpt from the first draft:

“It is the nature of a couple’s conversations that determines the quality, the vibrancy and the vitality of their marriage. Today, for a couple to have an enduring and fulfilling marriage, they must learn to be effective in having all kinds of conversations over many years. The kinds of conversations that a couple routinely engages in over time have a profound impact on what is possible in their marriage and on the quality of the couple’s experience of their partnership. The quality of a couple’s conversations shapes their experience of fulfillment, balance and vitality in their life together and their expression of partnership in their marriage.”

One of the earliest conversations I can recall having with Martha occurred about two and a half years into our marriage. We were living at the time in Clinton, New York. It was in the summer of 1976 as Martha was preparing to start a Masters Degree program in Public Administration at Syracuse University and I was working as a developmental therapist in a mental health program for emotionally and mentally challenged preschool children in nearby Utica, New York. She got home one night after being away for the weekend at an intensive personal growth seminar. She came in late in the evening, we sat together cross-legged on the floor and we talked well into the night. She started the conversation with two very simple questions: “Andy, what do want in your life?” and “What do we want in our lives together?” We had been married for about two years and had never really considered what we wanted together.

I remember that conversation. I don’t remember everything we said, but I recall how we were together and especially how Martha listened to me. What we each said to each other really mattered. That night, I felt as though I was headed on this great journey with my sweetheart. We sat on the floor for three hours and engaged in a conversation that altered the trajectory of our lives. That night was the night that I told Martha I wanted to get a Ph.D. in psychology and we shared the vision of our having a family someday. We “co-created” our life and our future in that conversation.

Subsequently, I was trained as a psychologist and a marriage and family therapist and was in private practice until 2002 when Martha and I moved with our family to Amsterdam, The Netherlands. I re-trained as a professional coach with the Coaches Training Institute and got interested in educating and coaching couples in how to strengthen their connection with each other and to sustain an enthusiasm for their marriage.

Over time, I have become intrigued with the idea that the quality of marriage is created through the kinds of conversations couples have with each other. Spouses create partnership in their marriage through the values they hold dear, through the vision of their life they share and through thousands of conversations. I became curious about giving couples the tools that would empower them to fulfill their dreams together inside of their marriage. What conversations enable couples to design their lives together? What tools can couples learn that will allow them to create a lifelong partnership that is active, enduring and full of vigor each and every day?

I hold marriage as an extraordinary opportunity to grow together and to develop a mature partnership in life. While love is necessary, it doesn’t seem sufficient in building an enduring, fulfilling life together. Creating loving connection, fostering teamwork and, ultimately, co-creating a lasting partnership while honoring the unique and individual gifts of each person seem to me essential ingredients for having a great marriage. In this book, I examine what it’s going to take for couples to create a mature partnership in marriage and in life, one that lasts a lifetime. Ultimately, partnership is a context for marriage and how every couple creates partnership in their marriage is through the commitments they make and the conversations they have.

Recently, I sent the book to an editor who is going to give me a manuscript review in the next few weeks. I am both nervous and excited, awaiting her feedback on pin and needles. I’ll get working on a second draft soon and am looking forward to sharing the book sometime in early 2014!

Reference

Miser, A. (2014) The partnership marriage: Creating the life you love…together. Charleston, South Carolina: Create Space Publishing.