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Why You Must Re-think The Way You Solve Relationship Problems Today

Copyright © 2009 Peggy L. Ferguson, Ph.D.

Republish: EasyPublish™ Published: 08Nov2009 Word count: 552 Viewed: 256 time(s) Get Free Content For Your Site

Communication is the life's blood of a marriage. Communication is the vehicle by which people in a relationship are able to communicate their love, commitment and affection to each other. It is the cornerstone of effective problem solving.

Without appropriate communication, relationships struggle to maintain the affection, the connection, and the sense of belonging and acceptance that are so important to all individuals.

With around half of all marriages ending in divorce, it is especially important to take steps to maintain the individual and family benefits of a marriage. A pro-active stance in maintaining the good will, good feelings, and individual happiness of partners goes a long way toward keeping marital stability.

Only a marriage that is satisfying to both partners is somewhat safe. If one partner is not satisfied with the marriage, it is vulnerable.

One of the major causes of divorce is conflict and ineffective communication/problem solving. Another is infidelity. Both of these problem areas for couples can be fixed or prevented.

Many couples believe that they have good communication, yet find themselves falling short of their own expectations when the conversation gets heated. Sometimes couples believe that they communicate well, when in fact, they spend very little time together, and even less, actually interacting with each other.

Often one partner will want and need more interaction and communication time while the other needs less, which puts their needs in conflict. This is a relationship issue that often finds its way into discussions that are seemingly unrelated. So, instead of talking about not feeling loved enough, feeling taken for granted, or feeling unimportant, a couple will end up arguing about taking out the trash. To one person, the issue is "taking out the trash". To the other, the meaning of repeatedly asking someone to take out the trash, means "s/he doesn't love me" or "I'm not important".

Many positive relationship outcomes can occur when couples identify that they do need more time together, with just the two of them, where they are not being distracted by television, phone calls, the kids, the job, or others, and they make time for this togetherness.

Commitment helps a marriage weather the many changes that it goes through over time. Change leads to stress. Individual partners experience shared stressors and individual stressors. Couples can use the relationship as a strength to deal with shared and individual stressors, or they can individually problem solve and try to sell their individual solutions to each other, thereby setting themselves up for more conflict and more stress. For couples to be able to assist each other with stress, there must be effective communication.

There are many ways to learn to effectively communicate. Couples counseling, marital enrichment programs, and structured or semi-structured communication exercises are all possibilities.

Couples counseling can teach you to identify when you are trying to problem solve on different levels and how to get on the same page. Couple's Feelings Meetings and The Honey Jar, a couple's conversation starter, are examples of helpful communication exercises.

If you are a spouse or a couple trying to recover the positive feelings you once had in your relationship, take action. Don't sit around hoping and waiting for something to change. Change is inevitable, but it may not be the type of change you are hoping for.

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