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March 2017 – Friends Couple Enrichment: Two sides of a story
December 2016 – Look What’s New with Friends Couple Enrichment
Stories
On May 3, 2017, most of the active leaders within Friends Couple Enrichment were able to join together virtually for one of our business meetings. It was delightful to combine 21st century video meeting technology with the 400-year-old Quaker practice of seeking unity on decisions rather than voting. Among other things, wee approved a budget, launched a new adhoc committee to look into videos about Friends Couple Enrichment, and — most important — shared with each other about why this ministry continues to blossom in our lives.
Kathy and Jeff Richman, Leader Couple
Eleven couples gathered Friday evening, giving thanks that the torrential winter rainfall of January had recently subsided, giving way to clear skies. Previous rainfall had caused widespread flooding, mudslides and road closures throughout the Santa Cruz Mountains.
Partners appreciated the opportunities throughout the weekend to practice communication exercises and to have or witness couple dialogues. Many couples commented how different a dialogue felt from other conversations, in that each partner felt truly heard. Several couples remarked that they had discussed the same matter many times before and yet in a short period of time had arrived at a point of understanding beyond what they had reached before. Speaking and listening tasks may appear simple, yet it takes a dedicated and active practice for a couple to internalize this way of communicating.
All of us found helpful the research findings of relationship psychologists John and Julie Gottman, concerning habits of couples that have stayed together for a long time. Successful couples had frequent positive, turn toward responses to “bid” messages (requests for connection), that partners send each other throughout the day. “Masters” of Love responded to bids with turn-toward responses three times as often as the “Disasters” of Love.
Saturday evening, partners put pen to paper and wrote love letters to each other. And singing, with guitar accompaniment, occurred frequently. Songs included Tom Paxton’s “Home To Me Is Anywhere You Are”, John Lennon’s “Starting Over”, and many more.
Jeff and Kathy found the weekend very satisfying and felt energized to continue the work of Friends Couple Enrichment, a ministry to which they feel called.
A testimony Mark and Daphne, past participants in a Couple Enrichment Workshop:
“We went to a Couple’s Enrichment weekend at Woolman Hill Quaker Center ten years ago. The workshop itself was both fun and enriching, the skills easy to learn and immediately applicable. At home over the following six months, we returned to that form of dialogue from time to time.
“Then, a stressful period in our marriage forced us to return more diligently and exactingly to the process we’d learned during the workshop. The regular living through of these skills was suddenly essential and gradually transformative.
“Since then we have devoted one evening each week to communicating using the techniques taught at that workshop. This discipline has created a safe container in our relationship, has established a place of trust where we now go automatically for communication that holds us to integrity and good will. This process has been invaluable sustenance for our growth as a couple.”
— Notes from Tom and Sharon Baring, Leader Couple from Fairbanks, Alaska
On Oct. 29th, 2016, Sharon and I led our first 4 1/2 hour introductory CE workshop. One of our intentions was to serve couples as busy as ourselves, with demanding jobs and full-on parenting roles. As we both work in the schools, a shorter format works better for us too, at least during the school year.
Six couples and one man, whose partner was absent, participated. In addition, we had timed the event to include Mike and Marsha Green, visiting from Durham, NC, and Cathy Walling and Scott Bell of Fairbanks, both veteran CE leader couples, so there were 19 people total.
We introduced listening, speaking and witnessing concepts by, primarily, drawing out the wisdom and experience of the group. Eager for early and frequent practice, we included mini-dialogs for each of these three skills. We had 1/2 hour for lunch, and then split into three groups for witnessed couple dialogs.
Mike and Marsha led two follow-up opportunities for dialoging, one and two weeks later. Of the original thirteen participants, eight attended one or both of these events. By this measure of interest, we deem the event a success.
One change we’ll make when we lead our next short format workshop will be to avoid a rushed lunch. We may shift the event to start at 9:00 am and offer an optional lunch when it ends at 1:30, having a hearty snack break midway.
Annie Lange LMSW
How many of us have been taught to operate under the guideline, “If you don’t talk about it, it is not a problem”? The proverbial belief, that if we sweep it under the rug, we won’t see it or feel it. However, eventually the mounds of debris under the rug become a hazard. Yet, often even in the best of relationships, we do not have the tools or strategies to safely work through our differences.
Differences and separate realities are a natural part of healthy and connected relationships. As separate beings, wearing different lens based on varying experiences and temperaments we can encounter the same event or interaction as if we are in separate worlds, and indeed we are. For example, one partner might love the bells and cheering at a sporting event, while the other would rather put pins in her eyeballs, than be in the cacophony of noise and chaos.
In couple-ship, we often have a false belief that intimacy and connection is predicated on sameness. Additionally, we often believe that one perspective is “right”, while the other is “wrong”. The “both/and” paradigm is much more helpful. This means that both realities are true.
As a clinical social worker for over twenty years, I have been in the business of “listening”. Yet, this “old dog” had a profoundly deepening experience related to listening and reflecting with my beloved in our first Couples Enrichment weekend retreat. To be in safe witnessed space, and have the structure to speak, listen and reflect for the sole purpose of understanding was sacred.
Merry Stanford and Peter Wood have developed their own five-finger model inspired by the model used in Mastering the Mysteries of Love/ Relationship Enhancement®.
The five- finger model tool begins with the thumb moving outward to the pinky finger. The five components are:
- The issue to be discussed
- The story I make up about the issue
- The feelings I have related to my story
- My concerns I have regarding the issue
- My desired outcome related to the issue
Essential to the dialogue process are the roles of speaker and listener. The speaker’s task is to speak completely from an “I” place. There is no inventory taking or speaking for the other. The listener’s role is to “Get It”. This means to listen fully for understanding of the speaker’s message and reflect it back. It does not mean agreement, nor at this point does it mean forming a response or a rebuttal. The listener eventually gets her turn to be the speaker.
In the interpersonal neurobiology world there is a phrase coined by Dan Siegel and Tina Bryson, “Name it to Tame It”. The five-finger dialogue model process facilitates this principle in a powerful way. The reduction in the fight/flee stress response is palpable when one has voice and feels heard and understood. Agreement is not an essential component.
My personal experience with the use of the five-finger dialogue model in my partnership is stunning. When my partner and I participate in this kind of conversation, our sense of connection and intimacy grows exponentially.
Recently, a dear friend of mine and I hit a very tender, scary, and angry place in our friendship. We dared to dialogue in the presence of our trusted circle. The healing result was nothing but a miracle. The five-finger dialogue model, when practiced with integrity provides an amazingly safe framework to navigate the sometimes very painful separate realities that occur in relationship.
Lastly, I have found this model to be incredibly helpful when working with couples and families in my clinical practice. When I coach couples in the five-finger dialogue model, and they effectively get to be listened to and have their truth reflected back, the energy shift in the room and within the couple is stunning. There is an amazing heart opening, which can be witnessed, in the physical, emotional and spiritual realms.
This is a process worth sharing !!!
Would you and your partner like to:
- Learn and practice skills for deep listening and respectful communication?
- Deepen your understanding and appreciation for each other?
- Learn to use conflict creatively?
Friends Couple Enrichment (FCE) is a ministry arising from the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) with a particular focus on couples in committed relationships.
Couple Enrichment workshops facilitated by Friends Couple Enrichment help couples celebrate the joys and strengths of their relationship, and learn new ways to nurture ongoing joy and commitment.
