Several years ago, my marriage to Helen nearly collapsed. We had been teaching relationship skills for years but we hadn’t been practicing them at home. Something held us in place, but we felt like hypocrites. Finally, we made the decision to set a timeline-we would give our marriage one more year, but we would devote ourselves to trying to repair the relationship.

I’ve already told you how negative we were with each other and the decision we made to end all negativity. We also committed to doing dialogue habitually. We even followed the three steps of mirroring, validating, and empathizing when we ended our days with the expression of three appreciations of each other. We learned so much more about each other as we stretched into each other’s world and learned to appreciate our differences.

I not only had to learn that Helen was very different from me, I came to appreciate those differences and, finally, to adore them. Our incompatibilities-and there are many-became the juice in our relationship, what gave it interest. In fact, we came up with a new truism that we tell all couples: incompatibility is grounds for marriage! When our marriage fell apart, we could hardly stand to be in the same room together; now we look forward to every minute we spend with each other. She is so interesting to me. And I feel loved in a way I had never experienced before.

We now realize that we went through seven stages of growing in acceptance of each other as different people. Each step expands your consciousness to include an “other” who is different.

1. To begin, simply acknowledge that your partner is “other” – a separate individual, not you and not like you. Say: “I acknowledge that you exist and you are not me.” You begin to get “difference,” that it is okay for your partner to be himself.
2. Stay with acknowledgement until you accept that it’s true. To accept is to stop objecting that your partner is not who you think he should be. You stop trying to change your partner. You surrender criticism. Say, “I accept that you are you.”
3. Next, take it a bit further and affirm your partner’s right to be who he is. Say: “I affirm your right to be the you that you are.” You’re serious; you’re starting to get it.
4. Appreciate your partner. Your positive feelings toward your partner increase and you see his value as a person. You say “I appreciate the person you are.” In your daily practice of expressing appreciations, find three positive traits or behaviors, noticing who he is and what he does for you.
5. Admire the specialness of your partner. Your partner is special and you regard him with pleasure, wonder, and approval. You feel deep respect and say with feeling, “I admire who you are and the things you are capable of doing.”
6. Adore the exquisiteness of your partner, her special qualities. Show her your utmost esteem and praise. Say, “You are amazing!! Say it with passion and intensity. Now you see your partner’s essence, or true self, the “God-ness” within. You truly honor your partner.
7. Now you advocate for your partner’s being and potential. Advocate means to speak for or on behalf of. You now speak only positively about your partner and in his behalf. You speak up for your partner’s welfare, his reality, and his potential, all without judgment and without conditions. You are her advocate. You say, “I will speak to everyone and anyone on your behalf.”

These “seven A’s”-accept, affirm, appreciate, admire, adore, and advocate-eliminate negativity and create the opening for joy. As you take each of these steps, you replace fear with joy. You are no longer judgmental. You become a safer person for your partner and thus safer with your partner. You are no longer an object of fear.

When two people become safe for each other, the relationship becomes more important than your individual needs. When you shift from yourself to the relationship, it is no longer “how am I going to get my needs met” but “what does the relationship need?”

• Does it need more fun?
• Does it need more sex?
• Does it need a night out once a week?
• Does it need a dog?
• Does it need to be detoxed from negativity?
• Does it need more admiration?

What are we going to do to nurture this relationship so that it becomes healthy enough to nurture us? Helen and I know this works because we’ve done it. We’ve tried and failed and come back from failure to achieve the greatest success. We used to say that our marriage was a journey, not a destination. We now say that it is the ultimate destination. Our marriage is the safest place we’ve ever been, the most peaceful, the most joyful. It is our dream marriage and we couldn’t be happier. My wish for you is that you, too, will have the marriage of your dreams.

Read all four articles in this series, “Discover Each Other and Deepen Your Connection.”

• Your Partner Is Not You!
• The Way We Talk and the Way We Listen Changes Everything
• Stop Abusing Your Partner With Negativity
• Become Curious About the ‘Other’ in Your Life

During the time our marriage teetered between renewal and divorce, my wife, Helen, and I were visiting a book store when we happened on a book about how astrology affects relationships. Just for fun, we opened to the page where our two astrological signs intersected. Then we read, “You will destroy your relationship unless you stop the unrelenting negative scrutiny of each other.” We were stunned. And then we laughed. We knew the book had gotten it right.

For a time, we were quiet and separate as we turned our thoughts around those words. That sentence fell like a bombshell, because we knew it was true. The more we thought about it, the more we realized we had to stop what we now call the “invisible abuse” of belittling, negating, and undermining each other. We started by trying to be more aware of what we were saying, what words we used. What was she reacting to when she put me down, suggesting how I could change? What was I reacting to when I cut her off without listening? We worked out a plan to monitor ourselves for negative behaviors, and negative thinking. At the beginning, as we tried to stop, we grew to realize our negativity seemed to have a life of its own. We then realized we were addicted to our negativity. This just had to stop.

It took time, but we did stop being negative, but then we experienced a strange awkwardness. We had nothing to say to each other! We would go on a date night vowing there would be no negativity, and we had nothing to say. We sat in silence. The place where all that negativity had lived was now quiet, but we were still not close.

So we designed another experiment. We began a ritual of appreciations. We pledged to end each day with the expression of three appreciations of each other. And we could not use the same three the next day. Having to express three new appreciations each day forced us to observe each other to find traits and behaviors we liked and to put them into words.

Over the next few months, a wonderful thing happened: We found our way back to each other. I discovered that I was married to an amazing person, someone I knew long ago but had forgotten! And Helen felt the same way about me. Before long, we both felt loved, but in a deeper way than before.

Then a miracle happened. We experienced a level of emotional safety with each other that we had never known before, and our hearts opened to a deeper experience of love. We fell in love again. But this time it was different; it was better. Passion returned and we began to feel fully alive and joyful. All of our senses were sharper, more attuned. It was amazing. She was amazing; and she found me amazing.

We now think of negativity as an emotional disease on the order of cancer. It is pervasively destructive and ultimately kills the relationship. But unlike cancer, negativity can be stopped in an instant. You can decide now to stop all negativity. Act on that decision and everything will change. To be blunt: negativity is invisible abuse and is an addiction of the human race. When you eliminate this invisible abuse in your primary relationship, then you eliminate it in your relationships with your children, your friends, and the broader world. You become a person of peace!

No relationship can grow or deepen or survive in negativity. Negative words inflict emotional injury. You can call it sarcasm or humor, or whatever excuse you make (“I was only kidding!”), but it’s abuse. If you find yourself saying, “Can’t you take a joke?” or, “I was only kidding,” or “I’m just offering constructive criticism,” chances are you are being abusively negative. Know this: you are harming your relationship.
When people tell me how hard it is to stop being negative, I am reminded of my first skiing lessons. I couldn’t imagine going down the slope with my feet turned the way the instructor told me. I asked him why I had to do it that way. He answered: “So you won’t die.” It’s the same answer for eliminating negativity. You have to stop, or your love will die.

Helen and I learned negativity in our families, as they learned it from theirs. It seems to be imprinted in the human race and passed on in our DNA. We unlearned it in that nightly ritual of ten minutes or so of expressing love in a new way, through appreciation and gratitude.

Your partner needs you to be a safe person. You can’t be safe AND negative. You can’t be intimate AND negative. Something good is trying to happen in your relationship, and negativity prevents it from happening. You can nurture that healthy change through dialogue (the subject of article two in this series) and by replacing negativity with appreciation and gratitude. Do this and you will experience a miracle, just as we did.

Dr. Harville Hendrix, in partnership with his wife, Helen Lakelly Hunt, created Imago Relationship Therapy and co-founded Imago Relationships International, a non-profit organization that offers training and support to 2000 Imago therapists in 30 countries. Dr. Hendrix has appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show 17 times. For more information, go to https://harvilleandhelen.com

The four articles in this series, “Discover Each Other and Deepen Your Connection”, are listed below and can be found using the search option at healthy.net.

• Your Partner Is Not You!
• The Way We Talk and the Way We Listen Changes Everything
• Stop Abusing Your Partner With Negativity
• Become Curious About the ‘Other’ in Your Life

Do you know that if you fully listen to your partner, I mean listen without judgment or filters, you will discover another person you never knew? And if you are listened to in the same way, you will overcome fear and find a part of yourself you have forgotten. In Imago work, we teach a three-step dialogue process that helps couples discover each other and deepen the connection between them. You see, the way we talk to each other and the way we listen changes everything.

The guiding principle of our dialogue technique is something you learned in kindergarten: Take turns and don’t interrupt. That applies during all three steps of the process: mirroring, validating, and empathizing.

Step One – Mirroring

In dialogue, one person talks while the other listens, then you take turns. While this sounds so simple and elementary, it is such a new experience for most of us that it takes a lot of practice to get it right. That’s why this first step is so important: it’s how we sharpen our listening skills and learn to talk in a way that invites listening.

When you mirror, you simply reflect back what your partner says. Start by saying, “Let me see if I got that.” State exactly or paraphrase what your partner said, then ask, “Did I get that?”

When your partner confirms that you got it, then you ask, “Is there more about that?” If your partner has more to say, you respond again with, “Let me see if I got that,” and the dialogue continues until the partner has said everything he or she needs to say.

When you say, “Is there more about that,” you are moving into curiosity. Your partner may say, “Well, yes, there is more.” Something that had been present as a feeling is now taking shape in words. When feelings are put into words, they become integrated into consciousness. And this gives you more understanding of your partner and yourself.

So often, we only hear the beginning and end of what the other person is saying. We get the two pieces of bread but not the meat in between. The practice of reflecting and summarizing is a way to get the meat. When you listen deeply, you are stretching into your partner’s world.

Step Two – Validating

Once you have practiced mirroring, go onto the next step, which is validating your partner’s point of view. You begin by saying, “You make sense.” This doesn’t mean that you agree with the point of view, it simply means that you have listened well enough to understand the logic behind your partner’s point of view. You get inside your partner’s world. Then follow that statement with, “You make sense because,” and explain the way you understand your partner’s reasons. You are saying that your partner has a valid point of view, regardless of whether you have the same point of view.

Then follow that statement, “you make sense,” with, “what makes sense is . . .,” and restate what was said, showing the logic in your partner’s reasoning. For example: “What makes sense is that since I did not call you about being late, you wondered if you were important to me.” You are saying that your partner has a valid point of view, regardless of whether you agree. One of the worst habits many of us have is defending our own point of view as either superior or the only one that counts. When you validate, you are no longer challenging your partner. Instead, you become someone safe to be with. Your partner is now beginning to relax in your presence.

Step Three – Empathy

The third step is empathy, trying to imagine how your partner is feeling. Empathy also takes the conversation deeper. When you listen carefully to your partner (mirror), and affirm the logic behind the words (validate), the next step is to try to understand the feelings behind those thoughts (empathy). You say, “Given that, I can imagine that you might be feeling. . .” and use the word or just a few words that you think would describe your partner’s feelings, for instance, “I imagine you are feeling hurt and angry when I was late.” Then ask, “Did I get your feelings right?” Everyone wants to be heard and validated. That process alone is healing. But affirming the other’s emotions carries the feeling of being loved. It completes the dialogue experience.

When you and your partner first engage in dialogue, it feels awkward and tedious. This is a new way to talk, so that makes sense, but with practice it becomes natural. You become present to each other. You are stretching into each other’s world.

Read all four articles in this series, “Discover Each Other and Deepen Your Connection.”

• Your Partner Is Not You!
• The Way We Talk and the Way We Listen Changes Everything
• Stop Abusing Your Partner With Negativity
• Become Curious About the ‘Other’ in Your Life

If you are still waiting and wishing that your partner will just see the light and behave the way you think he or she should, then you are living a fantasy.

Most of us live with a figment of our imagination rather than the real flesh and blood person who is our partner. We see our partners through our image of what we think they are, rather than seeing them as they are or as they see themselves. And here’s the rub: when you take up the banner to “improve” your partner, you are annihilating him or her.

You are wishing the real person to be gone and your image of him to take his place. And you treat him accordingly. And guess what? That’s what your partner does to you! And you wonder why your relationship isn’t going so well now that the euphoric stage of romantic love has passed?

I invite you to take a journey of discovery. Engage your partner with curiosity; surrender judgment. You may discover a whole new, amazing world. Your partner is an “other,” with a whole world inside, a world you cannot fully enter and you cannot change. You may want sameness, for your partner to be just like you or your ideal image, but that’s not going to happen. So, if you want a great relationship, you have to let your partner be.

Your frustration with your partner is an objection to her being herself; it is an objection to her reality; to the fact that she is not like you; that she does not fit your idealized picture. Let’s be honest: Your frustration is a denial of reality. The deepest form of suffering is the denial of reality and the greatest denial of reality is denying the reality of the person you live with.

Your partner will always strive to be who she is, even if she’s trying to fit into your image. If your partner tries to deny herself, she will eventually become angry or depressed. That wish for sameness is the source of difficulty in living with another person. Difference is the reality.

Your partner has an inner world that is different from yours.

Your partner’s feelings are different.

Your partner’s thoughts are different.

Your partner’s temperament is different.

Your partner’s sexual desires are different.

Your partner’s childhood was different.

Your partner is NOT you!

Get it?

Practice simple acceptance. Ask: “Why does he do that?” “Why does she feel that way?” Ask what it is like to live in your partner’s skin. When you judge your partner, he cannot help but become defensive. When you approach him with curiosity, you have taken the first step on the path to intimacy.

In the early romantic stage of your relationship, you felt inseparable, as though you were so much alike. You knew that all of your needs would be meet in this relationship. But in the second stage, you experience conflict. You disagree; you fight. Your partner wants things that you don’t. How could this be? Who is this person? You try to get your partner to see things your way, to behave as you wish.

You criticize, shame, and blame, all in the effort to coerce him into being who you think he should be. But he becomes defensive, distant. And this process will only escalate until the relationship is torn apart. Before you know it, you are leading parallel lives, and the prospect of divorce has raised its ugly head.

But this doesn’t have to happen.

You are longing to love your partner, and he is longing to love you. But you have become separate. Trying to create sameness will not get you there; learning to accept and honor your differences will. In a healthy relationship, you realize you live with another person who is not an extension of you. Your partner is a unique individual with an equally valid point of view. When you learn to love those differences that you now find so annoying, you have entered the realm of mature love.

To move beyond this conflict stage and deepen your connection, you have to learn a new way of talking and a new way of listening. In the next article, I explain a specific, three-step dialogue process that takes you to a whole new level of connection. Your relationship will be transformed.

Read all four articles in this series, “Discover Each Other and Deepen Your Connection.”

• Your Partner Is Not You!
• The Way We Talk and the Way We Listen Changes Everything
• Stop Abusing Your Partner With Negativity
• Become Curious About the ‘Other’ in Your Life