Communication Exercise for your Marriage

Communication Exercise for your Marriage

The goal of this communication exercise is to develop a new and improved understanding of each other.

Each of you might want to have paper and pen handy to keep track of what you hear and your own thoughts while your partner is talking. This is not necessary, but when you are dealing with emotionally charged material your attention and memory are likely to be limited. Read through these instructions before you attempt to do it yourself.

This exercise is to learn how to talk to each other using active listening. This has the potential to create an intimate moment for you as a couple.

You begin with your intention to deepen your emotional connection. Sharing meaningful information with your partner offers the opportunity for a much deeper understanding of you. Verbal intimacy brings you closer together and helps you keep freshness in your relationship. This is part of how you can keep that "in love" feeling all of the time.

• Start by sharing just one meaningful thought with your partner. The thought has to be important to you, one that you genuinely care about and it must pertain to your relationship.
• While you are speaking, help your partner to understand what it is that you are trying to share.
• You do this with patience and love.
• Allow your partner time to absorb the message that you are trying to convey.
• Share one thing at a time rather than a series of thoughts and feelings. If you want, you may build more of a structure of thoughts over time.

For the spouse doing the listening, try to understand where your partner is coming from and relate to his or her perspective.

Each of you sees and experiences the world through your own video camera. As the listener, your job is to understand what it would be like to experience the world through your partner's video camera. Imagine being your spouse for just a moment. This is likely not what you are used to but it is a way to gain a deeper understanding of your partner.

• Don't try to change his or her experience to your experience or understanding.
• Don't jump to the defense
• Don't turn the conversation into one about yourself, your experience, or your understandings.
• Rather, listen actively to what your partner is saying and try to figure out the meaning.
• Allow your spouse to change his or her mind while talking.
• Allow your spouse to develop what he or she started telling you.

It is important to remember that the person who will know if your understanding is correct or not will be your partner and only your partner. Go back and forth in your conversation, and encourage your partner to correct your understanding and to correct his or her own understanding in the process.

The point of this exercise is to deepen your own intimate knowledge of your spouse by actively listening to what is being said and trying to experience the world through your partner' s experience. Only then can you understand your partner on a deeper level.

This exercise is covered in more detail in each of my larger programs, Survive An Affair and in Saving Your Marriage, along with other exercises to enhance intimate and accurate communication.