marriage conflict – Save The Marriage: Even if only YOU want to!

Turning Conflict Into Intimacy

https://savethemarriage.com/stmblog/wp-content/themes/corpus/images/empty/thumbnail.jpg 150 150 Lee H. Baucom, Ph.D. Lee H. Baucom, Ph.D. https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/669b7e375d93f77521ddaba08adb8063?s=96&d=blank&r=pg October 30, 2019 October 21, 2019

By: Lee H. Baucom, Ph.D.

October 30, 2019

Relationships of any depth and any magnitude are going to hit up against conflict. It is just the nature of being close to someone. You are going to have differences that emerge. It is not a question of if, but when those differences appear. And then there is another question: how do you deal with the conflict? Does it serve to push you apart or does it pull you together?

In marriage, you are tying your life to the life of a spouse. That intensifies the potential for conflict, and the importance of that conflict. If someone else’s life has no real bearing on mine, I can disregard and ignore our differences… and we can even go our separate ways.

But in marriage, you pledge to move through those tough times, to find a way that works for both of you. And that raises the potential for the conflict.

For many couples, conflict only serves to divide and separate, not strengthen and pull together. Which means that an opportunity has been missed. A bridge has been lost.

On this episode of the Save The Marriage Podcast, my guest is Mari Frank. What makes Mari’s outlook interesting is that she is an attorney. A divorce attorney. Not one who likes to take relationships apart, but an attorney who sees the sadness of relationships that could survive, that still have potential… where the spouses can’t see a way through their conflict.

After Mari watched marriages ending unnecessarily, she decided to do something. She used the skills developed over the years of navigating negotiation and mediation to help couples get below their surface issues and resolve their deeper conflicts.

And she realized that couples could do this before they landed in her office! Before their marriage was in jeopardy! Not only that, the conflict actually created a path to intimacy, if the couple followed it.

This led to her book, Fighting for Love. And in this episode of the podcast, it leads to our discussion of how conflict can be turned into intimacy

Listen in as Mari and I discuss the 6 A’s To A Long Relationship, and how to use HARD LOVE to get out of conflict.

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11 Things Happy Couples Do Differently: Conflict (part 1)

By: Lee H. Baucom, Ph.D.

May 20, 2015

This week, we start a series on what happy couples do differently than other couples.

Success leaves a trail. Experts have been saying this for decades. If you want to get somewhere, look at people who have gotten there. What do they do differently? How have they managed to get themselves there?

Happy couples are not special. They are no better trained than other couples. They don’t have some special “coupling” gene. They don’t come from better homes. They aren’t “relationship geniuses.”

In fact, they are like all the other couples — except they do some things differently. And those differences result in happy relationships.

So, what are those differences? They are the focus of this series of free audios.

Over the course of the next three podcasts, we will examine 11 things happy couples do differently.

By taking a look at those 11 things, you can see the path. You can see the trail. And you can follow their map.

Over the years, I have noticed a truth: 100% of couples have struggles. Around 50% find a way to work through those struggles. But that doesn’t mean that 50% of couples are happy. Only that they have chosen to stay together.

Couples really fall into 3 categories:

Decide to bail because of the difficulties.
Decide to “hang in there,” and just be miserable.
Decide to learn from the struggles, grow, and build a great relationship.

This series is focused on how couples get to category 3. This is not about “sticking it out,” nor is it about bailing, hoping to find a better option. It is about building a great relationship, where you are and with your spouse.

In this episode, we take a look at 3 ways happy couples deal with conflict differently. Learn their secrets and apply it to your relationship.

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