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Does self-help advice make marital communication sound too easy?
Licensed clinical therapist Peter Kleponis thinks so. “I cringe a little when I flip through magazines and see articles on ‘10 Easy Steps’ to solving communication problems,” he says. “They often give the impression that it’s a simple, tidy matter of learning a few skills. In fact, it’s an ongoing process involving deep-seated issues and two imperfect human beings!” While how-to tips can be helpful, he says in the following interview, couples who want to improve on their communication should begin by looking at the families they grew up in.
What are some of the underlying factors that hinder communication in marriage?
Anger, fear, loneliness, and mistrust are the most common root causes, I’d say. Most of the time, these problems don’t originate within the marriage itself. They develop as each spouse is growing up and observing how their own parents interact.
Normally, the patterns and styles of relating that we learned in our family of origin are what we bring into our marriage. Some of our difficulties arise from our unconscious repeating of our parents’ emotional, behavioral, relational, or spiritual weaknesses. This can happen even if we’ve vowed never to fall into those patterns!
The negative effects can become very obvious in couples whose parents had serious problems (see Bob and Jan’s story, p. A4). But even spouses from relatively healthy family backgrounds can improve on their marital communication by taking a look at how their parents related.
Doesn’t this foster a “blame it on your parents” attitude?
This is something to guard against. After all, we learn strengths from our parents, too, and it’s important to recognize them. Also, we have to take responsibility for our actions and not blame our mistakes on others. It’s important to keep in mind that the point of looking at our family of origin is not to assign blame but to acquire insight.
Since the only perfect family is the Holy Family, most of us become aware of flaws in our parents’ way of relating and communicating. If we reacted to these with anger, fear, or mistrust, the same unresolved emotions can affect the way we now respond to our spouse. We may have to begin the process of learning to forgive. Other times, the issue is more about recognizing a family dynamic that wasn’t essentially sinful but that is unhelpful in our own marriage.
Spouses whose parental wounds are numerous and run deep may want to seek out a qualified therapist who can help them to healing and marital intimacy. Certainly, every couple should call on the help of the Holy Spirit, the great Counselor who provides light to see and power to forgive and change.
What’s a good way to explore these family-of-origin issues?
Look at the “Questions for Insight” on page A6. First, reflect on them individually, perhaps writing down some of your thoughts. Then, as a couple, discuss what you each found as you thought about the family you grew up in: “Here are some of the weakness I’ve brought into our marriage. Here are some of the strengths.” Listen carefully to one another, and you’ll gain some insight: Now I understand why he flies off the handle whenever I bring up the subject of money… . Maybe this is why she avoids the subject of change… .
Here is the place to use communication skills and how-to tips! In a conversation like this, it’s so easy to get negative and accusing. Instead, work on being respectful and open. Use your findings to strengthen your marriage rather than to bring your spouse down. After you’ve identified root causes, then you can work at problem-solving and helping one another to overcome deficits and build on strengths.
What if the process uncovers hurt and anger?
It very well may! Since we all struggle with sin and weakness, it’s no surprise that we hurt the people we relate to most closely, and that they hurt us. For this reason, I love it when I go to weddings and the priest talks about the need for constant forgiveness.
Whether the hurt is minor or major, the first step is to acknowledge and look at it honestly. In cases where no wrongdoing is involved, simply discussing the problem may be enough. Other cases call for dealing with our anger and learning to forgive (more on this subject at www.MaritalHealing.com).
Here, the Sacrament of Reconciliation is a tremendous aid. Not that anger is always sinful—it’s a God-given emotion that alerts us to injustice and energizes us to right the wrong. The problem comes in when we use our anger to hurt others. Confession strengthens us to let go of this vindictive anger. It melts our hearts with a renewed awareness of God’s personal love. It builds compassion for that other wounded person in our marriage—our spouse—and increases our desire to be instruments for their growth and healing.
Any final thoughts?
Just to stress that it’s God who brings the healing! I can walk into a therapy session with my bag of tools and instruments, but it’s not going to work apart from God. It’s the same with a husband and wife who sit down together to reflect on their families of origin.
So the first and best piece of advice I can give is: Invite God into the process. Turn to him as a couple. Receive the Eucharist together. Pray for your marriage every day, asking God to deepen your communication and help you resolve problems. And don’t forget to give thanks for your marriage and all its wonderful strengths! Be encouraged by the knowledge that the God who called you into the loving covenant of marriage is with you to make you even more of a blessing to one another, your family, and the world.
Peter C. Kleponis is a licensed clinical therapist working at the Institute for Marital Healing, West Conshohocken, Pennsylvania
As weekend presenters for World Wide Marriage Encounter for more than 15 years in 3 states, we consider ourselves very knowledgeable on the subject of marriage and communication in particular.
We have come to the conclusion that being proactive at changing our own behavior is far more important than finding out why we behave. Life is too short and we don’t have time to dwell on the whys, but just “do it”. Then if time is left over, we can wonder about the whys.
Then we eliminate all the reasons to blame anyone else for our behavior. If we can blame our family or lack of, it follows that we can blame our spouse.
Time now is too short to expand on this subject so dear to our hearts.
Therapist Kleponis makes many very good points in this interview.
Tricia & Conrad Holsomback