Seven naslovi

Exercise 2: The Stress-Reducing
Conversation
Although you can earn points in your emotional bank account during
just about any everyday activity listed above, we have found the first
one, "Reunite at the end of the day and talk about how it went," to be
the most effective. What this "How was your day, dear?"
conversation does (or ought to do) is to help each of you manage the
stress in your life that is not caused by your marriage. Learning to do
this is crucial to a marriage's long term health, according to research
by my colleague Neil Jacob son, Ph.D., of the University of
Washington. He has found that one of the key variables in relapse
after his own approach to marital therapy is whether stress from
other areas of your lives spills over into your relationship. Couples
who are overrun by this stress see their marriages relapse, while
those who can help each other cope with it keep their marriages
strong.
Many couples automatically have this sort of calming-down
conversation, perhaps at the dinner table or after the kids fall asleep.
But too often this discussion does not have the desired effect--it
increases your stress levels because you end up feeling frustrated
with your spouse for not listening to you, whether you're the one
venting or the one who's offering advice. If that's the case, you need
to change your approach to these catch up conversations to make
sure they help you calm down.
For starters, think about the timing of the chat. Some people
want to unburden themselves when they're barely through the door.
But others need to decompress on their own for a while before they're
ready to interact. So wait until you both want to talk.
On a typical day, spend twenty to thirty minutes on this
conversation. The cardinal rule is that you talk about whatever is on
your mind outside of your marriage. This is not the time to discuss
any conflicts between you. It's an opportunity to support each other
emotionally concerning other areas in your lives.
This exercise takes active listening, that classic technique of
standard marital therapy, and stands it on its head. The goal of active
listening is to hear your spouse's perspective with empathy and
without judging him or her. That's all well and good. But this