When a couple first comes together, the knee-weakening, heart-stopping,
pants-dropping passion exhilarates. But turning that love into an
intimate bond comes no more naturally than learning to ride a bicycle or
use chopsticks. What we are socialized to assume should be spontaneous
and effortless requires patience and learned skills. Worse, should any
problems erupt we fear the relationship and ourselves are irrevocably
broken. We need help.
Though written by two noted psychologists, Open Hearts is not technical
but gentle and uplifting. Patrick Carnes, along with Mark Laaser
and Deb Laaser, share how they found their way to joyous and
fulfilling intimacy. While these concepts originated in the recovery
movement, they can transform any couple seeking renewal or trying to
restore a broken relationship.
Open Hearts starts with basic truths:
- We can only work on a relationship when we're in that relationship.
Running away never solved anything
- If we have not resolved childhood developmental issues, we will seek
out partners we think will resolve them
- It's perfectly healthy to fight. We just have to learn to do it
better.
- As partners w'ere often stuck in coupleshame. However, working through
it leads to true intimacy
Open Hearts is a book a couple reads together. It takes techniques
that Carnes and the Laasers developed in their psychotherapy practices
and weaves them into a series of individual and joint exercises. It
looks at tough issues: shame, anger, money, betrayal, sex, parenting. It
encourages fun: drawing up a family motto, expressing spirituality
together, taking gentleness breaks. It works.
Open Hearts addresses coupleship to show how a relationship, no matter
how imperfect or new, can be transformed and restored to loving
intimacy.
