What is the best marriage enrichment book/study you experienced?

WolfGate

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Not looking to fix anything broken, just thinking about something to spark new conversations, ideas or perhaps get DW and I to look at new viewpoints. Marriage is good. Been married 27 years and reality is you get pretty set in assumptions and how you look at things and interact over time. In the spirit of continuous improvement, it is good to examine things from time to time.

Yeah, we could just talk about stuff, but since it is the two of us with the same long term history I'm not sure we would get the new perspectives to discuss. That is why I think a book or study would be good. Not looking for a marriage bed study, but something more on communication/romance - the foundation and environment things that when better can help all aspects of marriage (including therefore the marriage bed).

Open to any resources that are not 1) contrary to a Christian worldview or 2) if Christian highly patriarchal. So secular could be fine. Egalitarian or complementarian could be fine. We got that balance sorted out so can work around what would be chaff to us.

Post is getting too long...so... what is the best resource you've experienced and what was good about it?
 

ValleyGal

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I'm pretty sure you already know this, but I am going to suggest Dr. Gottman's "Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work." Dr. Gottman is Jewish, his work is secular. I like it because it is based on scientific research over 40 years. Not only can it be used for improving sketchy marriages, but it can be used to enhance the ones that are already working, like yours. I also like the versatility. You can work through the book on your own, with your spouse, with a therapist, or you can attend a retreat or use it as a small group guide.

The only downside is that these principles require both spouses to really make it work. Dr. Gottman alludes to this in his book "The Relationship Cure" where he hones in on a couple of the principles more deeply. One of the principles is "turning towards" your spouse when they make bids for connection. In "The Relationship Cure" he breaks down the forms of reacting to a bid. If both spouses turn towards each other when they make bids, it improves marital satisfaction, but turning away and turning against are detrimental. But even worse, he identifies "unrequitted" bidding, where one partner makes more bids and responds to bids by turning towards, but the other partner makes few bids and responds by either turning away or against. What happens is the one who was making all the bidding eventually stops, and there is nothing left anymore. This demonstrates how important it is for both spouses to be 100% invested in implementing all the principles.

Although his work is secular, there is not one principle that is not supported by the Bible.

Other books I've thought were pretty good include
A Sacred Marriage - Gary Thomas
A Sacred Influence - Gary Thomas
Learning to Live the Love we Promise - Lewis Smedes
Boundaries (and Boundaries in Marriage) - Cloud and Townsend

The Gary Thomas books have a more complementarian view, although this is not bordering patriarchy. Gary seems to be of the view that the husband is to "lead" the wife by focusing on what it really means to love her (sacrifice, putting her first, etc). In the Sacred Influence, he discusses how wives can "influence" their husbands - but when you break all of that down, it becomes more egalitarian than complementarian. Very well written, and goes into more of a theological approach.
 
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WolfGate

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Thank you Valleygal for the well detailed response.

While I certainly recall you talking before about Dr. Gottman's concept of bidding for connections, I did not recall the author or title. I will take a look at that. It sounds promising.

I will also browse through the others. Gary Thomas may be interesting - sounds like his understanding of complementarianism is pretty close to mine (and not what I see being represented by much of the church today). May have promise as well.
 
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WolfGate

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"His Needs, Her Needs" by Dr. Willard Harley- We've been talking about this one in the Men's forum
Five Love Languages

Maybe I'm getting senile, but I cannot find a thread talking about it on the Men's Forum. Is it in the main forum or one of the subs?
 
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ValleyGal

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My wife and I did a kind of Sunday school class called Love and Respect using a book by the same title. We read a chapter and had a discussion along the theme. We found it very helpful.

Stay away from "Love and Respect"...please. It's a very shallow, one-size fits all book. I wrote a scathing review on it for a college class...

Read it years ago. Remember nothing.

I do not want to derail the thread, but I have to agree with Wolf and RPD - the book was less than memorable aside from the fact that the authors twisted scripture and made a whole lot of inferences that are invalid.
 
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WolfGate

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I've actually found a lot of books I read to be less than memorable. It seems the concept could have been communicated effectively in a blog or magazine article. I said I remember "nothing", that isn't quite true. I recall the principle that in general men have a higher priority on receiving respect and women a higher priority on receiving love. Obviously both sexes deserve and desire both, but I'm willing to accept that across the larger population there might be a difference in how each sex ranks those in a list of priorities.

With any books like that, every individual is different. Those large population generalizations only serve as a starting point for a specific individual as they are trying to discover how to best love and support their spouse. There is some value in that if the author presents it correctly. However, I did not see the concept of Love and Respect as worth a book and while I don't recall how he supported in this particular book, sometimes I believe the attempt to expand a concept to book length results in lots of filler that is counterproductive to the author's main message. The fact I remember nothing but the main concept tells me this book likely was in that category.
 
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Mudinyeri

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Stay away from "Love and Respect"...please. It's a very shallow, one-size fits all book. I wrote a scathing review on it for a college class...

My wife and I went through the study several years ago with about 10-12 other couples. It wasn't the greatest thing for our marriage but we walked away with a few nuggets. I think most marriage books and studies are like that. We've also gleaned some benefit from The Five Love Languages. Mostly, I think the benefit comes from looking at one's marriage and being willing to work on making it better.

My wife and I came up with a "game" that we recommend to couples that we counsel. Depending on your marriage, the game can be as bland or spicy as you want. We call it Twenty Wishes. Each spouse comes up with twenty things that they wish their spouse would do with them, for them, to them .... Each spouse gets two "Mulligans," i.e. they can choose not to fulfill two of the wishes. However, if you take a Mulligan, you have to come up with an alternative that you think your spouse would enjoy. No wish can be repeated and the couple should lay down some ground rules prior to writing down their wishes. Once the ground rules are in place, spend some time writing down the wishes on a slip of paper. Place each spouse's wishes in a small gift bag. Draw out one wish per spouse per week. Once the wishes are drawn, each spouse must fulfill the other's wish within an agreed amount of time. Some wishes are "larger" (maybe a vacation) and may require planning and scheduling. Others are "smaller" and can be fulfilled within a few minutes or hours.

My wife and I have done this ourselves and we've probably suggested the game to a dozen couples. Without exception, the couples who have been willing to try it have come back with positive reviews.

Examples to get your creative juices flowing:

I wish we could go on a sunset hot air balloon ride together.
I wish we could have sex under the stars.
I wish we could go for a sunset canoe ride.
I wish you would give me an all-over body massage with massage oil.
I wish you would perform oral sex on me.
I wish you would take me on a wine tasting tour.
I wish you would send me sexy texts during the day.
I wish we could go on a vacation to Barbados.
I wish we could rent a convertible and drive up into the mountains.
I wish we could go skinny dipping.
I wish you would set up a romantic bath with me with candlelight and rose petals.
I wish you would set up a scavenger hunt for me to find you at a romantic location.
 
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