MarriageStrong: A Ministry of Mutuality

You can't have relationships with other people until you give birth to yourself.

Sonia Sanchez

For the past five years, we’ve been facilitating groups and retreats for couples who yearn for constructive tools to loosen "stuck" patterns in their relationship; who want to pursue coupleships that serve (rather than hinder) the process of healing, transformation and growth; who want to put more energy into becoming the kind of people capable of offering respect, support and nurture in the pursuit of each others' individual and collective values and dreams. 

One goal of the work is to bring awareness to the pain that resides at the root.  There it hides, masked by natural copings meant for protection, but which often hijack control of our brains.  At the first sign of threat, the gloves are off, ready for a fight!  Think: spilled milk.  Or at least your version of it.  These natural patterns of defense get us all tangled up, treating each other in ways we wouldn't if we had more power to choose. Or could somehow Jedi ourselves out of - and more deeply into - our bodies for a moment! (Lindsay's fantasy pretty much daily since she became a convert of the Star Wars epic saga...oh yeah, Jedi training in our household day and night these days!).  These automatic patterns and copings - meant for protection - end up deepening and causing further pain in the process. 

Ironically, we reproduce the exact results we are white-knuckingly trying to avoid.  We sabotage all our best efforts to nurture the relationships we need for supporting and navigating the lives we value. As many couples share, once these destructive cycles start, it can feel extremely difficult to find any off-ramp. A lot of what we do in these groups and retreats is simply help folks find reliable off-ramps!

As facilitators, we share from our own experience and practice with the material.  We teach basic Restoration Family Systems theory (the theory grounding the MarriageStrong material, developed by our mentor trainers: Sharon Hargrave, LMFT, founder & exec. director of MarriageStrong/and Dr. Terry Hargrave, LMFT), and we model, guide, and accompany with practical tools couples can take home. Our own "pain and peace cycles" are named, and we guide couples in discovering and utilizing their own. As it turns out, no one has all their shit together, but we can move more and more in the direction of healing and growth once we start releasing ourselves from all these destructive and unrealistic fantasies. We find adequate support to name our pain. We begin taking steps that can address, honor, curb, and eventually replace the toxic cycles of shame, blame, control and escape continuing to spiral ourselves - and (ever-increasingly) our society - out of control.

We have come to see this aspect of our work very much as a ministry of mutuality. We need the groups and retreats just as much as each and every couple that is being newly introduced to the material. This is not false humility. It's reality. We are pushed to fresher and deeper discoveries every time we get to walk with a new couple. This work is not only tremendous gift, it also keeps us on our toes! We do manage to have some fun in the doing as well...

The curriculum is eight sessions, which last ninety minutes each. In addition to pain and peace cycles, we also do a couple sessions around personalities and dreaming together.

We have been blessed with the opportunity to get to know over twenty couples in these settings. No group is the same, but we are consistently blown away and heartened by how willing these partners are to be transparent about their diverse experiences and patterns. Authenticity is contagious and community-cultivating, even if challenging at times, and we help each other get there at our own pace. We see and honor the bravery entailed in such work, and we work to lead in a way that is supportive to such a process.

Pictured below: Our dear friends Jenn Svetlik & Sheldon Good, after a day of sitting in on Chelsea Manning's brutal sentencing trial. They traveled to Southern California during the Winter of 2013-14 for our first weekend retreat.

For some, these sessions serve as pre-marital counseling. For others already married, it’s a chance to learn more about why they get stuck in conflict and how to do it differently going forward. Some couples have even participated in groups during the first year or two of their relationship—still in discernment about when (or whether) to get engaged.  

In this new vocational season, we are realizing that couples are wanting and needing follow-up on this work. Many decide to continue with deeper work in therapy, which we are happy to refer to, and often recommend for those able and ready to do so. In addition to therapy and other outside supports, a more informal and regular "Couples' Check-in" has also become a vital component to our own journey over the years (a process we were first introduced to and learned from our Manna & Mercy House community... for more on that journey, see here!). 

Below: Lindsay's "Decades" birthday party (04.02.14), with our families, chosen & gifted.   We are filled with gratitude for these precious people who support, inspire, nurture & prod this aspect of our work to greater depths!

As we move into 2018 and begin the process of forming our non-profit, we are finding ourselves in a more healthy and stable rhythm of life. Concurrently, we've had many conversations with couples and individuals looking for support and guidance. Some in more acute crisis. Others tired of the same old conflicts. And still others who know intuitively that we all do this work better in the company of folks honestly naming our struggles, joys, pains, sorrows, challenges and gratitudes. 

This year, we are hosting an engaged couple for a retreat in June and we hope to organize a group in the Fall. We are facilitating a workshop at the Bartimaeus Institute in February where the core of the work will be guiding singles and couples through an introduction to the material. In addition, we are excited to be offering follow-up Skype check-ins for couples who have been through the MarriageStrong curriculum in the past and are finding themselves in a season of needing follow-up or support. These check-ins consist of mutual sharing and further exploring to understand the depths of our pain and copings and find more freedom.

This work feels increasingly compelling and important to us because let’s face it: it's easy to think other people's marriages are better, easier and happier than they really are. We have been trained by our culture to put our best foot forward and strap on a happy face. As a result, hiding, isolating, posturing and couple shame are epidemic. We all think other couples are doing better than they really are, and certainly better than us. And likely, they are thinking the same! When we get behind closed doors, though, it’s an entirely different story. Most of us feel more lonely, in pain, struggling, exhausted, confused, and like we are working harder (not smarter) to maintain an image that continually feels under threat and keeps us from finding peace. We are seeking to co-create and help facilitate spaces where those masks are invited and encouraged to come off, so we might find together space to breathe and practice more honesty, freedom, integrity and love - starting with ourselves and our most intimate relationships, and hopefully rippling outward into everything else we do.

Below: Lindsay "unmasked" during one of her/our multiple bouts of unrelenting sinus infections this winter.

Last week, we celebrated our 13^th anniversary. Perhaps we would have made it to this milestone without all this training, the groups and the check-ins. Perhaps we wouldn’t have. Our relationship is far from perfect (and increasingly, these two over-achieving oldest children truly are thankful for that!), but this MarriageStrong work has been instrumental in nudging our coupleship, and ourselves, to more loving and trustworthy ground. More intimacy. More laughter. More understanding. More community. Less unaccountable schlepping of our pain onto others. Less tip-toeing around conflict. Less medicating. Less broken glasses, sleepless nights, and unremitting feelings of resentment, confusion, desperation and exhaustion. More leaning into our peace. Less handing the reigns over to our pain. In these challenging times, moving from surviving to thriving is what we yearn for. And what all of us most certainly deserve. Amidst all the death-dealing, may we support each other in all the healing and transformative ways of tipping these scales toward life.

From Pain...

To Peace...

...and everything else in-between!

One day at a time.