EVERLASTING RELATIONSHIPS: The art of loving – Part 1
Powerful techniques for building everlasting marriages and harmonious families

By Dr Victor F L Tai, BA(Hons), MSc, PhD.
Snr Consultant Psychologist, Adam Road Hospital
Snr Management Consultant, Psyscan Consulting Intn’l

Copyrights reserved

SOME TYPICAL CASES

• What do you do when your relationship reaches the point where everything you say or do feels the same - when everything you say to your partner sounds as if it's been said a hundred times.
• I've been married 3 yrs, and he is wonderful and he loves me very much. However, during the last few months, he was so preoccupied with work that he had begun to stop making love. He is quick to temper and sleep alone in the spare room. What's happening to our love life? I don't think there's someone else in his life.
• My husband had an affair with my best girlfriend for 14 years. At first, he showed very little interest in her, but over a period of months I could tell that there was something going on. It all came to a head when I walked in on them in her bed. Since then, I constantly picture them in my mind having sex. I can't forgive both of them.

These situations all have one thing in common, and that is that the couples are experiencing serious breakdowns in their marriages or families.

Have you ever wondered where your relationship with your spouse, children, and family members are going? Have you always wanted to have everlasting peace, eternal harmony and total fulfillment? In this article, you will learn how to build a healthy, loving relationship with yourself, your partner and your family members.

Listening to couples in conflict had indicated that most couples reported that their emotional needs were no longer being met in their marriage. And the love that they had for each other was replaced by indifference, and in some cases, hatred. It is clear that when the emotional needs of spouses are not met, marriage is in danger of dissolution. If emotional needs are met, however, the danger passes. It is that simple.

The following five principles are useful for helping couples understand the rise and fall of their feelings of love, sex and fulfillment and how these are related to their emotional needs and the durability of their relationships.

THE FIVE PRINCIPLES OF EVERLASTING RELATIONSHIPS:

1: Keep a high positive balance in your "Love Bank" account
2: Fulfil your Most Important Emotional Needs
3: Do not rebuke or destroy your love bonds with Love Busters
4: Use the Policy of Joint Agreement in Solving Problems
5: Uphold the Rule of Honesty for a successful relationship

Principle 1: Keep a high positive balance in your "Love Bank" account

What is “Love Bank”? We have a love bank and people we know have accounts in it. When people do things that make us feel good, "love units" are deposited, and when they do things that make us feel bad, love units are withdrawn. We are emotionally attracted to people with large balances in their Love Bank accounts, and repulsed by those with negative balances. Therefore couples need to learn how to deposit as many love units as possible, but they also should learn to avoid withdrawing them. Couples deposit love units by meeting each other's emotional needs, and they avoid withdrawing them by overcoming habits that hurt each other.

Principle 2: Fulfil Your Most Important Emotional Needs

Most Important Emotional Needs An emotional need is a craving that, when satisfied, leaves you with a feeling of happiness and contentment, and, when unsatisfied, leaves you with a feeling of unhappiness and frustration. There are some emotional needs, when met, make us so happy that we fall in love with the person that satisfy these needs as they deposit the most love units into our love banks.

THE TEN MOST IMPORTANT NEEDS OF COUPLES:

1. Affection – Show care and concern abundantly
2. Sexual Fulfillment – Be demonstrative & faithful
3. Conversation – Keep it sweet, simple and frequent
4. Recreational Companionship-Shared interests and activities
5. Honesty and Openness – Be trustful and truthful
6. An Attractive Spouse – Be sexy and desirable
7. Financial Support – Be generous but realistic
8. Domestic Support – Share in family duties
9. Family Commitment – Train, develop and spend quality time with children
10. Admiration – Respect and appreciate each other

Principle 3: Beware! Do not rebuke or destroy your love bonds with Love Busters

Love Busters Love units are not only deposited, they are also withdrawn. One way to withdraw love units is to fail to meet important emotional needs. When our needs are unmet, we're left frustrated and unhappy and that withdraws love units. But there are many other ways to withdraw love units. Thoughtlessness is usually the culprit. Spouses often try to gain at each other's expense, and when they do, they inflict pain and suffering on each other. The ways that couples withdraw love units are called Love Busters. A Love Buster is a habit of one spouse that causes the other to be unhappy.

BEWARE OF THESE FIVE LOVE BUSTERS
1. Angry outbursts
2. Disrespectful judgements
3. Annoying behaviors
4. Selfish demands
5. Dishonesty

Couples must learn to avoid these destructive habits to protect the romantic love they have for each other.

The Fisherman’s Net Story helps explain the way love busters destroy marriages. Marriage is like fishing net. One fisherman takes his fish from the net every day, but let's debris from the ocean accumulates. Eventually so much debris is caught in the net that he can hardly cast it out of the boat, and when he does, it's almost impossible to retrieve. Finally, in a fit of anger, he cuts the net loose and goes home without it. He's unable to catch and sell fish again until he buys another net. Another fisherman removes debris every time he retrieves the net with the fish he caught. Each time he casts his net, it's clean and ready to catch more fish. As a result, he catches and sells enough fish to support himself and his family.

In this parable, the fish are emotional needs met in marriage and the debris is Love Busters, habits that cause unhappiness. Bad marriages are like the first fisherman's net. Angry outbursts, disrespectful judgments, annoying behavior, selfish demands, and dishonesty accumulate over time. The burden of the unhappiness they cause ruins a couple's willingness and ability to meet each other's emotional needs. Eventually the marriage supplies no benefits to either spouse and ends in divorce or emotional separation. Good marriages are like the second fisherman's net. Love Busters are eliminated as soon as they appear, making it easy for each spouse to meet the other's emotional needs

Principle 4: Use the Policy of Joint Agreement in Solving Problems

The Policy of Joint Agreement Never do anything without an enthusiastic agreement between you and your spouse. This policy teaches couples to become thoughtful and sensitive to each other's feelings. It encourages couples to consider each other's happiness as equally important. They are a team and both should try to help each other and avoid hurting each other. It just makes good sense.

The most powerful incentive for following this policy is that it helps create and sustain romantic love. Once the Policy of Joint Agreement is acted upon, it helps insulate a couple from many of the destructive forces that are ruining marriages. And it helps couples learn to meet each other's needs in ways that are mutually fulfilling and enjoyable. Spouses that follow this policy and meet each other's needs fall in love and stay in love ever after with each other.

Remember to keep this policy whenever you negotiate with your spouse: Don’t ever do anything without an enthusiastic agreement between you and your spouse.

Principle 5: Uphold The Rule of Honesty for a Successful Relationship: Most couples do the best they can to make each other happy. But their efforts, however sincere, are often misdirected. They aim at the wrong target. Ignorance, not lack of effort, causes their ultimate downfall.

The Rule of Honesty for a Successful Relationship: Reveal to your spouse as much information about yourself as you know; your thoughts, feelings, habits, likes, dislikes, personal history, daily activities, and plans for the future.

REMEMBER THAT THERE ARE FIVE PARTS IN THIS RULE:

Emotional Honesty: Reveal your emotional reactions, both positive and negative, to the events of your life, particularly to your spouse's behavior.
Historical Honesty: Reveal information about your personal history, particularly events that demonstrate personal weakness or failure.
Current Honesty: Reveal information about the events of your day. Provide your spouse with a calendar of your activities, with special emphasis on those that may affect your spouse.
Future Honesty: Reveal your thoughts and plans regarding future activities and objectives.
Complete Honesty: Do not leave your spouse with a false impression about your thoughts, feelings, habits, likes, dislikes, personal history, daily activities, or plans for the future. Do not deliberately keep personal information from your spouse.

Dishonesty sometimes is a good short-term solution to marital conflict. It'll probably get you off the hook for a few days or months. But it's a terrible long-term solution. If you expect to live with each other for the next few years, dishonesty can get you into a great deal of trouble. Only the truthful expression of your feelings will create an opportunity to stop future losses. Only the truth can lead you to a solution. Deception can only lead to continuing misery. You cripple your spouse when you fail to reveal the truth. You deliver a map that leads nowhere.

In summary, for your marriages to last, your interests and your spouses’ interests must be considered simultaneously. One of you cannot afford to suffer for the benefit of the other, even willingly, because when either of you suffer, your marriage suffers. You're a team, not two individuals. And your joint success will determine the success of your marriage. The constant reminder and maintenance of these five principles will help you achieve that everlasting perspective.