barbara wyer dot org

The reality for many (most?) of us is a long way from warm & fuzzy Hallmark cards or Norman Rockwell’s holiday dinners. With families on the move, packed schedules, and multiple generations of blended families it’s a challenge to gather in one place for Thanksgiving, Hanukkah or Christmas. Add to that mix tight quarters, unrealistic expectations, differences of opinion, old wounds, and exhausted little ones and you have a perfect storm. Peace on earth? Sure, maybe – just not with my family.

If this sounds familiar, there is hope! Here are six tips that just might help.

You can prepare in advance

While the word “intentional” may have reached saturation point, it’s a concept that is powerful, true, and really works. Many families now deal with relationships outside the immediate nuclear family. Adult kids with “significant others,” married children with their own kids, parents that have re-married, blended families and friends that have been invited to join holiday festivities can create complicated dynamics. Think them through in advance. By not projecting too much or too little into these holiday vignettes you can relax. Accepting what will be and not trying to manage, mediate or even manipulate the dynamics and outcome of holiday relationships may offer you the freedom to just enjoy what is.

Worried about hot topics escalating during dinner? Think about having an honest conversation ahead of time with family members about areas of sensitivity and subjects that should be avoided. Wounds of the past can bleed over into conversations and turn an otherwise wonderful meal into a time of hurt, withdrawal, and sensitivity.

Truth is, it can be very difficult to get past the pain of the past. Something that has helped many of my clients to begin to forgive is accepting this person was doing the very best they could at the time. (Even if it wasn’t that great.) Thankfully, it’s possible to grow and change.

With that said, there are many toxic family relationships where a “forgive and forget” attitude is dangerous. In that case boundaries must be structured to keep oneself safe from further emotional, psychological, or physical harm. Sometimes that means you simply don’t go home.

It’s a season, not a day

So many parties, people, board games, movies, and kids showing off their musical talents. You simply can’t fit it all in – so don’t even try.

Between the days leading up to the holidays, the week between Christmas and New Years and the extra time kids have off from school there is plenty of time to enjoy each other. Get your calendars out and schedule time with your special people. Plan small groups, one-on-ones or time where kids can spend time with grandparents. It doesn’t have to happen in a day or two.

Throw a low-stress party. It doesn’t have to be exhausting. People don’t just come for the food, drink or decorations. Mostly, holiday parties serve as a great excuse to get together with family and friends. Paper and plastic work just fine. Invite your friends to a post-Christmas potluck. Take the pressure of performing off of yourself and connect with those close to you.

Reframe

Reverting back to family roles we've long outgrown perpetuates dysfunctional family dynamics. You’re adulting now! Sometimes it’s tough for parents to accept that, and you may feel like you have to pretend to be someone you’re not. Let your guard down, be who you are now. Notice what triggers you to revert back and ask yourself how that is helpful (or not) to the person you’ve become. Give your family the opportunity to fall in love with who you are now.

Avoid Arguments

Some people just love to argue. If you have a family member that enjoys stirring up conflict, don’t let them suck you in. Being pulled into an awkward debate can be avoided by tapping into humility for the sake of peace. It’s not the end of the world if someone sees things differently than you do – unless you think that being right makes you a winner and not being right means you’re a loser. One of my favorite conflict de-escalaters: “You could be right.” It takes the charge right out of controversy as they think you’ve conceded. (Of course, the unspoken second half of that is, “you could be wrong.”)

A final thought on conflicts and arguments; alcohol can fan the flames. Many family gatherings have ended poorly when one or more members have been over-served. As you celebrate with family keep that in mind.

Get Quiet

Whether you are a person of faith or not, the one thing universally beneficial in spiritual practice is quiet. We just don’t have enough of it in our lives. But for many, the end of one year and beginning of another is an opportunity for reflection. Go for a walk, get outdoors, breath deep in the hope of the future and exhale things from your past.

Accepting the gap between the idealized family celebration we'd like the holidays to be and the reality of everyone getting there, being there, and leaving there will allow us to enjoy the season with a minimum of stress, tension, or emotional damage.

Johnson, Sue. Hold Me Tight. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2008. 289 pgs.

EFT in the Paradigm of Marital Complexity

Sue Johnson, the author of Hold Me Tight, has been a driving force behind the development of Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) for couples. During her doctoral studies in counseling psychology at the University of British Columbia in the 1980s, she and thesis advisor Les Greenberg began developing a short term structured approach to couples therapy, calling it Emotionally Focused Therapy. Hold Me Tight is Johnson’s effort to distill her clinical research and therapy into a practical tool for all couples.

Taking over two decades of watching couples in distressed relationships recover and forge stronger, more loving bonds, Johnson extrapolates simple guidelines that explain how EFT can be leveraged by “real couples” to transform their relationships. Rooted firmly in her understanding of adult attachment issues, Johnson’s EFT for couples is both informed by and builds upon John Bowlby’s attachment theory, a “perspective [that] recognizes that our need for emotional connection with others is absolute” (p. 253). While all theories regarding marriage complexity share in common a belief that relationship patterns are impacted by love (or the lack thereof), Johnson points out “a key part of Bowlby’s attachment perspective is that we use the eyes of those we love to reflect back to us a sense of ourselves” (p. 91).

Johnson views adult attachment needs as the lynchpin of loving relationships. As she describes the Demon Dialogues (a sort of conflicted dance), EFT theory may be understood to fit best within the context of “Interactional” dynamics in the Paradigm of Marital Complexity. However, it can also be argued that a couple’s Family of Origin (“Individual”) issues play an equally important role in the influence of each partner’s attachment needs. Perhaps EFT is best described as an equal convergence of the Interactional and Individual dynamics present in a relationship.

EFT for couples is based on “encouraging a special kind of emotional responsiveness” (p. 49) and it asks three fundamental “A.R.E. Questions:” (1) Accessibility– Can I reach you when I need you? (2) Responsiveness– Can I rely on you for emotional support? (3) Engagement– Can I be sure you will value me and stay close? Johnson asserts all human beings need someone who will answer those questions with a resounding YES!

Achieving a Healthy Marriage Through EFT

According to Johnson, most marriage relationships break down not due to increasing conflict but as a result of disaffection and lack of emotional responsiveness. Her EFT for couples seeks to take partners beyond their outward emotional expression (fighting) to the inner distress about emotional disconnection. 

In a healthy marriage relationship, says Johnson, securely attached partners become attuned to each other’s “core needs” and can express them coherently to their partner (p. 156). In Hold Me Tight she teaches couples about the Seven Conversations of EFT (pp. 50 ff): Recognizing the Demon Dialogues; Finding the Raw Spots; Revisiting a Rocky Mountain; Hold Me Tight; Forgiving Injuries; Bonding Through Sex and Touch; and Keeping Love Alive.

Interferences to Achieving a Healthy Marriage

As Dr. Johnson developed EFT for couples she sought to answer the question: Why did EFT work? She recognized EFT owed its success to the principles of attachment theory and that the great human need for attachment bonds did not end with childhood. She consistently identified three “Demon Dialogues” in distressed couples; an other-blaming “Find the Bad Guy,” the destructive, looping dance of the “Protest Polka,” and the deathly silence of a couple shut down in “Freeze and Flee.” While appearing different from each other, Johnson noted each served the same end; protecting self from further hurt and rejection from a spouse and in the end, further isolating partners from each other and any hope of achieving a healthier marriage.

Characteristics of a Healthy Marriage

The Boomers generation is the first to embrace the concept of therapy. Many self-help books on the shelves in the 1970s and 80s focused on lists of “how to’s” for achieving love and happiness by improving communication skills, among others. Sue Johnson proposed a radical new idea.

“Forget about…analyzing your early childhood, making grand romantic gestures, or experimenting with new sexual positions. Instead, recognize and admit that you are emotionally attached to and dependent on your partner in much the same way that a child is on a parent for nurturing, soothing, and protection.”

Marital health, according to Johnson, begins with the establishment of basic emotional safety. In order to sustain the secure bonds necessary for healthy adult attachment, couples must intentionally create “moments of engagement and connection” (p. 142). Johnson calls this the “Hold Me Tight” conversation, believing it to be “the ultimate bridge” and “tipping point encounter” in EFT. In the book she lays out a roadmap to assist couples in designing personal “bonding rituals” (p. 211) to deliberately and intentionally structure moments of connection.

Research Support for EFT

Hold Me Tight is birthed from Johnson’s quarter-century of research and practice in the trenches of couples’ therapy. Her work has been published in The New York Times, a number of peer-reviewed journals (see References for a partial list of research by Johnson and her colleagues), and Time magazine, among others. From the early days of her studies in graduate school and continuing today at the Ottawa Couple and Family Institute and the International Centre for Excellence in Emotionally Focused Therapy, a breadth of empirical research by Johnson and her colleagues has proven EFT to have the highest success rate in achieving marital healing for couples. Outcome research studies have demonstrated EFT therapy to be successful for 70-75% of distressed couples and results appear to be lasting (Johnson, 1985 and 1999).

Personal Relevance and Agreement with the Theory of EFT

The author of this abstract has been asked to rate agreement with the material found in Hold Me Tight on a scale of 1-10. Given limited first hand experience with EFT it might be presumptuous to unequivocally give the book a 10, but Johnson’s statements about what makes couples “tick” deeply resonates with this 22-year married writer. The fact that outcome research continues to demonstrate EFT is effective for three-quarters of the couples who choose this form of therapy is astounding. The book, therefore, will get a “10.”

Several relationship issues discussed in Hold Me Tight stand out as particularly useful reminders in the context of this writer’s personal marriage dynamics. Johnson explains that when couples are trapped in their version of the Demon Dialogues and a safe connection between them is broken, the fight-or-flight mode that follows is not really the aggressive attack appearing on the surface. Instead, says Johnson, it is a desperate cry for reassurance and attachment, a cry that can “only be quieted by a lover moving emotionally close to hold and reassure” (p. 47).

Later, in a Play and Practice (where readers can act out the principles just taught, p. 139), Johnson describes a helpful process to de-escalate conflicts in a romantic relationship. She suggests reviewing memories of a somewhat unsettling (but not too upsetting) incident and talking about what feelings were involved for each partner, then writing a new ending to that story as a way to practice potential behavior reactions in the future. A number of insightful suggestions such as these combined to earn the book a “9” in helpfulness.

Numerous studies over the last several decades about EFT for couples have continued to inform therapists and scholars in clinical circles. While many academically oriented studies and books have been written on adult attachment and love the topic has never been presented in a format for the masses. Johnson states her goal was to offer a “streamlined version of EFT” and lay out a plan for readers to apply the principles of EFT in order to turn their relationships into a “glorious adventure.” She succeeds magnificently.

For Further Study: Selected Outcome Research

Retrieved online from http://www.iceeft.com/EFTResearch.pdf

Clothier, P., Manion, I., Gordon-Walker, J. & Johnson, S. M. (2002) Emotionally Focused Interventions for Couples with Chronically Ill Children: A two year follow-up. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, 28, 391-399. Rev.5–August 2012 Page 3 of 5

Denton, W., Burleson, B., Clark, T., Rodriguez, C. & Hobbs, B. (2000) A Randomized Trial of Emotionally Focused Therapy for Couples in a Training Clinic. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, 26, pp. 65-78.

Dessaulles, A., Johnson, S. M. & Denton, W. (2003) Emotion Focused Therapy for Couples in the Treatment of Depression: A Pilot Study. American Journal of Family Therapy, 31, 345-353.

Goldman, A. & Greenberg, L. (1992) Comparison of Integrated Systemic and Emotionally Focused Approaches to Couples Therapy. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 60(6), 962-969.

Greenman, P.S., Faller, G., & Johnson, S.M. (2011). Finding the words: Working with men in Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) for couples. In D.S. Shepard & M. Harway (Eds.), Engaging men in couples therapy (pp. 91- 116). New York: Routledge.

Greenman, P.S., & Johnson, S.M. (2012). United We Stand: Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) for Couples in the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder. Journal of Clinical Psychology: In Session, Vol.68 (5), 561-569.

Halchuk, R., Makinen, J. & Johnson, S. M. (2010) Resolving Attachment Injuries in Couples using Emotionally Focused Therapy: A 3 year follow-up. Journal of Couple and Relationship Therapy, 9, 31- 47.

Honarparvaran, N., Tabrizy, M., & Navabinejad, Sh. (2010) The efficacy of emotionally focused couple therapy (EFT-C) training with regard to reducing sexual dissatisfaction among couples. European Journal of Scientific Research, 43(4), 538-545.

Johnson, S. & Greenberg, L. (1985) Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy: An Outcome Study. Journal of Marital & Family Therapy, 11, 313-317.

Johnson, S. & Greenberg, L. (1985) The Differential Effectiveness of Experiential and Problem Solving Interventions in Resolving Marital Conflict. Journal of Consulting & Clinical Psychology, 53, 175-184. (EFT, CBT and controls tested.)

Johnson, S., Hunsley, J., Greenberg, L. & Schindler, D. (1999) Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy: Status & challenges (A meta-analysis). Journal of Clinical Psychology: Science and Practice, 6, 67-79.

MacIntosh, H.B. & Johnson, S. (2008) Emotionally focused therapy for couples and childhood sexual abuse survivors. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, 34, 298-315.

In the 46th chapter of The Gift of Therapy (Helping Patients Assume Responsibility) Dr. Irvin D. Yalom offers up some golden advice. And it's advice we can all take to heart, it's not just for the therapy room. Listen as Yalom speaks to a client who believes blame for a certain horrible sequence of events should be placed completely and totally one-hundred-percent external to herself. “Even if ninety-nine percent of the bad things that happen to you is someone else’s fault, I want to look at the other one percent–the part that is your responsibility.”

At first blush that may seem a rather insignificant contribution for a therapist to ask of a client. Only one percent…what can be accomplished from that sort of half-hearted effort?

I kept reading and was nearly at the end of the chapter before the thought yanked me back for a re-read: I want to look at the other one percent…your responsibility. What I heard Dr. Yalom telling his young therapist readers is that, unless a client accepts at least some responsibility for his/her predicament–even if it’s only the tiniest one-percent part, he/she will not achieve the maximum healing for which counseling has been sought. In fact, no matter the skill and experience of the therapist, significant therapeutic change requires some degree of responsibility acknowledged by the client.

I find great personal value in this statement. Dr. Yalom’s words are powerful, and they have great potential for a much better way of approaching interpersonal disagreements. I’ve never quite considered how powerful one percent might be. I’m used to hearing that successful relationships derive from a 50/50 – or more likely – 100/100 effort. But never from only one percent. While it may not be much, what I think Yalom means is that a tiny effort has the potential to exponentially multiply itself into a whole lot more. Just one percent of personal responsibility opens up unknown possibilities for peace, change – and more.

As for the clinical implications of this chapter, there are several. The first is clear to me: Convincing a client to buy into the idea of personal responsibility will bring client and therapist a step closer to accomplishing the mission of success in the therapeutic relationship.

Here’s another possible implication. Might not the therapist’s ascribing only one percent of a problem to the client be a back door into joining with the client and establishing trust? In other words, the therapist is not overwhelming the client by asking him/her to “over-accept” responsibility. I can see this, in effect, engendering a feeling of safety for the client, not manipulatively but in a way that disarms the client and softens the ground for further work.

Overview

RAINN, the nation's largest anti-sexual violence organization, will take part in Data Privacy Day by creating a series of infographics for survivors, highlighting ways to stay safe online. RAINN's infographics and top five tips for survivors can be found here: http://ow.ly/sfqag.

At the beginning of third quarter 2013, membership in the social-networking megasite Facebook climbed to nearly 1.2 billion, with nearly 50 percent of those users in the coveted 18- to 34-year-old demographic. For many, Facebook has become an automatic part of the daily routine and a preferred way to self-curate their day-to-day living.

Are you old enough to remember when mood rings were a popular fad in the mid-1970s? According to Barbara Wyer, it’s been more than four decades since the mood ring craze swept America, taking us from low-tech jewelry to online social media gorilla Twitter as a way to predict moods.

Utilizing tweets to measure psychosocial trends, researchers have found people tend to spend the morning hours in a good mood, but gradually lose their positive attitudes as the day goes on. Further, work hours seem to be associated with more negative attitudes.

While couples over the age of 55 said it took about two and a half months before their relationship was official, younger people reported a much shorter timeline: about 24 days. Digging further, Barbara Wyer found the difference seems to be that tech-savvy couples are more quickly calling each other “girlfriend” or “boyfriend” relative to their interactions via technology. What you’ve suspected is true: Instead of face-to-face conversation, recent generations have begun to rely on various forms of digital media to express their undying love for each other.

It might seem impossible to be smitten so soon until one considers social media allows for 24-7 activity that crams intense feelings and emotions into a short period of time. And, speculates Barbara Wyer, the absence of actual face-to-face conversation in these interactions makes such declarations “safer” in an emotional sense. The Pixmania study quantified the average length of time it took for people to fall head over heels:

163 text messages

30 phone calls

37 emails

224 Tweets

70 Facebook messages

Not surprisingly, this easy avenue to romance works both ways – 27 percent of all surveyed participants felt it was acceptable to break up with a romantic partner via text message. Love the one you’re (not) with

If you’re hoping to find your soul mate in a bar or restaurant, you might be looking for love in all the wrong places. Match.com recently conducted a study that indicated nearly one-third of all singles had dated someone after meeting him or her online. Nearly 20 percent of respondents said they had met their most recent first date online. In fact, bars were a meeting place for only 7 percent of those surveyed. Meeting a potential suitor online doesn’t have to mean building an online dating profile with Match.com, OKCupid or any other website. People today find their perfect fit through social-media conversations that can often lead to flirty exchanges.

In the summer of 2010, an ad in Discovery Girls magazine invited readers to complete an online survey for a chance to win a free iPod. Stanford-based researcher Roy Pea wanted to explore how heavy media use might affect in-person face-to-face communication and potentially, peer friendships among young girls. Discovering the report as part of a graduate school assignment, Barbara Wyer was intrigued by the findings of Pea and his colleagues.     

Q: What age group was targeted in Dr. Pea’s study?

Barbara Wyer: The magazine’s demographic was primarily made up of 8 to 12 year old North American girls.

Q: How many girls responded to the survey invitation?

Barbara Wyer: There were nearly 3500 respondents.