Living Together, Loving Together: A Spiritual Guide to Marriage

. Shalom Place

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Living Together, Loving Together

A Spiritual Guide to Marriage

Philip St. Romain and Lisa Bellecci-st. romain

ISBN 0-89243-788-X
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 94-73020

Copyright @ 1995, Philip St. Romain and Lisa Bellecci-st. romain
Printed in the United States of America
First Edition 1995
95 96 97 98 99 5 4 3 2

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted without the written permission of Liguori Publications.

Scripture quotations are taken from the New American Bible, Copyright
© 1970, 1986, and 1991 by the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, 3211 Fourth Street, N.E., Washington, DC 20017-1194, and are used with permission. All rights reserved.

The quotation from 1 John 4:16 on page 83 is taken from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright © 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA. All rights reserved. Used with permission.

Excerpts from the English translation of the Catechism of the Catholic Church for the United States of America, Copyright © 1994, United States Catholic Conference, Inc. - Libreria Editrice Vaticana. Used with permission.

Cover design and illustration by Christine Kraus

Introduction

Part One: HEALTHY COMMUNICATION
. . . . Chapter One: Listening With Your Heart
. . . . Chapter Two: Affirming the Good
. . . . Chapter Three: Feelings and Intimacy
. . . . Chapter Four: Asking for Your Wants and Needs
. . . . Chapter Five: Reaching Agreement

Part Two UNDERSTANDING OUR PERSONALITIES
. . . . Chapter Six: Starting Off---The Two Attitudes
. . . . Chapter Seven: What's Next?-The Four Functions
. . . . Chapter Eight: And Now-The Eight Basic Types
. . . . Chapter Nine: Loving Our Differences

Part Three: CHRISTIAN MARRIAGE IS A SACRAMENT
. . . . Chapter Ten: Marriage as Sacrament
. . . . Chapter Eleven: "I Take Thee
. . . . Chapter Twelve: Sexual Lovemaking
. . . . Chapter Thirteen: Bonders: I, Thou, and We
. . . . Chapter Fourteen: Sent Two by Two
. . . . Chapter Fifteen: Marriage Is a Vocation

Part Four: LIVING TOGETHER
. . . . Chapter Sixteen: Money Matters
. . . . Chapter Seventeen: Marriage, with Children
. . . . Chapter Eighteen: Handling Stress
. . . . Chapter Nineteen: Work and Play
. . . . Chapter Twenty: Putting God First

APPENDIX ONE: Descriptions of the Types

APPENDIX TWO: Budget Work Sheet

SUGGESTED READING

The primary vocation for all Christians is to love. In married life, we are invited to love another person so completely and intimately that our lives become one. No other kind of human relationship has the possibility of such a profound union. Paradoxically, a healthy, loving union also empowers each partner to develop his or her individual personality to I he fullest. Marriage provides the ideal situation for living and growing in the deepest of all human loves.

This is the ideal and some experience its reality. Many, however, do not. Instead of being united in love, couples are enmeshed codependently. Instead of becoming more whole in marriage, they experience despair, loneliness, low self-esteem, and dashed hopes. Their commitment is eroded. When marriage goes well, there is perhaps no greater human happiness; when it goes poorly, there may be no greater misery!

In writing this book together, we want to assure our readers that we know both the joyful and painful sides of married life. We have been married over eighteen years and have learned many important lessons along the way. In our work of counseling, lay ministry, writing, and public speaking, we have been fortunate to meet many people who have taught and supported us in our relationship. From these experiences, we have come to base our marriage on three important convictions:

When we married, we had an abundance of faith in and commitment to each other. Faith and commitment kept us together when pride, hurt feelings, misunderstandings, and miscommunication tempted us to throw in the towel. We lacked the knowledge and skills we needed to enable our love to flow freely. Once we learned to communicate effectively and accept each other's personality type, our love came alive and stayed alive!

In this book, we will share with you our experience and understanding of skills which enable love to thrive within a marriage. Without a personal commitment to each other these skills will have little value. But a couple with commitment and even a small amount of faith will discover that these skills will help them begin to feel love for each other and/or deepen the love they already share.

How To Use This Book

Knowing about a skill and possessing it are two different things. To possess a skill, you must understand what it is, you must want to use it, and you must practice, practice, practice. When practicing, you will make many mistakes; don't get discouraged. Keep on practicing. Sooner than you imagine, the skill will become habitual.

To give you an opportunity to practice together, we provide opportunities for you to reflect separately and together on how you experience the various lessons discussed in each chapter. We also provide practical suggestions on how to use these skills in everyday life.

We invite you to make a commitment to read the first three chapters together and practice the suggested exercises before you decide whether this book will make a difference in your marriage. Complete the first three chapters within a week; if you decide to continue, try to do at least one chapter each week. Give yourself at least one hour per chapter and come together when you will not be disturbed by children or the phone.

If you decide to go through the book together, we encourage you to pray for each other in a special way. Let this be a line of growth and renewal for your marriage; ask God to bless your efforts. This is prayer according to God's will. God wants your marriage to be a living sign of love for all to see. This is what we mean when we say that marriage is a sacrament.

We begin this book with a section on communication because these skills play a pivotal role in fostering a healthy relationship. In married life, there are good times and bad. The hard times test a relationship. Couples who know how to listen to each other, to share feelings appropriately, and to (negotiate their expectations of each other not only survive the troubling times but grow closer together. Those who not know how to communicate make things worse with their tongues; they become more hurt and distant from each other.

In Part One, we will emphasize four basic communication skills: listening, affirming, sharing feelings, and asserting. With these four skills, you can at least talk about any problem without making things worse. More positively, these skills can help you more fully enjoy conversing with each other. The fruit of healthy communication is intimacy. When a couple experiences intimacy, happiness is not far behind.

PHIL

When I first began dating Lisa, I enjoyed listening to almost everything she talked about. I liked the tones of her voice and her expressiveness as she enthusiastically related the happenings of her day. In addition, I had read enough from Fr. John Powell's books on relationships to know the importance of listening. So I made it a point to give her my full attention when she had something important to tell me.

But after we married and began to experience the stresses that come with keeping a job, doing daily chores, adjusting to each other's needs, parenting, and keeping social obligations, listening became a struggle for me.

I was frequently too tired or preoccupied to give her my full attention. There were times when she tried to confront me about something I did that bothered her or asked me to do something I didn't particularly want to do. I frequently failed to listen to her and also became defensive, making matters worse. I listed her shortcomings or tried to justify my behavior with a variety of intellectual principles that really had nothing to do with the present issue. Consequently, Lisa felt ignored and discounted and our relationship was strained.

To become a better listener, I have had to learn to lower my defenses to hear what Lisa says before I respond. The most important listening skill I have learned is validation. When she shares something important with me, I still note my inner reaction, but I also make a conscious effort to let her know I hear what she is saying. If, for example, she shares a frustrating experience, I wait until she is finished and then reply, "Pretty frustrating!" This lets her know that I hear her feelings. I try to validate her opinions, too, when she shares them with me. Validation does not mean that I always agree with her; it only lets her know that I hear her. She needs this from me and I need it from her. Listening opens me to Lisa's world, which I am learning to enjoy and appreciate more and more each year. When I fall to listen, I am left with only my world. According to a saying I first heard in my native Louisiana, the most lonesome place in the world is "Bayou Self." I do not want to live there, especially not in marriage. And so I try to listen.

When I learned to drive a car, I learned to drive defensively. My instructor cautioned that though it may be my turn and I may be "in the right," if the other driver didn't stop, I would be "dead right." I finally realized that I was being "dead right" a lot in our marriage-and it was killing us. I was shocked when I realized this because when I wear my "social worker hat," I am a great listener and negotiator! Listening skills such as giving the other person my full attention, making nonverbal gestures and expressions to show I'm following the speaker's ideas, and listening for the unspoken feelings are skills that I use very naturally when I'm in a listening mode. And it seemed that I could be in such a mode with everyone except my husband-the one person who matters the most!

That's where being "dead right" came in. I wanted to win. Many times I knew I was right so I would push for my way or my plan. And though I often got what I wanted, I felt hollow inside. I now know that I felt this way because I had slashed our relationship when I insisted on getting my way. When I dealt with others, I didn't put issues in a win-lose perspective and could let the conversations flow and unfold. To get out of the win-lose attitude with Phil, I had to stop and quietly tell myself: "This marriage, this relationship with this man, is more important than winning." Sometimes, when my pride was so entrenched and my fear of an uncertain outcome was so strong, I felt I was dragging myself out of a boxing ring. Sometimes I thought I'd choke on the pride I had to swallow so I wouldn't verbally fight. Yet every time I have taken the risk of refusing to see an issue as win-lose and, instead, have listened and acknowledged his point of view, I've won.

We both have a commitment to consider the other person's point of view, and trusting in that helps me to give up insisting on my way. The rewards of trusting are the creative solutions we find and the bond of intimacy that grows each time we discuss an issue considerately, showing care for the other.

The Skill of Listening

To learn and grow in the skill of listening, practice the following:

Common Defenses
Defenses usually rise when we feel hurt and angry about what someone tells us. Defenses minimize the impact of the message. One harmful consequence is that we really can't hear another person when we are defensive. Some common defenses include:

Dialogue Exercise

Take a few minutes to reflect individually on the questions below. We recommend that each of you write your responses to each question, then come together to share your reflections with each other. Remember to pay attention, to validate, and to clarify when necessary.

I. On a scale from one (very poor) to ten (very good), how do I rate myself as a listener? How do I rate my spouse? What are my reasons for these ratings?

2. Which of the obstacles to listening apply to me? When do I experience these obstacles? What obstacles to I recognize in my spouse?

3. When I don't like what I hear and begin to feel hurt and angry, what defenses do I most commonly use? What defenses do I see my spouse using?

4. How do my defenses affect my spouse and our relationship? How does my spouse's defensiveness affect me?

5. What commitment am I willing to make to improve my listening? What change do I want my spouse to make?

How many times have you heard prayers of petition for increased vocations to the priesthood and religious life? It seems the word "vocation" is almost always used in reference to those special callings. This is unfortunate because we consequently fail to appreciate that marriage, too, is a vocation, the one to which most people are called.

A vocation is a calling by God to a particular state of life in which one works out one's salvation. Any state of life includes some inconvenience and suffering; knowing that marriage is a vocation helps us remain committed to our duties and obligations when we experience the cross in our lives. It is the cross that can open us more fully to relying on God for our happiness. In marriage we experience the paschal mystery, dying and rising again and again, confronting our selfishness, yet persisting in the struggle to love. Only by carrying our crosses is our self-centeredness healed and our hearts prepared for heaven.

Knowing that marriage is a vocation can help us remain committed to the relationship when we are tempted to give up and leave. Vocation means that God has called us to this state of life, that marriage was not just our idea but also God's. Therefore we can depend on God to help us love each other.

You have probably heard the saying, "The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence." I have experienced this many times in married life. In my work as a lay minister, I have been privileged to be on staffs with members of several religious communities. I have sometimes envied their lifestyle and regretted my choice of marriage and family. This was especially true when I saw community members leaving at the end of the day to go home for an evening of prayer and leisure; I was going home to a tired wife, needy young children, and a long list of chores to do before bedtime.

At other times, the grass has looked greener in the person of another woman. I have met other attractive women and have thought I would surely have been happier married to one of them than to Lisa. These thoughts happened most frequently when Lisa and I weren't very close.

I certainly empathize with couples who have decided they can no longer live together as husband and wife. Marriage and family life are very difficult at times. When my feelings of attraction for Lisa have waned and when the stresses of family life have turned my eyes to the "greener grass" elsewhere, I have relied on my conviction that marriage is a vocation to help me persevere. ! believe that God wants me to stay, and I know that my happiness comes from doing God's will. I do not know how couples can stay together without this belief.

What I have learned through these struggles is that my resistance to embracing the obligations of marriage and family usually arise from my selfishness rather than from defects in Lisa or the children. Married life has forced me to confront this dark side of my nature. If I had run to the "other side of the fence," I would have taken my selfishness with me and perpetuated the same cycle again somewhere else. By living out my calling, however, my heart has softened, and I have found a deeper beauty in Lisa and our children.

A sponsor couple for the local marriage preparation program was telling us how much they enjoyed hearing the priest give the Stages of Marriage talk. Though it did not seem to "click" with some of the engaged couples, our friends related to the concept of progressing from "Romance" through other stages to "Disillusionment" and then to either "Misery" or "Acceptance." I recognized the process from my high school dating experience. Initially I perceived a boy to be "perfect," then a "nothing," and finally "normal." At this stage we could become friends.

When Phil and I first married, I was sure we would skip the disillusionment stage! A few years later, however, I was ironing Phil's shirt, wallowing in self-pity and loneliness, tears streaming down my face. Other men seemed more sensitive and appreciative than Phil. Faithfulness was definitely part of my idea of marriage and I didn't want to hurt Phil. I didn't think our marriage was hopeless--he just needed to change! While I waited for Phil to change, I warded off temptations by recalling the maxim "If he cheats with you, he'll cheat on you." This helped keep me realistic about someone else being my new prince charming. I hung in there with Phil, through thick-headedness (from both of us) and thin-skinnedness (taking offense at every remark). Finally, through spiritual direction, retreats, and reflective prayer, I began to see, bit by bit, my part in making the misery. God's love for me became more and more personal as I scrutinized issues, ideas, and personality characteristics. Phil underwent a similar process, though in a different way. Because of the personal spiritual work we did individually, we became more tolerant and accepting of each other.

Our children felt more secure at home too, something that should be an outgrowth of the marriage vocation. They had friends whose parents had divorced; when we were angry with each other our children worried that we would divorce too. Some couples I know stay together for the sake of the children. I think that if they aren't working on themselves emotionally and spiritually, they probably aren't doing their children any favors by staying together.

1. Marriage is a vocation. What does this mean to you?

2. Describe a time when you felt like running away from your marriage and family commitments. What helped you stay?

3. How has married life helped you become a better person? How have you seen your spouse become a better person?

analyzing	generalizing	projecting
attacking	glaring	protecting
blaming	grinning	rationalizing
complying	intellectualizing	shouting
debating	interrupting	silence
defying	joking	staring
denying	judging	switching topics
evading	justifying	threatening
explaining	minimizing	withdrawing
frowning	questioning