Rob's notes on Sue Johnson's books

Rob’s Notes from “Hold Me Tight” & "Love Sense" by Sue Johnson

1 – Does it matter whether we understand LOVE?   [Love Sense - p.13-18]

If you had asked that question as recently as 30 or 40 years ago most of the world would have said: "Not really". Love, despite its power, wasn't considered essential to daily life. I t was seen as something apart, a diversion, even a luxury, and often times a dangerous one at that (remember Romeo and Juliet and Abelard and Heloise). What mattered was what was necessary to survive. You tied your life to your family and your community; they provided food, shelter, and protection. Since the earliest conception of marriage, it was understood that when you joined your life to another's, it was for eminently practical reasons, not emotional ones: to better your lot, to acquire power and wealth, to produce heirs to inherited titles and property, to create children to help with a farm and to care for you in your old age.

.....for most women the top reason to marry was financial security. Lacking access to schooling or jobs, women face lives of punishing poverty if they remained unwed, a truth that continued well into the 20th century. Even as women gained education and the ability to support themselves, love didn't figure too highly in choosing a mate. When asked in 1939 to rank 18 characteristics of a future spouse or relationship, women put love fifth. Even in the 1950s, love had not made it to first place.....

In the 1970s, however, loved began heading the list in surveys of what American women and men look for in a mate. By the 1990s, with vast numbers of women in the workforce, marriage in the Western world had completely shifted from an economic enterprise to, as sociologist Anthony Giddens calls it, and emotional enterprise. In a 2001 US poll, 80 per cent of women in their twenties said that having a man who could talk about his feelings was more important that having one who could make a good living. Today, both men and women routinely give love as the main reason to marry. And indeed, this is increasingly the case around the world; whenever people are free of financial or other shackles, they select a spouse for love. For the first time in human history, feelings of affection and emotional connection have become the sole basis on which we choose and commit to a partner. These feelings are now the primary basis for the most critical building block of any society, the family unit.

A love relationship is not only the most intimate of adult relationships, it is also often the principal one. And for many it is the only one. The American Sociologist Review reports that since the mid 1980s, the number of Americans saying that they have only their partner to confide in has risen by 50%. We live in an era of growing emotional isolation and impersonal relationships. More and more we dwell far from caring parents, siblings, friends, and the support of communities we grew up in....

Loneliness researcher John Casioppo, a psychologist at the University of Chicago, contends that in Western societies, "social connection has been demoted from a necessity to an incidental." As a result our partners have been forced to fill the void. They serve as lover, family, friend, village, and community. And emotional connection is the only glue in this vital, unique relationship.

So understanding the nature of love absolutely does matter. Indeed, it is imperative. Continued ignorance is no longer an option. We must learn to shape our love relationships so that our marriages can not only survive, but thrive.  And now, for the first time, we can, thanks to an unheralded revolution in the social and natural sciences that has been underway for the past 20 years.

A REVOLUTION. ....two decades ago, love did not get much respect as a topic of study. No emotion did. Emotions were not rational and therefore suspect. And love was the most irrational and suspect of all, it was not a fit subject for scientists, the supreme rationalists......

However, social scientists began to recognize that much of their work was not addressing public concerns about the quality of everyday life. So a quiet movement, without riots or bullets, began in campus life laboratories in academic journals challenging assumptions about human behaviors and how to change them. New voices began to be heard and suddenly, in the 1990s, emotions emerged as legitimate topics of inquiry. Happiness, sorrow, anger, fear - and love - started appearing on the agenda of academic conferences in a multitude of disciplines, from anthropology to psychology to sociology. Feelings, it was becoming apparent, were not random and senseless, but logical and "intelligent."

At the same time, therapists and mental health professionals began adjusting their frame of reference in dealing with relationship issues, especially romantic ones. For years they had focused their attention on the individual, believing that any turmoil could be traced back to a person's own trouble psyche. Fix that and the relationship would improve. But that wasn't what was happening. Even when individuals grasp why they were acting in a certain way and try to change, their love relationships often continued to sour.

Therapists realized that concentrating on one person did not give a complete picture. People in love relationships, just as in all relationships, are not distinct entities, acting independently; they are part of a dynamic dyad, within which each person's actions speak and fuel reactions in the other. It was the couple and how the individuals "danced" together that needed to be understood and changed, not simply the individual alone. (MRI machines eventually helped provide the scientific evidence.)

2 – So…What is a LOVE relationship?     [Hold Me Tight – p. 5 – 25]

A love relationship is “emotional bonds” based on the innate need for safe emotional connection.  Just like the British psychiatrist John Bowlby talked about his attachment theory concerning mothers and kids….the same thing is going on with adults!  Romantic love is all about attachment & emotional bonding.  It is all about our wired-in need to have someone to depend on, a loved one who can offer reliable emotional connection and comfort.

Bowlby rebelled against theories that patients problems lay in internal conflicts and the unconscious, he insisted the problems were mostly external, rooted in real relationships with real people.  Contrary to the James Bond stereotype of the individual who never needs to rely on anyone, Bowlby proposed “effective dependency”, that is, being able ~ from cradle to grave ~ to turn to others for emotional support is a sign and source of strength (not weakness).  In fact, the MORE we can reach out to our partners, the MORE separate and independent we can be!  Healthy attachment includes 4 key behaviors:

1 – We monitor & maintain emotional & physical closeness with beloved.

2 – We reach out to this person when we are unsure, upset, feeling down, etc.

3 – We miss this person when apart.

4 – We count on this person to “be there” for us when we go out into the world and explore.

Healthy attachment teaches us that our loved one is our shelter in life (in the same way babies feel safe and content in their mothers arms).  However, when our shelter (loved one) is emotionally unavailable or unresponsive, we are assailed by emotions…anger, sadness, hurt, and above all FEAR.  We all experience some fear when we have disagreements or arguments with our partner.  For those of us with secure bonds, it is a momentary blip.  The fear is quickly and easily tamped down as we realize there is no real threat or that our partner will reassure us if we ask.  However, for those with weaker or fraying bonds, the fear can be overwhelming  (neuroscientist Jaak Panksepp calls this “primal panic”).  

Fear & Love are constantly BOTH at play in our most important relationships (spouse & God).  In an instant I can feel distant/unsafe/fear…leading to fight or flee.  If I can name (share) my fear (or other emotions), I can calm down and begin to think about how to deal constructively with the situation.  Of course, the assumes the other person will know best how to deal with me and my sharing.

When we are AFRAID (experiencing “primal panic”), we don’t THINK, we ACT:

We only have two ways of protecting ourselves and holding on to our connections with our partners when we do not feel safe and responded to….

• One route is to avoid engagement, that is, to try to numb our emotions, to shut down and deny our attachment needs. (I won’t let you hurt me!  I will chill out, try to stay in control.)
• The other is to listen to our anxiety and fight for recognition and response... Become demanding and critical. (Notice me!  Be with me!  I need you!)

Which of these two strategies we adopt when we feel disconnected partly reflects our natural temperament, but mostly is dictated by lessons we learned in key attachments of the past (our family of origin) and the present. Moreover because we learn in every new relationship our strategy is not fixed. We can be critical in one relationship and withdraw in another.

This situation spirals downward and gets worse and worse….each assumes the worst and they get more disconnected.  Why don’t we hear each other’s calls for attention and connection?  Because ~ in our panic ~ we don’t know how to speak the language of connection….we demand ~ or flee ~ rather than request.

 

 

We fall into one of three Demon Dialogues:

The longer partners feel disconnected, the more negative their interactions become. Researchers have identified several damaging patterns, they go by various names. I call the three that I consider the most basic “Demon dialogues.” They are Find the Bad Guy, the Protest Polka and Freeze and Flee, you’ll learn more about them in Conversation  1. (Hold Me Tight  - p. 65)

By far the most dominant of the trio is the Protest Polka. In this dialogue one partner becomes critical and aggressive the other becomes defensive and distant. John Gottman finds that couples who get stuck in this pattern in the first two years of marriage have more than 80% chance of divorcing within four or five years.

For example, in a session in my office, Carol confronts Jim over his latest transgression:  He didn’t show up on time for their scheduled movie night. “How come you’re always late?” She challenges. “Doesn’t it matter to you that we have a date, that I’m waiting, that you always let me down?” Jim reacts coolly: “I got held up. But if you’re going to start off nagging again, maybe we should just go home and forget the date.” Carol retaliates by listing all the other times Jim is been late. And Jim starts to dispute her “list,” then breaks off and retreats into stony silence.

The idea that these demon dialogues are all about attachment panic is still revolutionary to many psychologists and counselors. Many who come for training have been taught to see conflict itself and couples’ power struggles as the main problems in relationships. As a result they focus on teaching couples negotiation and communication skills to contain the conflict. But this addresses the symptoms, not the disease. It’s telling people caught in a never ending dance of frustration and distance to change the steps when what they have to do is change the music. “Stop telling me what to do,” orders Jim. Carol considers this for a nanosecond before angrily retorting, “When I do that, you do nothing and we are nowhere!”

We can come up with many techniques to address different aspect of couples’ distress, but until we understand the core principles that organize love relationships, we cannot really understand love’s problems or offer couples enduring help. The demand-withdrawal pattern is not just a bad habit, it reflects a deeper underlying reality: such couples are starving emotionally. They are losing the source of their emotional sustenance. They feel deprived. They are desperate to regain that nurturance.

The standard remedies do not address yearnings for or desperate efforts to save emotional connection. They do not tell couples how to reconnect or how to stay connected. The techniques they are taught may interrupt a fight, but at a terrible cost they often further the distance between partners, reinforcing fears of being rejected and abandoned just when couples need to reaffirm their bond.

 

 

Things happen fast. I can suddenly feel uncertain or vulnerable or less connected (unsafe) with a loved one. See the story of Peter and Linda at a party (Page 36 of Hold Me Tight). She is talking with a handsome man and he feels less adequate-what does he do?

1 - calm himself or have another drink….or six.

2 - does he reach out to her and communicate his vulnerability (at least nonverbally).

3 - can he later communicate even more fully (verbally).

When marriages fail, it is not increasing conflict that is the cause. It is decreasing affection and emotional responsiveness. Indeed, the lack of emotional responsiveness rather than the level of conflict is the best predictor of how solid a marriage will be five years into it. The demise of marriages begins with a growing absence of responsive intimate interactions. The conflict comes later.

As lovers, we poise together delicately on a tight rope. When the winds of doubt and fear begin blowing, if we panic and clutch at each other or abruptly turned away and head for cover, the rope sways more and more and our balance becomes even more precarious. To stay on the rope, we must shift with each other’s moves, respond to each other’s emotions. As we connect, we balance each other. We are in emotional equilibrium.

The heart of the matter.

1. The powerful emotions that come up in couples or anything but irrational… They make perfect sense. When a person does not feel safe it is essential to connect. It is like the need for oxygen.
    
2. Demon Dialogues are a protest against disconnection and the spiral gets worse because each negative result causes more fear and more disconnection. (It is like trying to convince a drowning person to relax!)
    
3. However, when couples can learn to see the Demon Dialogues (as they are happening) and do it differently… and connect… They can sooth each other and forged a bond of intimacy.

How to help couples.

With the help of a therapist or studying a book like Hold Me Tight, we hope to help couples SEE their negative patterns of interaction ~ their “Demon Dialogues” ~ as the enemy (not the other person).

But even when they learn to see the negative patterns, they keep doing them (because they are “habits” that are automatic).  So they have to learn how to slow down the “spin” of the Demon Dance by sharing “softer emotions” (sadness, fear, embarrassment, shame) which always appear….then talking more about these emotions (maybe for the first time) can help them to feel safer with each other.

The next step is to be willing to RISK talking more fully about my FEARS (“What is the most difficult thing to talk about with you?”)

When couples can dialogue about their FEARS, they can connect with one another (the relationship is more intimate).

Over the years, as scientific studies on adult attachment have continued and confirmed what I have learned in leading and watching thousands of couple therapy sessions, the key conversations that promote an emotional bond and a safe, secure connection have become clearer and clearer. We have shown in our studies that when they happen, couples recover from distress and build a stronger bond between them. This book is about sharing these conversations with you in a way that you can use in your own relationship. Until now this is been a process supervised by professionals trained in Emotionally Focused Therapy. But it is so valuable and so needed that I’ve simplify the process so that you the reader can easily use it to change and grow your relationship.

A.R.E.

The basis of emotionally focused therapy is seven conversations that are aimed at encouraging a special kind of emotional responsiveness that is key to lasting love for couples. This emotional responsiveness has three main components:

1 - Accessibility: can I reach you?

This means staying open to your partner even when you have doubts and feel insecure. It often means being willing to struggle to make sense of your emotions so these emotions are not so overwhelming. You can then step back from disconnection and can tune in to your lovers attachment cues.

2 - Responsiveness: can I rely on you to respond to me emotionally?

This means turning in to your partner and showing that his or her emotions, especially attachment needs and fears, have an impact on you. It means accepting and placing a priority on the emotional signals your partner conveys and sending clear signals of comfort and caring when your partner needs them. Sensitive responsiveness always touches us emotionally and calms us on a physical level.

3 - Engagement: do I know you will value me and stay close?

The dictionary defines engaged as “being absorbed, attracted, pulled, captivated, pledged, involved.”  Emotional engagement here means the very special kind of attention that we give only to a loved one. We gaze at them longer, catch them more. Partners often talk of this as being emotionally present.

One easy way to remember these is to think of the acronym A.R.E. and the phrase “Are you there, are you with me?”

The Seven Conversations of E.T.F.

The first four conversations teach you how to limit negative spirals that leave you both disconnected, and how to tune in to each other in a way that builds emotional responsiveness.

1 – Recognizing the Demon Dialogues. (Hold Me Tight  - p. 65 +)

2 – Finding the Raw Spots. (Hold Me Tight  - p. 98)

3 – Revisiting a Rocky Moment. (Hold Me Tight  - p. 121)

4 – Hold Me Tight. (Hold Me Tight  - p. 141)

The next two conversations demonstrate how you can promote emotional bonding through forgiving injuries and sexual intimacy.

5 – Forgiving Injuries. (Hold Me Tight  - p. 165)

6 – Bonding Through Sex and Touch. (Hold Me Tight  - p. 185)

The final conversation shows you how to care for your relationship on a daily basis.

7 – Keeping your Love Alive. (Hold Me Tight  - p. 204)