Marriage counseling has been enormously popular for couples hoping to strengthen good marriages and save bad ones. These couples place enormous faith in the doctor, counselor or therapist to be an expert in saving marriages. Usually this comes at a cost of both time and money. Too many times though, the counseling advice they receive is of little help and can actually make their problems worse. After me and my wife’s own failures with marriage counseling and near divorce a few years back, I learned an incredible secret that would change everything. You can save your marriage even if you have never been to counseling.
Recent studies have shown that traditional marriage counseling only has about a 20% success rate. Of the couples who were interviewed in this study, 8 out of 10 said the counseling was of little or no help at all to their marriage. The same studies have indicated that these couples who attend counseling end up divorcing at the same rate as the couples who did not attend counseling. Many couples said their marriages actually got worse after seeing the counselor!
The problem appears to stem from the fact that the majority of people who offer marriage counseling are educated and trained in psychotherapy and individual counseling. Their focus is on the happiness and life satisfaction of individuals. When trying to apply this same model to a married couple, the goal becomes teaching better communication skills to two individuals. The focus is still on individuals rather than the marriage itself. No one doubts the sincerity and dedication of these professionals. They obviously want very much to help the couple improve their marriage. The problem is, they just don’t know how!
Most marriage counselors who use this model base the entire model for therapy on communication. This usually is not even the root of the problem. It often just teaches couples how to fight better, but does nothing to strengthen the relationship and build a better more loving marriage.
After nearly getting a divorce and desperate to save my marriage, I discovered a powerful secret: I learned how to get out of my negative emotional state and put myself in a much more resourceful state. I learned about the critical mistakes that were hurting my chance to save the marriage and how to avoid those mistakes. I found out about a proven step-by-step approach that taught me very specifically what to say and do around my wife and it made an immediate difference. Finally, I allowed myself to trust the process, even if it seemed like the complete opposite of what I should be doing! I became willing to take powerful action!