So many couples out there are having horrible fights with their spouses. You could be wondering whether your marriage will really last. So many people wonder whether counseling really works. There are some questions that are so common among spouses. The challenge with traditional counseling is that it is not very effective in saving marriages. It explains why so many people are preferring to visit clinics such as Naya Clinics.
Traditional counseling normally relies on a technique that is referred to as active listening. In active listening, one couple will air out his or her grievances as the other one listens carefully and tries to understand. In theory, active listening makes the person who is listening to understand how the party that is talking feels.
It is a great technique but it will not work if you are fighting. The active listening will just make the person say hurtful things about the other person. There is no need to let the person continue speaking if they are still fuming about something.
This is the main problem that comes with traditional counseling. When you visit a therapist, he will try out active listening first. However, if you don’t handle this properly, it can reduce the success rate of marriage counseling. You need a person who is highly creative to come up with solutions that are unique to each situation.
When Does Counseling in Marriage Work?
One of the top things that makes marriage therapy to work is finding the one who will cultivate the spirit of friendship between you and your partner. The best marital therapist will help you to nurture a positive view towards your spouse.
It may sound obvious but if you consider your spouse as a close friend, you will not have a hard time trusting and respecting them. As a result, it will not be hard to overcome any challenges that come your way. If you have a strong friendship, the thoughts of splitting will not come your way. It is this spirit that the marriage counselor should cultivate between the spouse for his services to materialize.
The best way to overcome this conflict is simply liking the person that you marry. However, most people tend to overlook this element when joining a union. Just find a way of reminding yourself the much you like your spouse. You will avoid the thoughts of contempt that end up breaking so many families.
If your admiration and respect for your partner has faded away, you really need to do some serious work for your marriage. With a lack of fundamental respect and trust, there is no way you will maintain a healthy family. It explains why the standard advice of learning to communicate does not always work for troubled marriages. For your marriage to work, you should bring back the admiration and fondness that you had for your spouse at some time. This has nothing to do with effective communication.
To turn your relationship around, the first step is getting in touch with your deep feelings of affection and respect that you have for your spouse. When you are better in touch with these feelings, you increase your chances of surviving the rocky times in your marriage. A large part of traditional consulting focuses on understanding and communication. It does not focus on the fact that you first need to bring passion and admiration into your union.
Therefore, instead of asking yourself whether counselling services work, you should be asking what you need to do to make sure that marital counseling works. Here are some tips on how to make sure that you have a successful marital counselling relationship.
1. Have a Goal Before Attending a Counselling Session?
For marriage counselling to be effective, individuals or couples must decide on one goal that they want to achieve after attending the session. Without a goal, you will not tell whether the counselling sessions have helped you or not. A goal could be something like;
- We want to talk about finances rationally and calmly without raising voices to one another.
- I want my wife to learn listening to me.
- We want to become closer and work out our differences.
When you enter a counselling session with your spouse, the therapist will use your objectives to help you out. Remember it is your marriage and the therapist will not tell you how it should look like. It is you and your spouse that can determine the best thing for your partnership.
2. Don’t Take Too Long Before Going for Counselling
It is wise to go for counselling sessions when both partners are working towards a healthy and happy marriage. The challenge with most couples is that they turn to counselling as the last resort to help save the union from divorce. When you wait for too long, the other party may not care about the outcome of the marriage. Besides, the other party may believe that the only way out to resolve the problem is divorce.
In such a situation, there isn’t a guarantee that the counselling session will work. Your marriage will not improve as long as one of the spouses is resisting the change. In such a case, it can be helpful to assist the reluctant partner understand the consequences of divorce and separation.
3. Know That Marriage Counselling is a Process and Hence Takes Time
If you are facing a severe problem in your marriage, there is a high chance that it took some time before the problem became this way. Therefore, it is unrealistic to think that one counselling session will be magic and heal all the problems overnight.
Once you set specific and realistic goals, you will give yourselves reasonable timelines to realize an improvement in your relationship. You can be sure that it will not disappoint you in any way. You should give one another enough time to practice and learn new ways to communicate. You should also acknowledge the efforts that your partner is making.
Therefore, marriage counselling can fail because the counsellor uses the wrong approach. These sessions also fail when you don’t have clear goals, take too long before going for counselling, or expect instant results. Make sure you plan well before attending any of these sessions.
