Imago Relationship Therapy
For Couples
Overview
Imago Relationship Therapy proposes that nature put the two of you together for a specific reason. Your relationship has a greater purpose than the initial romantic love you felt when you first met your partner. Nature did that just to hook you up. Her hidden agenda was to help each of you heal your childhood wounds and grow into a whole person.
She did this by having you find and join with a partner who represents not only the positive qualities of your caregivers/parents but also their negative qualities. This target that you search for and hit is called your Imago which is Latin for image. When you find your Imago match you initially experience all the positive qualities of romantic love. Eventually you start to notice and react to your partner's negative qualities and the power struggle and conflict begins. What is most likely happening is that all of your unhealed stuff is coming to the surface and you now have the opportunity to work through these childhood issues with your partner. In addition to possessing the characteristics that trigger you, your partner also carries those qualities that you haven't developed in yourself. Rather than seeing your partner as your adversary, you can choose to see your partner as your teammate on a common journey towards wholeness.
The places you are most frustrated with your partner on are the places you most likely need to develop for yourself. Our families socialized us to give up certain ways of expressing ourselves. These ways include thinking, acting, feeling and sensing. To reach our full potential, we need all four ways of expressing ourselves. Often we pick a partner who complements us. For example, one partner is the thinker and doer and the other partner is the feeler and senser. The Couples Dialogue creates a safe environment so that you can reconnect to your partner and learn how to reclaim and strengthen each of these qualities for yourself.
The Couples Dialogue
Imagine talking with your partner without being interrupted or talked over. Imagine having a dialogue where there is no arguing and the conversation doesn't escalate out of control. Where one person doesn't leave physically or withdraw emotionally. Imagine having a discussion where hearing is more important than winning. This kind of experience becomes possible when couples learn how to communicate by using the Couples Dialogue. The Couples Dialogue helps resolve conflict and create emotional safety.
The Couples Dialogue is a three-step process. One partner shares a frustration while the other partner listens. The listener then mirrors and validates his partner, the first two steps. Finally, the listener shows empathy, the third step, for the sender of the message. When both partners have a chance to express thoughts and feelings using this process, each feels fully heard by the other. Compassion increases and partners begin to reconnect.
For Singles
- Learn how to develop and sustain intimate relationships
- Learn how your childhood affects your relationships and how to make different choices
- Let go of destructive patterns and replace them with healthy behaviors
- Release fears and begin taking loving actions for yourself
- Learn how to value yourself
- Learn how to fill your own inner emptiness rather than looking for others to complete you
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