Popular marriage counselor and seminar leader John Gray provides a unique, practical and proven way for men and women to communicate and relate better by acknowledging the differences between them.
Once upon a time Martians and Venusians met, fell in love, and had happy relationships together because they respected and accepted their differences.
Then they came to earth and amnesia set in: they forgot they were from different planets.
Using this metaphor to illustrate the commonly occurring conflicts between men and women, Gray explains how these differences can come between the sexes and prohibit mutually fulfilling loving relationships.
Based on years of successful counseling of couples, he gives advice on how to counteract these differences in communication styles, emotional needs and modes of behavior to promote a greater understanding between individual partners.
Gray shows how men and women react differently in conversation and how their relationships are affected by male intimacy cycles ("get close", "back off"),
and female self-esteem fluctuations ("I'm okay", "I'm not okay"). He encourages readers to accept the other gender's particular way of expressing love, and helps men and women learn how to fulfill each other's emotional needs.
With practical suggestions on how to reduce conflict, crucial information on how to interpret a partner's behavior and methods for preventing emotional "trash from the past" from invading new relationships,
Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus is a valuable tool for couples who want to develop deeper and more satisfying relationships with their partners.
The Highly Sensitive Person in Love: Understanding and Managing Relationships When the World Overwhelms You
Research finds that 50 percent of what determines divorce is genetic temperament -- or rather, according to the author, ignorance about how partners should understand
each other's temperament, known as Highly Sensitive Persons, or HSPs. The risk of an unhappy relationship is especially high if you are one of the 20 percent of people
born highly sensitive. Your fine-tuned nervous system, which picks up on subtleties and reflects deeply, would be ideal of both you and your partner understood you better.
But without that understanding, your sensitivity could make your close relationships painful and complicated. The author, a research psychologist and highly sensitive
person herself, has taken a closer look at how inborn temperament affects intimacy. Based on new research, this book offers practical help for HSPs seeking happier,
healthier romantic relationships. Every aspect of HSP in relationships is covered, from low-stress fighting to sensitive sexuality. Included are self-tests and case studies --
and the results from the first survey ever done on sex and temperament. With wonderful advice on making the most of all personality combinations in relationships,
the author offers a wealth of insights for non-highly sensitive people as well.
Mixed matches are more complicated relationships than those between people from similar backgrounds.
Often, the very qualities that attracted us to our partners ultimately lie at the roots of our most difficult problems.
For even when partners don't feel a strong identification with their racial, religious, or cultural groups, they discover
that their loyalty to the past goes deeper than they realized. Psychotherapist Joel Crohn has learned in years of counseling
couples in cross-cultural relationships that how partners negotiate their cultural and religious differences is as important as what the difference are.
Over time, the reserve of a Protestant wife can seem like emotional withholding to her Jewish husband, whose openness seems intrusive to her.
An Asian father may feel his children need more discipline, while his American wife thinks they have it harder than she did.
A black Trinidadian man is excited about the opportunities in the United States, while his Detroit-born black girlfriend thinks he's naive about racism.
The methods in Mixed Matches have helped these and many other couples approach each other compassionately, teaching them to
"translate" their different styles of expression and negotiate successful resolutions. Dr. Crohn also offers practical advice on how couples
can confront prejudice and stereotypes, deal with in-laws, and help children achieve a sense of identity in a bicultural family.
Dugan Romano delivers a "reality check" for anyone already in or contemplating an intercultural marriage -- before the honeymoon is over or the romantic fantasies sweep you away.
Covering specific issues such as raising bicultural children and coping with death or divorce, the book identifies the three stages of relationship development and clearly distinguishes
between differences found in all relationships from those uniquely inherent in marriages that span diverse cultures and/or different countries.
Giving voice to hundreds of couples she has interviewed and followed for nearly a decade, the author identifies 19 trouble spots--from ethnocentrism,
religion, values, and social class to male-female roles and sex. She weaves lessons learned into strategies for turning challenges into opportunities for lasting and fulfilling relationships.
