Marin Couples Counseling & Therapy

With SKYPE and other video conferencing technology, clients can now do therapy without leaving their OWN couch. To many people this at first seems strange. And there are certainly advantages to coming into our office for in-person therapy.

However, remote therapy by video conferencing also has many advantages, most of which we ourselves were unaware of until we began Skyping with some clients by necessity. My first Skype session was with a long-time client who moved to Berlin. She didn’t want to begin therapy with someone else, so we began using Skype. And we’ve been doing so now for about two years – without any discernable diminishment in the effectiveness of the therapy.

One flipside to awareness is denial: closing our eyes to what is in front of our nose. Often the first response to relationship trouble is to turn over in bed and ignore it, hoping it will go away. Life gets so busy and it is so unpleasant, even scary, to acknowledge that something isn’t working. If we just keep moving along, looking forward, the hope is, problems will disappear. Then the more we look away, the larger the issues become.

If you are just beginning a couple relationship, you and
your partner hopefully enjoy respect, kindness, generosity, a
sharing of intimacy that is both verbal and physical, a spirit of
discovery, passionate mutual interest, and altogether a great
aliveness. Hopefully, you and your partner share conversations
from the heart about your fears and dreams, a heated sexuality,
and leisure and social activities in common, whether they be
cooking, dancing, gardening, or reading together. For most of us,
passion and connection are relatively easy in the beginning
because the obstacles from the bottom of our psychological sea
have yet to surface.

Virtually every couple that visits us arrives seeking very “practical” help. Most want to “communicate better,” “reduce conflict” and/or “get along better.” Sometimes they want assistance with very specific areas of conflict, such as sexual intimacy, a betrayal, financial differences, or child-raising.

These are all very important matters and we very respectfully and directly address these with the couples who work with us.

We’ve collected a few quotes or relationship tips from experts that we think people might find inspirational and that give you and your partner perspective on your relationship and/or your marriage:

For one human being to love another: that is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks, the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preperation.

Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

Mature love is the capacity to find enjoyment in the enjoyment of the other person’s enjoyment. It isn’t enough to enjoy your wife’s cooking. You ought to enjoy the pleasure she has in cooking.

by Jonathan Goodman-Herrick, LCSW
Marin Marriage and Couples Therapist

“The wisdom distilled here emerges out of Jonathan’s wide clinical experience and deep personal reflection.”
Jan Chozen Bays, M.D., American Zen Teacher, To Heal the Human World

We are always so eager to get our partner to change. If only they would be kinder, more independent, more responsible, more fun, more sexual, less sexual, more emotional, less emotional, if only they would be different, our life would definitely improve. After decades of failed attempts to change my wife, and of watching other partners’ unsuccessful attempts to change each other, I have come to the conclusion that the easiest and probably the only way to transform a partner is to change ourself. As we evolve, so does our partner. Though, strangely, this secret formula is among the most difficult of secrets to remember.

NEW YORK TIMES 3/30/10: “THE SANDRA BULLOCK TRADE”

Times columnist David Brooks writes intelligently about hard, contemporary research on personal relationships – and on marriage in particular. He takes Sandra Bullocks’ recent experience as a starting point and poses the question: “Would you take an Academy Award over a faithful partner and happy marriage?” He points out that “winning the lottery doesn’t seem to produce lasting gains in well-being.(However) the daily activities most associated with happiness are sex and socializing.” “According to another study, being married produces a psychic equivalent to more than $100,000 a year.”

Preface to Heart of Relationship

For one human being to love another: that is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks, the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation.

Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet.

From the beginning of love, through the passing of the years, five truths describe and explain the world of committed, intimate relationship. When everything else is stripped away from the confusion and stories surrounding the life of a couple, five truths remain.

Eckart Tolle wrote a great article in the Huffington Post recently. In his article “Living in Presence With Your Emotional Pain Body”, he does a great job of communicating a key concept that’s important for couples to understand, especially if they want to learn how to reduce fighting in their relationship. The gist of Tolle’s article is that we each have what some of us refer to as an Inner Critic lodged within us. This plays a GIANT role in couples’ fights, in couples hurting themselves and each other. In fact I would venture that 99.9% of couple acrimony comes out of what Tolle refers to as the pain body. This is a wonderful perspective on an aspect of being human that few people consider. Jonathan Goodman-Herrick, LCSW