Dr. Johnson is a psychologist that created Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT), which is a short-term couples therapy focused on adult relationships and attachment/bonding. She practiced for 35yrs and has become a leader in the science of relationships. She put her findings in this couples-counseling-in-a-book. It is thoughtful, tested, and directly applicable to any relationship, not just ones that are struggling or broken. It is one of the very few books that I plan to re-read regularly and would highly recommend it to anyone in a committed relationship. Enjoy!
Top 10 quotes
1. “I can now say with confidence that we know what love is. It's intuitive and yet not necessarily obvious: It's the continual search for a basic, secure connection with someone else. Through this bond, partners in love become emotionally dependent on each other for nurturing, soothing, and protection.”
2. “Learning how to nurture the bonds of love is an urgent task. Loving connection provides the dependable web of intimacy that allows us to cope with life and to live life well. And that is what gives our life its meaning. For most of us, on our deathbeds, it is the quality of our connection with our precious ones that will matter most.” This was proven by this study.
3. “Even though we are programmed by millions of years of evolution to relentlessly seek out belonging and intimate connection, we persist in defining healthy people as those who do not need others.”
4. “Although our culture has framed dependency as a bad thing, a weakness, it is not. Being attached to someone provides our greatest sense of security and safety. It means depending on a partner to respond when you call, to know that you matter to him or her, that you are cherished, and that he will respond to your emotional needs.”
5. “If we “feed and clothe a human infant but deprive him of emotional contact he will die.” But we have been taught to believe that adults are a different animal. How ever did we get here?”
6. “A secure connection to Mom and the closeness of early friendships forecasts the quality of love relationships at age twenty-five. We are our relationship history.”
7. “There is no perfect performance in love or sex. Obsession with performance is a dead end. It is emotional presence that matters.”
8. “The idea that one of the best things you can do for your child is to create a loving relationship with your partner is not sentimental, it’s a scientific fact.”
9. “Better relationships between love partners are not just a personal preference, they are a social good. Better love relationships mean better families. And better, more loving families mean better, more responsive communities.”
10. “We can learn sympathy and compassion for others from the Christian Bible, from the Koran, or from the teachings of the Buddha. But I think first we have to learn it and feel it in the tender embrace of a parent or a lover. Then perhaps we can actively and intentionally pass it on in ever-widening circles to the larger world.”
Summary ex the Seven Conversations
o The emotional need to be close to our partners is wired in our genes
o Working on building a closer relationship can actually rewire our brains as we repeatedly have positive loving experiences together over time.
o Effective dependency means that we are stronger when (securely) dependent to our partner.
o Communication fixes the signs of relationship troubles. To fix the cause, we need to build emotional intimacy.
o She believes that John Bowlby and his attachment theory (children’s need for secure attachment with a caregiver is an evolutionary response to needing and finding protection from danger) revolutionized human psychology and would put him ahead of Freud.
o Romantic love is all about attachment and emotional bonding. We have a wired-in need to have someone to depend on and offer reliable emotional connection and comfort as much as we need food, sex, and shelter.
o Basic needs of attachment. That we…
Monitor and maintain emotional and physical closeness
Reach out when we are unsure, upset, or down
Miss them when we’re apart
Count on them to be there for us
o If you feel your partner has your back no matter what, you are more confident about solving problems on your own and are more successful in achieving your goals.
o Curiosity comes out of a sense of safety; rigidity out of being vigilant to threats
o Love is a basic need like oxygen or water. We can’t get to the heart of relationship problems until we understand this.
o When marriages fail, it is not increasing conflict that is the cause. It is decreasing affection and emotional responsiveness,
o The A-R-E Basics of Emotionally Focused Therapy:
Accessibility: Can you reach your partner?
Responsiveness: Can you rely on your partner to respond emotionally?
Engagement: Does your partner value you and stay emotionally close?
The Seven Conversations
1. Recognizing Demon Dialogues (downward spiral situations). Identify common emotional reactions that lead to arguments and negative cycles.
Find the Bad Guy – blame game
The Protest Polka is when one reaches out in a harmful way, making the other withdraw, which makes the other become more demanding, the other withdraws further, and so on.
The Freeze and Flee is when the pursuing, critical partner gives up trying to get the spouse’s attention and goes silent.
o Carol was able to admit that she had “given up” and “built a wall” between herself and Terry to blunt her sense of rejection. She confessed that she had turned to the children to fulfill her longing for touch and connection. Terry divulged how shocked he was to hear this and how he still very much wanted his wife.
2. Finding the Raw Spots
We often don’t recognize that we have raw spots
They come up in the middle of a conversation that suddenly changes the tone from joking/fun to serious/upset/aloof/chilly.
“I know you are trying to be caring. And you are right. You do talk to me about my problems. And it’s fine, until you say, ‘Look’ in that tone, like I am a stupid little kid who doesn’t know anything. That is like a needle in my skin. I get that you are exasperated with me. You think I am stupid. And that hurts.” This is news to Eric; he thought they were arguing because she didn’t like any of his ideas.”
What are my/my wife’s raw spots? Do I know what she/I does to irritate it?
3. Revisiting a Rocky Moment
Stop the game of who’s right/wrong
Claim your own feelings rather than focusing on blaming the other
Own how you shape your partner’s feelings
Ask about your partner’s deeper emotions. Recognize what’s really going on.
Share your own deeper emotions.
Stand together
4. Hold Me Tight
“When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You just know that your name is safe in their mouth.”
Example of wife that gets angry while the husband retreats, exhausted by not being able to do things right and avoid her being critical. “I want you to accept that I am more emotional than you and that this is okay. It is not a flaw in me. I want you to stay with me and come close, to show me you care when I don’t feel strong. I want you to touch me and hold me and tell me I matter to you. I just want you to be with me. That is all I need. Charlie looks completely stunned. He says, “You mean you just want me to come close?” Kyoko asks him, “What is it like to hear me say these things?” He shakes his head. “It is like I have been working so hard to keep us on this one track that I have not seen the simple easy way just off to the side here.” Then he smiles softly. “This feels good. It is better. I can do this. I can do this with you.”
List of phrases people use in this conversation. I need to feel, to sense that:
I am special to you and that you really value our relationship.
I need that reassurance that I am number one with you and that nothing is more important to you than us.
I am wanted by you, as a partner and a lover, that making me happy is important to you.
I am loved and accepted, with my failings and imperfections. I can’t be perfect for you.
I am needed. You want me close.
I am safe because you care about my feelings, hurts, and needs.
I can count on you to be there for me, to not leave me alone when I need you the most.
I will be heard and respected. Please don’t dismiss me or leap into thinking the worst of me. Give me a chance to learn how to be with you.
I can count on you to hear me and to put everything else aside.
I can ask you to hold me and to understand that just asking is very hard for me.
5. Forgiving Injuries
“And I was there, I was sitting on the stairs and I said to you, ‘The doctor thinks I probably have it. Breast cancer. I’ve been waiting all my life, knowing it was coming. My mother died of it. My grandmother, too. And now it’s come for me.’ ” Her voice changes; she sounds bewildered. “And you brushed past me as I sat there” — she touches her shoulder, as if still feeling the touch — “and you said, ‘Get yourself together. There’s no point in freaking out and getting all upset when you are not sure. Just calm down, and we can discuss what to do later.’ You went upstairs to your office and closed the door. You didn’t come down for the longest time. You left me sitting alone. You left me dying on the stairs.” Since then she has become more numb and distant to avoid closeness and feeling that kind of rejection again. She didn’t understand that he didn’t know how to respond and went to his room to cry.
Partners often try to handle relationship injuries by ignoring or burying them. That is a big mistake.
What are the emotional injuries I’ve caused that I don’t even know about? And maybe she’s forgotten or doesn’t even realize that they were injuries?
6. Bonding Through Sex and Touch
“We waste time looking for the perfect lover, instead of creating the perfect love.” — Tom Robbins
“Emotional connection creates great sex, and great sex creates deeper emotional connection. When partners are emotionally accessible, responsive, and engaged, sex becomes intimate play, a safe adventure. Secure partners feel free and confident to surrender to sensation in each other’s arms, explore and fulfill their sexual needs, and share their deepest joys, longings, and vulnerabilities. Then, lovemaking is truly making love.”
Sex is the “canary in the coal mine.” What’s really happening is that a couple is losing connection; the partners don’t feel emotionally safe with each other. That in turn leads to slackening desire and less satisfying sex, which leads to less sex and more hurt feelings, which leads to still looser emotional connection, and around it goes. In shorthand: no safe bond, no sex; no sex, no bond.
When sex is an anti-anxiety pill, it cannot be truly erotic.
Eroticism is essentially play and the ability to “let go” and surrender to sensation. For this, we need emotional safety.
What are your four most important expectations in bed?
7. Keeping your Love Alive
Creating a Future Love Story. This story outlines what you want your bond to look like five or ten years down the road and how you would like your partner’s help in making the vision a reality.
Small gestures that say “you matter to me”
Holding, hugging, kissing throughout the day (leaving, coming home, etc.)
Calling/texting throughout the day
Writing letters and leaving short notes
Regular date night
Once a year, take a class or do a project together
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