What approach have you taken to solve your marital issues?

One common issue that pops up from time to time is people's experience with counseling. A number of couples that have written to me have already tried receiving counseling a few times, and the progress they have made as a result of this counseling has had surprisingly little effect. Despite going to several counseling sessions, for some couples over many months, many couples seem to be no closer to communicating effectively or solving any of the issues that threaten to tear their relationships apart.

But in thinking about the reasons that counseling has failed these couples, do we blame the counseling or do we look closer at the couples and the part they have played in this too?

I believe the answer to this is in looking at both. A number of counselors specialize in specific fields, and the complex nature of marital disharmony can mean that the approach they take to diagnosing or fixing the problems can be inaccurate, and in some cases completely misses the major issues of the conflict.

Of more concern to me however, is the attitude many couples have to counseling, and this is the bit that you really need to look at closely if you are committed to saving your marriage.

When you go to counseling, how badly do you want the counselor to side with you and tell you that you are right? How much of counseling is motivated by your need to prove your partner wrong? Or are you prepared to participate in counseling and open your mind to learning something?

The attitude you have is what is going to help determine if your counseling is going to bring you together or whether it is a pointless exercise. Unless you are both able to be honest about your beliefs surrounding counseling and what you both hope to achieve from it, it is unlikely that any counseling will help. In order for counseling to work, you need to communicate with each other what you hope to achieve. What are your expectations? Are they similar? Counseling is not about you changing your partner or your partner changing you. It is not about one person being right and the other being wrong. In order for counseling to be effective, you need to both participate actively in it and work towards a common goal. Going into counseling believing that the other person needs to do the changing is counter-productive to the counseling process. You are both in the marriage and you are both invited into the counseling process to learn and grow. Assuming you have done all the growing you need to do is going to guarantee that your counseling is going to fail you. In fact, you are going to fail your counseling.

Supporting the idea of going to counseling means you are going to have to accept your part in this issue and commit to a different way of looking at your marriage issues. It may not be something you like to do, but if you are serious about putting the issues behind you it is going to involve self-examination and sacrifice from both ofyou. Remember, you are never too old or wise to learn.