The Role of Relationship Skills Education
Copyright 2002, empathic coaching associates. All rights reserved.
A couple distressed by relationship problems is often faced with an added anxiety - where to turn for help? Marriage counseling is one possibility, although as explained in Dr. William Doherty's presentation How Marriage Therapy Can Be Dangerous to Your Marital Health, choosing the wrong therapist could make matters even worse.
Other couples may seek to find their own way through relationship issues by reading self-help books. Bookstore shelves are loaded with marital advice, but again the couple is presented with the challenge of finding the right information that will be helpful to their particular situation.
What about Relationship Skills education, such as the Relationship Enhancement program?
First, it's important to understand how Relationship Skills training differs from counseling and therapy. Suppose John and Mary agree to see a marriage counselor. Mary tells the counselor that a big problem in their marriage is John spending too much time with his buddies and not enough with her. The marriage counselor may use a variety of approaches, including directly confronting John about his actions, digging deeper into their relationship and individual history, and advising them on recommended approaches to solve the problem.
With the Relationship Skills education approach, the educator does not analyze, diagnose, or prescribe solutions regarding the couple's specific marital issues. Instead he provides training to help Mary express all of her feelings on this and other issues in a way that does not provoke a destructive argument, and to help John listen and respond to Mary in a way that shows he has empathically understood her. The couple is taught a process whereby they can discuss conflict issues and then work out solutions that are mutually satisfying.
So how is that different than counseling? It's a little like that old saying, "Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach him how to fish and you feed him for a lifetime." With Relationship Skills education, couples are instructed how to communicate and resolve conflicts themselves in ways that can benefit their relationship for years to come.
Since the Relationship Enhancement approach applies universally to all interpersonal relationships and to all conflict issues, it is likely to benefit a wide range of couples. Also, because it is not the educator's role to advise the couple on specific issues, the full responsibility for working things out stays exclusively with the husband and wife.
Some couples who learn the Relationship Enhancement approach find this meets their needs quite adequately. Other couples may seek additional help from marriage counseling or self-help books, but also discover that the skills they learn in Relationship Enhancement training fit in very well with the other assistance they are receiving.
