How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It Quotes

“Excluding your partner's perspective and insisting on your own, no matter how you put it, implies that being right is more important to you than how your partner feels and more important than the well-being of your relationship.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“Protection involves caring about her emotions more than the content of what she says. You can disagree with the content, as long as you value her.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“How Do You Make It Hard for Your Partner to Give You What You Want?”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“Hug your partner in a full-body embrace a minimum of six times a day, holding each hug for a minimum of six seconds. The six-times-six formula is not arbitrary.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“Protection in committed relationships is different from protection in dating. The battle cry is no longer “to the rescue” or “I'll fix this for you.” The key now is maintenance, empowerment, assistance, and friendship”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“The great test of masculinity in our modern era is not going into the woods and eating bugs to prove we can overcome our fear in a bold display of our survival skills; it's learning to protect the women in our lives without trying to control them.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“It's funny how sex factors into the way people describe the state of their relationships. Studies show that, when things are going well, sex contributes only 15 percent to the overall satisfaction of a relationship. But if things aren't going well, it contributes 85 percent to the dissatisfaction.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“Be at your best when your partner is at his or her worst.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“Am I acting like the person I most want to be? If not, what can I do to act like that person? Answer: Improve (make it a little better), appreciate, connect, or protect. Am I being the partner I want to be? If not, what can I do to be that kind of partner? Answer: Improve (make it a little better), appreciate, connect, or protect.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“nothing soothes fear and shame like connection.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“Girls are born with more sensitivity to isolation and fear; boys are born with more sensitivity to arousal and shame.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“Women, the men in your life will definitely be more loving, compassionate, and nurturing if you can understand and accept their vulnerability to shame and reduce the ways you trigger it.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“His shame is too great to allow him to understand her fear, and her fear keeps her from seeing his shame. When they try to alleviate their feelings of vulnerability in opposite ways—by talking and not talking—all they end up sharing are disappointment and heartache. Your relationship can fail with neither of you doing anything wrong, if you do not understand the extent to which fear and shame drive your disconnection from each other. Understanding each other's core vulnerabilities and learning how to manage them will give you a new perspective on your relationship—a dual perspective based on both points of view—that leads to compassionate connection and love beyond words.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“Men see relationship and marriage more as a place to relax than a dynamic interaction. It's a secure place to get their batteries recharged before the world takes another whack at them. Ideally, it's an unchallenging place, where he can kick back, unwind, and be himself without having to play roles or manage pretenses or do things he doesn't want to do. What makes it relaxing is the comfort of having his partner in the room or at least in the next room. For men, a relationship is a secure base, as long as his partner is around or nearby.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“the tip-off indicators of fear and shame: resentment and anger (blaming your shame or fear on someone else); materialism (providing illusions of status for a man and security for a woman); people pleasing (doing things detrimental to the self to gain the admiration or approval of others); obsessions (thoughts you can't get out of your mind); and compulsive behavior like impulsive shopping, overeating, and binge drinking.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“Once you decide what your heart gesture will be, practice it routinely during the four crucial times of each day: 1. when you wake up, 2. before you leave home, 3. when you come back home, and 4. before you go to sleep.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“The bottom line is: Be there with her. Don't ignore it; don't “fix” it, tell her what to do, or try to drag her out of it. If you're just there with her a short time, the two of you can usually step out of the puddle together.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“This is an important point about parenting, too. You're not going to help your sons and daughters by telling them that they shouldn't feel the way they do. You'll help them by being in the emotion with them for a few moments while they work their own way out of it.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“Be there with your partner's feelings. Don't ignore them, try to “fix it,” or try to talk about it or drag him or her out of it.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“Developing the ability to experience the world through your partner's eyes, while holding on to your own perspective, may be the single most important skill in intimate relationships.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“How Could You Make It Easier?”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“The easiest way to keep true to your core values is to invoke what we call the four core value inspirations: IMPROVE
APPRECIATE
CONNECT
PROTECT Inspiration means “breathe in.” If you take a deep breath and try to improve, appreciate, connect, or protect, you will find yourself back to what is most important to you.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“respond to stressful situations by protecting themselves and their young through nurturing behaviors—the tend part of the model—and forming alliances with others, particularly women—the befriend part. Women bond around helping one another through troubled times. The more they talk about their troubles, the closer they feel. Because emotional bonds serve as a woman's primary”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It

“Fix your partner firmly in your heart during four crucial times of the day. Hug your partner six times a day for six seconds. Hold positive thoughts about your relationship. Make a contract to hand out love with compassion and generosity.”
― Patricia Love, How to Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It