Relationship Vision

Maximus sent me this picture he took while stopped on the freeway in San Francisco. It was a sign… And i just love this picture!!

Fern sent us the Relationship Vision sheets to work on. We’ve not had a chance to start on them yet due to work and travel, but i thought i’d share the instructions and worksheets now. i’ll post about what we come up with after we’ve had a chance to work on them, whenever that may be.

Mutual Relationship Vision:

My Dream Relationship Worksheet

Adapted from Short-Term Couples Therapy: The Imago Model in Action by Wade Luquet, A.C.S.W., page 110.

Working by yourself, write down all the things you would like in your relationship that would make it a fulfilling and nourishing relationship.  Start each sentence with the pronoun “We” and write each dream in the present tense as if you are already experiencing it.  Add descriptive words and make the items at least 50% believable.

Examples:

• We are happily hiking together at least once a month.
• We are effectively and peacefully doing projects on our shared space as needed (organizing, cleaning, fixing, redesigning, etc.).
• We are enjoying satisfying sex and both freely asking for what we enjoy.
• We are a cooperative partnership, allowing each individual to balance their goals and desires.
• with their active participation in nurturing the relationship.
• We are peacefully resolving issues as they arise and extending good will and appreciations for one another often.
• We are enthusiastically supporting each others professional lives and easily creating abundance for our lives together.
• We are joyously finding time for creative play and sensual satisfaction at least once a week.
• We are playfully balancing our time together and apart.
• We take time daily to listen to each others thoughts, feelings and stories.
• We keep romance alive through daily attentive gestures and weekly dates.
• We respect the ways in which we are different and cherish our similarities.
• We resolve conflict through dialogue and containment.
• We delight one another with random and unpredictable surprises.

Then go over your lists together, discovering statements that you mutually agree on. Add others as they come to you.

Combine the mutually agreed upon statements onto a single sheet. Print out copies (personalize with photos, a relationship mission statement, a favorite quote or poem, etc) and put up some place you each will see each day.

Ideally read EVERY day, and read together at least once a week.

Do ONE ACTION each week to help cultivate something on the list.  (It might take research, putting a reminder in your calendar, etc.)  You might choose to do the same thing for more than one week or you might try new actions.

Repeat ones that work!  Try new actions and build up that love account.

Do APPRECIATIONS!

i’m looking forward to working on our Relationship Vision and using it to reinforce our love for each other and filling our love accounts!