So I'm going to describe the stages.
And I'm going to do that through looking at these two circles.
And what you see here is two individual people.
They're going through the world.
They're doing their own things.
And then they meet and you can see by the different fonts that you have two different individuals.
One is yellow here,
One is a bluish purple.
And they each have a boundary around themselves as an individual.
And there's nothing significant going on between the two of them.
And when it isn't an arranged marriage.
Usually what happens in that first stage is that there is some kind of attachment formed,
Some kind of falling in love.
Now,
It may be very brief.
Or it may be very extended.
I asked you to actually take the time to reflect on when you may have felt exhilarated or happy being in a loving relationship.
Now,
I did see one couple that had the shortest first stage that I've ever seen,
And this I saw many,
Many years ago with a couple.
Who went out on a blind date.
Their date was arranged by friends.
They went out.
They went to dinner.
They had an amazing connection over dinner.
They felt so,
So excited about each other.
And they made an unlikely decision.
They made a decision that they would,
In fact,
Move in together.
And so before her children from her first marriage woke up the next morning,
These two people had made a commitment to live together and be together.
And they were exhilarated and happy and said they had fallen in love.
Now,
Sadly,
That didn't last very long,
And it was already by the next afternoon that they were starting to fight.
But when people fall in love and they actually come together.
They merge boundaries,
And this is part of a healthy process,
And you see it in this diagram with the we.
The two individuals now are no longer completely separate,
And you have that internal we that is being developed.
And when they're developing that we,
What goes on is couples tend to focus on their similarities.
And their differences will recede very far into the background.
And so what you have is you have things like.
I mean a silly thing like when my husband and I met I He said,
We were talking about something and I was talking about doing archery at a summer camp.
And he said,
Oh,
I love archery too.
Well,
The reality is that archery is not that big of a deal for either one of us.
But in that moment,
It felt like,
Oh,
We have something,
A place where we're similar.
It's amazing the number of things that people will focus on that can make them feel very,
Very connected.
The process of developing the we is part of normal,
Healthy couples development.
And also during this time as the bonding is being built.
Friends and family tend to get excluded.
And so many times you'll have somebody say about a friend,
They've just disappeared,
Or they don't care about me anymore because all they care about is this person that they just met.
And again,
This is part of a normal process.
Of developing a strong initial attachment and connection.
An attachment and connection that often leads to a decision to make a commitment.
Now,
Usually it's about when couples have been together for,
Let's say,
About two years.
Really clearly the differences begin to emerge.
And it is safer for the differences to emerge when there is a strong initial attachment or a strong initial bonding.
And so when the differences emerge,
You might hear things like,
Whoa,
He or she is not the person that I thought they were.
Or I didn't see that in the beginning.
My husband actually tells kind of a funny story about How?
When we met and I would go to visit him,
He lived in another town,
And when I would go to visit him,
He would always have somebody come and clean his apartment before I came.
And so when I would get there,
It looked like he was such a neat person.
And I was thinking to myself,
Wow,
I'm so glad that he is neat,
Because I like an uncluttered environment.
Well,
When he moved to California and we began to live together.
All of a sudden I found out that he wasn't so neat and that clutter was actually going to become a very significant issue in our relationship.
So as you see here in the diagram,
When the we has been formed,
Those individual eyes begin to separate some.
And there is a sense of anxiety that gets developed when people see the differences.
The anxiety might be things like,
Oh my gosh,
Is this the person for me?
Do we belong together?
Are we going to make it?
Because often they don't know how to deal with the differences and the differences are becoming much clearer.
And the person who may have been up on a really giant pedestal is being taken down and being brought back to more of what will reality be like being with this other person.
Now,
A goal of this stage is to keep the differences actually from driving the two of them apart.
And there are many,
Many things that.
Your clients will often need to learn in order to be able to work through their differences and not have the differences drive them apart.
When this is done well,
It provides a lot of opportunity for couples to work out how do we do things as a couple.
Again,
When it doesn't work out very well,
Then you get patterns.
That are going to be challenges and patterns that often bring them in to see a therapist or a coach.
The third stage of relationship is a stage of individual independent development.
And so you see in the diagram here,
The we has become very,
Very small,
And the individual eyes,
Again,
Are predominating.
Now at this stage,
If the couple has been able to build a healthy differentiation process,
It won't be so threatening.
But there are quite a few couples who have not built that differentiation process.
And so this stage becomes very,
Very threatening because it seems like I don't matter anymore.
He or she is just involved in their own life.
They don't pay attention to me.
And it can feel very,
Very isolating.
And a lot of times at this stage,
People will ask themselves.
Do we have a connection?
Do we matter to each other?
Or are we each going our separate ways?
And here is a representation of what this stage can look like.
If the individual identity is no longer threatening.
They touch back to we,
They explore themselves as individuals,
They come back together,
They move apart.
And it's an ongoing process,
Often one that goes on for many,
Many years.
And during this stage,
People are developing a sense of self-esteem.
Apart from the way the relationship is faring.
And of course,
If the relationship is doing well,
That is a really big support to what people may be doing in their careers or in their child rearing or in their hobbies.
So this can be a very,
Very powerful and positive stage,
Again,
When there is a base of the other two stages underneath it.
Now,
After that stage goes on for a period of time,
What you see is partners coming back together.
And even more back and forth patterns of intimacy.
And the we is growing.
The things that they're doing away from each other are becoming more and more enriching.
And so they move out into the world or into their individual development,
And then they come back together again and build on what they're doing out in the world.
And so you get a moving in and moving out,
But in a way that is not threatening.
And the final stage of relationship is one that we call either synergy or mutual interdependence.
And this is where one plus one,
The two individual eyes.
Are part of a much greater we.
And the couple is able to create this together.
And the beauty of couples in synergy is that when you are around them,
You feel good.
It feels great to be with couples where there is where you can have that felt sense that these two people love each other.
They're committed.
Many times they're doing something much bigger than themselves,
Sometimes together,
To bring something into the world that is very,
Very meaningful.
