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For many couples, it can be difficult to connect emotionally at times. The expression of emotion and the response to our spouse's emotion can lead to a sense of disconnection rather than connection.  Emotional intimacy can be difficult to cultivate especially if emotion was off-limits in our own family of origin experience. 

Join Dr. Steve and Lisa Call as they offer an insightful conversation about how couples can make a few subtle shifts in cultivating emotional intimacy in their relationship.

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When couples are apart and then return, it's common to experience conflict, hurt, and perhaps disappointment. Most often this is connected to different hopes and expectations in the return. An essential part of how couples return to one another well is connected to how well couples communicate while being apart.  
 
 Listen in as Dr. Steve and Lisa Call offer some helpful insight into how couples can navigate being apart and how to navigate the return to one another well. 

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The use of why naturally creates a sense of defensiveness, yet it can be a common phrase couples use with one another. Often the use of why occurs when we feel frustrated and when something occurs that we might not have expected.  

Listen in as Dr. Steve and Lisa Call offer Insight and awareness into how couples can rephrase the use of why in other ways that can lead to the desired connection we hope for. 

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"I'm sorry, but..." is a common phrase in marriage. Often it's a response to the pain and/or hurt we have caused. I'm sorry is an expression of sorrow, yet when we cause pain or hurt, we might quickly offer "I'm sorry, but..." as an attempt to hurry our spouse through the pain. What we crave though is tenderness.

 How might we navigate sorrow well?  Listen in as Dr. Steve and Lisa Call offer some insight and reflection into how we can navigate sorrow well in moments of pain and hurt.

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A common question couples have is this question: "But how do resolve it?" Especially in moments of conflict or tension. When a couple is in the midst of conflict, perhaps we can  imagine something other than resolution to be the goal. 

 Listen in as Dr. Steve and Lisa Call offer a thoughtful conversation to how couples can move toward understanding in the midst of conflict or difference rather than resolution.

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We are very excited to share our conversation with Christa Hardin, MA, the founder of Enneagram + Marriage (@enneagramandmarriage)  who has spent two decades studying, researching, and helping couples through the use of various marriage and family tools, including the Enneagram. 

Listen in to discover helpful tools and insights that help couples understand the value of the Enneagram in their marriage relationship! 

You can find more info about Christa on her website: enneagraminyourmarriage.com

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Bids for connection are an expression we offer our spouse to simply connect.  
Sometimes when we offer bids for connection, our spouse may respond in a way that communicates they would rather not participate in the bid or invite.  

What is the goal and/or hope in offering a bid for connection?  It communicates a desire to be with the other.  Listen in as Dr. Steve and Lisa Call have a thoughtful conversation about how we can communicate bids for connection well and how we can respond well to our spouse's bids for connection. 

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Sometimes spouses feel limited in expressing thoughts, ideas, and even emotions with one another. Part of the difficulty in doing so is the lack of relational safety. There are often embedded relational responses and patterns for many couples that can reinforce a lack of safety.  Join Dr. Steve and Lisa Call in a hopeful conversation in offering couples keys in cultivating relational safety with one another. 

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Every couple struggles at times with differences and marriage is a constant tension of navigating differences. We can have different thoughts, ideas, beliefs, and/or behavior. And differences in how couples live life together can create a sense of frustration.   Yet how might we honor and bless difference?  When couples have differences, what's the goal? What's the hope?  

Listen in as Dr. Steve and Lisa Call offer helpful ways to engage differences in your marriage that can create and cultivate understanding and connection. 

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Often in experiences of frustration, disappointment, irritation, and even conflict we have common and familiar relational responses. One of those internal/external responses is the phrase, "here we go again."

Join Dr. Steve and Lisa Call in a candid conversation around how couples can develop an awareness of what perpetuates "here we go again" and how we can move toward a deeper sense of what drives and fuels this familiar relational response and what helps us in those moments.